That's actually probably not true. I'm not a historian, but one interesting thing I've learned from reading lots of history is the different attitudes different societies had about the past/future.

As far as I know, it's only really since the enlightenment/industrial revolution, that people feel like the future is going to be better. The idea that the past was the golden age, where Humans were much more advanced, knew more, Had better technology, etc, seems to be the common position in history.

Im not sure about the feeling that society was"hungry" ala the article, but I suspect that feeling is connected.

And it was probably true for most of them. The stakes for humanity keep rising, so "now" is usually the most important time in history.

If the stakes keep on rising, how high would they be 50 years from now? And in 200? 2000?

How high were the stakes 300 years ago? Should we think people living in 1720 didn't have it that bad compared to now? Will people in the future look at now and think the same?

I mean stakes have been pretty high when Mongolians were invading Europe and China, when Hitler was invading everywhere, etc etc.

Or when the Spanish vini vidi vicied the Americas.

But you could argue too that post nuclear has been continually the highest stakes by far.