Is the glass empty or is it half full.    It is easy to find fault with society of today.   However, health and medicine keep improoving.    People are living longer than every before.   My father was told he has two years to live about 5 years ago.    He is still going strong.   20 years ago he would have been dead by this time.

Polution is bad, but we are far more concerned about it that ever.   Have you ever looked at plants and factories 100 years ago or what they dumped into the river.   I think we are making progress.

Diseases used to wipe out entire populations.   Today they are mainly controlled.   Take a pill and never get chicken pox or measles.

On a macro sense, we all very helpless.   It is hard to believe you can make a difference.   On a micro sense, I believe individual people make a great difference.    I work for a large utility, but have the coolest job in the company.   I teach people and low income groups how to save money on their bill, which in turn saves energy, which in turn helps the environment.   I train all the case managers for THAW (the heat and warmth fund) Family independence agency, legal aid, society for the aged, etc. and do about 20-50 consumer presentations a year.   After one presentation, a woman came up to me and said that if everyone would just follow one of my suggestions, and just saved 5% of their energy use, what effect that would have on the country.   It was a profound thought that stayed with me.

Is is easy to be part of the solution.   It is far harder to realize that what you do makes a difference.