Well, I see it the way that everyone is evil, me, you, everyone. It just depends on how evil you really are. There's you and me (not very evil) and there's people like Racists who are a lot more evil.
I think humans (like all animals) are fundamentally flawed for several reasons. Animals, including us, are programmed to procreate and consume and (for some species) construct things. It's all about survival and thriving. All animals all have a general "I got mine, fuck you" mindset.
We despise cancer for its brainless infinite growth programming...when our operational model is hardly different.
In short, I think we're all a bunch of selfish idiots competing against each other and other life forms. There is no greater purpose or benevolent spirit watching, much less cheering us on. Where there is life, it's just reproducing and eating and dying and repeating that cycle for as long as the local environment allows.
So no, I don't think the good in humankind will prevail. There's evidence all around that goodness is losing the battle to greed and other self-destructive tendencies. Things which are hard-wired in the human animal. Don't look up!
Is that an excuse to not even try? No, I don't think so. I think we are still morally and ethically obligated to always strive to do better and fight against that brainless animal programming. Even if goodness ultimately fails, it can greatly reduce suffering along the way. And perhaps keep the concept of a new "enlightenment" alive long enough that we do eventually figure out a way to break out of that animal programming and build some kind of egalitarian utopia. Because there is also evidence all around us of people performing selfless acts of self-sacrifice to help others.
I think the chances are very, very slim of that utopia ever happening. Because quite frankly, evil is like a force of nature and goodness is like a guy with a shovel and a plan. But I do think utopia is theoretically possible.
In short, I think it goodness will not prevail, but I would love to be dead wrong about this. I hope goodness wins.
Some good and encouraging stats in there. Most of which do little to undermine my position about fundamental human nature.
Article last updated in 2018. The war in Ukraine, genocide in Gaza, rising inflation, food and petroleum shortages, global warming, mass extinction of myriad species, and ascending fascism are all pulling these graphs back towards regression to the mean, I'm afraid.
The media tends to overstate these things on the crime and despair side, I will quickly admit that. But there's plenty of wishful thinking and denial coming from psychologists and sociologists (and often-cited airport books) on the other side.
Pinker and others in his camp were/are arguing that giving more power to the state helps mitigate and even reverse many of these social issues. I agree with them on this. But, the staristics and context of the underlying data is a bit dubious.
I don't mean to say this to sound like a pessimist (in fact, humans have been shown to be wonderful on an individual level), but I have low faith/regards to "humankind" as an entirety having their appreciable side endure. I define this similar to what Aristotle would say is the tripartite soul, where balance of thought is prioritized and people see passions for what they are, but in my experience, this couldn't be further from how most people act. I've seen families and even cultures befallen because those contributing to their demise are so accustomed to each other and their own pre-existing customs that "due process" becomes a memory, perhaps a beforethought to a certain question. Even as one might remind us how crude and imperfect the human being is as a construct, the same people often choose to wear it, demonstrating that "human nature", which is a term we use to excuse a myriad of things, is worse than any other form of neurodivergence I have come across, which in a poetic sense may be why my closest associates are outside the neurotypical realm. In such a dog eats dog world, I'd be regretfully glad to be eaten.
For that to happen, the good ones would need to be bad enough to shoot the really bad ones in the face.
We should have been blowing up pipelines and sinking mega yachts for decades by now.
But this civilization is just too damn polite to do more than kindly ask the parasites among us to please stop killing us before they don't have anything left to eat.
If things get better, if will be after we nearly go extinct.
And even after that, there will be some who take actions that risk the annihilation of us all, rather than have lass then others.
Yup, any catastrophe is a reset. But the problems in us remain. The fundamental shifts aren't learned. I gives weight to that idea of filters of civilizations. We can delay them, but not avoid them
Sadly, no. I think most people are apathetic about anything that does not immediately and directly impact themselves. Evil doesn't need much more than that to thrive. Meanwhile, good requires active participation, selflessness, and continual vigilance to thrive.
Judging by the number of people who cannot literally lift a finger to make roads a safer place through the use of turn signals, I don't hold much hope for humankind, as a whole, to put in the continual effort to quash "evil".
I'm an optimist, but I think so. The overall trend in humanity's history is things are getting better. There are less wars, crime, hunger, disease, etc. There have been missteps and steps backwards of course, but overall humanity has been able to overcome major obstacles and I think that will continue.
It may be hard to see right now because there are so many crises we are facing, but it's always been that way, people are just more informed now.
... and all that variations of noblesse oblige principles out there.
with that out of the way:
If the most prevalent form of strength is money, like capitalism, then the way to earn it must be through greed.
...the good in humankind...
with greed, no. excessive greed is not good.
... can prevail
especially the prevail part. There's a few notably strong people not swayed by greed, but it can only go that far. Greed is a really strong force for both incentive and corruption.
I certainly think so. We have the extremes always, but on the whole, we seem to be moving in the direction of progress, fewer wars, more conservation, better equality, etc. This stuff just takes time.
Everytime I look to my left and right and the people surrounding me, I come to the conclusion that most people are nice and good. It doesn't look that way if I'm reading the news, however. I think most people are in fact good and the media coverage is skewed. But we definitely need to defend our world from the assholes. It's a constant struggle to prevail.