It may appear that right now, a lot of things are going the wrong way simultaneously and that that somehow is an unique point in history. But it's not. Several large-scale events with potentially horrific outcomes have happened simultaneously for centuries. There were plague epidemics during the Thirty-Years War. Conflicts in faraway lands did influence trade at home. Political turmoil happened during economic collapse. Animals went extinct in the medieval age, at some point we (Europeans) managed to essentially raze most of our forests, continent-wide, for construction and shipbuilding (just ask Iceland...). This is the human normal. Hell, for decades, we stared death in it's nuclear eye constantly.
What is different today: You can now watch all of these events unfold in real-time, and have journalists who no longer are out to tell stories, but to foster your fear so that you create more ad clicks.
But fear and dread are bad advisors. Let's not buy into them, and see the problems as what they are: challenges to solve. Because, just like any of the crisis' of the past, if we don't solve them, they will blow up in our faces.
The idea of “putting information in people's hands” was seen as a net good due to the pattern starting from the printing press in the west. However the source of information was still controlled by the elites. This mostly creates problems but in the case of the sciences, it was beneficial. Then we created a medium where even the source was a free-for-all and the pattern just collapsed. The lowest energy state of the system hinges on inherent biases and not on the Truth with a capital T.
> Let's not buy into them, and see the problems as what they are: challenges to solve. Because, just like any of the crisis' of the past, if we don't solve them, they will blow up in our faces.
Unfortunately, without fear and the resulting public pressure, nothing will change. That used to be what drove change in the past: scientists raised the alarm, activists followed up, politicians acted. When acid rain was an issue, politicians regulated sulfur content of fuel. When the ozone layer got a giant hole, they regulated CFC gas production and usage (by almost completely banning both). When species got threatened, they got under special protection statutes, some of which more-or-less globally banned trade of them (e.g. ivory, whale and dolphin products).
Today? Scientists have raised alarm about a lot of the issues I listed. Even the rise of Trumpian authoritarianism, the threat of Putin invading Ukraine or Putin using gas dependency as a weapon against Europe was foretold. But politicians openly sharted on these predictions, they did nothing at all to prepare, and as a result societies were caught pants down. Even on this very forum we're discussing on, people are regularly acting like COVID isn't a crisis or that following libertarian "free speech" interpretations is harmless and won't lead to problems despite evidence to the contrary being available just one Google search away.
Science denialism has become commonplace, and I think this is what depresses me the most about our future. We have so many tools, almost every person on this planet has access to the entire knowledge of humanity in their pants pocket, and yet so many people refuse to do so for ideology, religion or out of simple foolishness and arrogance.
You are describing a time period that spans about 50-70 years, in which alarmism led to some outcomes (or actions which coincided with positive outcomes). This reactive type of fear -> public pressure -> change politics is not the historical norm. And still, mankind did not die off before "science advisors" became a thing.
Wielding fear as a political tool can only end in ruin of the free political system - ultimately, there is no qualitative difference between invoking fear of climate change or fear of immigrants, it creates a split in the populus: those who will subscribe to the panic, and those who think the panikers are irrational. Such splits, we have seen in the past, will lead to political divides, and ultimately, if civil society cannot mend them, to civil-war-style uprising and the end of free societies. We are seeing this all around the world right now, but most prominently in the US and the UK.
At the same time: once fear has been normalised, people will buy into snake oil, like arming themselves, or a massive upbuilt of CCTVs until privacy is gone, or accepting the TSA as a necessary evil, or submitting themselves to curfews, or abandoning social contacts because travelling cross-country to their loved ones is ecologically unsound. A fearful society is a society that falls prey to anyone who promises them safety - and those rarely stay democratic leaders.
We would do good not to consider "scientists" as the high-priests of a new religion with a infallible dogma: "The science says X" is a religious statement of belief, when science should be "we have this theory, this is the data that supports it, but we may be wrong". Whenever I do see scientists in the media today, they do no longer seem to see themselves as explorers of knowledge or professional doubters, they see themselves as the ultimate beacon of truth. That is dangerous, it leads to arrogance both in them as well in the part of the populus that agrees with them. As a reaction to that, it is no wonder anti-science sentiments rises.
> and yet so many people refuse to do so for ideology, religion or out of simple foolishness and arrogance.
Agreed, but still: those in charge did something to fight the crises in the past whereas today those in charge in the best case sit on their hands and do nothing, or in the worst case actively make things worse (e.g. Bolsonaro permitting farmers to blaze away the Amazon rainforest) - and those in power to stop the latter also don't do anything.
Where are, for example, sanctions against Brazilian products like beef that are made on razed rainforest lands? Where are actually impactful sanctions against China? Where are deliveries of MBTs to Ukraine to help drive out Russia? Where are sanctions against Qatar for bribing FIFA and letting thousands of people die in building the WC stadiums? Where is material support for the protesters in Iran fighting against a murderous regime?
Your major misconception is that what you consider good and right aligns with what is politically convenient.
As a nation state, you only have that much political influence, both in the world as well as within your borders, and you will soon find yourself in trouble when people can't afford to eat anymore, or there are no more goods imported from China, or when Qatar gets cranky, or Iran for that matter.
As for Ukraine: The west has no interest in a quick end of the russoukrainian war. It's a perfect testing ground, why stop the fun when you can sell everyone in the neighbourhood so many weapons with the Russian bogeyman getting beaten up with western technology in full view? This conflict will be perpetuated as much as possible, at least another year, after all, Ukrainians do not vote in US elections, but Lockheed Martin engineers do. War is good for business. We all know that, but we like to conveniently forget about that, because our own wallets are closer to our hearts than some kid dying in a trench on the other side of the globe - and that has been true since forever.
What is different today: You can now watch all of these events unfold in real-time, and have journalists who no longer are out to tell stories, but to foster your fear so that you create more ad clicks.
But fear and dread are bad advisors. Let's not buy into them, and see the problems as what they are: challenges to solve. Because, just like any of the crisis' of the past, if we don't solve them, they will blow up in our faces.