Is our world getting better or worse?

Every day we hear about wars, crime, terrorism, natural disasters, poverty and new diseases. However, have you ever thought about the current condition of our world in comparison to what it was like 50 years ago? Has humanity made any progress?

Check what students from the English Literature Course have to say regarding this issue after making thorough research based on data and facts.


First, I thought the condition of the world was getting worse, because of how many terrible things we can think in comparison to the good ones, like pollution, gas emissions, delinquency, etc. After some research, I saw that not everything was bad or horrible and that it is getting better in a lot of aspects, such as health, safety, education, air pollution, and so many other aspects. That made me change my mind and accept that the world is actually getting better than worse. About the aspects shown in the presentation, education is something that caught my eye, since the amount of progress made during the past hundred years was high.

Before my research, I thought that the world was getting better by the years, specifically in social terms and freedom. And after my research I learned that as a world we get better not only in one aspect, but we also improve the literacy rate, quality of life, education, safety, human rights, etc. Now I know that the world is getting better, but obviously with new issues such as climate change, because, as I learned, the new solutions bring new problems.

My perspective about the world before the research we did was different. I had an idea that the world was getting worse, and I still think that. However, we have been improving a lot these years in some aspects. I think this idea of the world getting better or worse depends on the context we are and the topic we are talking about. For example, education or health in Africa is different than America. The purpose of the research was to get informed about the situation of our world now and the difference with the past.

The thing that caught my attention the most was how data showed the improvement of our world, how in some aspects the world is better and in others it is worse. It is interesting to do this research, it has improved my knowledge about the subject.  Lastly, it is important to support our opinion and information with facts, because that is the way we can talk with the truth and be confident with what we know.

What caught my attention the most was how a myriad of diseases that were endemic 50 or 80 years ago are no longer endemic today. This is because of all the vaccines that we have now and how the medicine and health has been improving in the last century. Supporting our opinion with facts is important because it’s proof that what we are saying is true.

Previous to the research I thought the world was getting worse because I just considered the social themes that are not solved, without considering the advances that the world has made in aspects such as wars or health that are critical for a good quality of life. After my research I think that the world is getting better. I think that the world is always solving the previous problems and is always a process of progress situation, so statistically the world will always be better in total of the good and bad situations.