I found it difficult to accept much of what I read, and several claims are not supported by citations. Fears of SARS and Ebola can be (and were) exaggerated, but H.I.V./AIDS should remind us that the danger from modern plagues is real enough.Īs to rising living standards, again the long-term case is right, but many of those left behind in today’s America have good reason to challenge Easterbrook’s rosy account of contemporary middle-class prosperity. Temporary, true (life expectancy has recently been going up), yet there is nothing temporary about 35 million deaths. But it is not true that the trends “are smooth and almost uninterrupted: Graphs look like an escalator rising at a 45-degree angle.” Easterbrook mentions H.I.V./AIDS only to say that life expectancy did not “decline much during wars or health alarms such as the AIDS spread.” AIDS has been responsible so far for the deaths of around 35 million people, and it brought life expectancy down in around 20 African countries, including South Africa (10 years), Botswana and Swaziland (14 years each). Life expectancy indeed shows upward trends worldwide. There is no contradiction between having the best possible life and living on the edge of a precipice. I believe that this is more than half right, but I think Macmillan applies more than Grey does not we are doing very well, but the lamps are flickering. He argues that fixes are available and not too hard to attain. Gregg Easterbrook’s “It’s Better Than It Looks” is a tour of how much better life is today - we live longer, we are richer, we are less subject to violence, we are more democratic - as well as a guide to dealing with the threats that might bring us down. People often react with astonishment and disbelief when told how well we are all doing. The news media thrive on fast-moving disasters, while slow-moving improvements are neither new nor news. We hear more and we worry more about the threats - climate change, authoritarianism, rising inequality - than we recognize our good fortune. In 1957, the British prime minister, Harold Macmillan, marked the end of postwar gloom by declaring that “most of our people have never had it so good.” Forty-three years earlier, in 1914, another British statesman, Foreign Secretary Sir Edward Grey, presciently remarked, “The lamps are going out all over Europe we shall not see them lit again in our lifetime.” Today, are we in a Macmillan moment, or a Grey moment? |a Two ways of looking at life - Learning to be helpless - Explaining misfortune - Ultimate pessimism - How you think, how you feel - Success at work - Children and parents: the origins of optimism - School - Sports - Health - Politics, religion, and culture: a new psychohistory - The optimistic life - Helping your child escape pessimism - The optimistic organization - Flexible optimism. |a Includes bibliographical references (pages -303) and index. |a DLC |b eng |c DLC |d XDM |d NLM |d COM Seligman's principles of reasoned, flexible optimism will help you: - Attain maximum personal achievement - Avoid feelings of helplessness and depression - Develop a hopeful, healthy outlook More powerful and pragmatic than a simple program of positive thinking, Dr. The Science of Personal Control Based on years of rigorous research, Learned Optimism examines the importance of "explanatory style" - the way in which we explain our problems and setbacks to ourselves - and offers a series of exercises that will help you target unhealthy habits of pessimistic thinking and bring them under your control. Martin Seligman, a pioneer in cognitive psychology and motivational research, tells you how to identify your own self-defeating thought patterns - and how to harness the powers of your conscious mind to break those patterns. ARE YOU HOLDING YOURSELF BACK? Without knowing it, most of us impose limits on our achievement and our happiness by approaching life's problems and challenges with unnecessary pessimism.
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