Progress, yes for sure. But it's also good to realize it works in cycles.
- planetary orbital wobbles have always induced periodic climate changes like ice ages etc. David Siegel tries to put what's happing today into that perspective. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=76Ln3Ou6jnc Good to keep in mind that climate disruption have ended more civilizations than wars.
- Ray Dalio shows societal development also operates in growth and decline cycles. Something we can also see reflected in these graphs on societal discontent
- and far more worrying is the fact that our entire global system today is running on a cheap and once abundant fuel that is now ending. 8bln people, soon 10bln all depending on it and with no credible alternative. https://escholarship.org/uc/item/9js5291m
So a invetible thermodynamical death and social disruption is awaiting many many societies. An evolutionary keyhole moment in which, my guess, an extremely effective social governance is going to prove pivotal.
If democratic nations want to survive they will have to evolve fast, like towards systemic consensus and an Economy for the Common Good, or devolve into the totalitarianism Huxley predicted in 1958. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ASWhhGLJHkc
