I do think your comment is bringing up valid questions/points.

One thing that worries me about the current state of things is scale and speed. Modern technology, markets, communication systems and supply chains make it possible for things to go catastrophically wrong very quickly for a massive number of people.

I think this is somewhat unique to the current era.

I still don’t buy into the belief that we’re absolutely witnessing a collapse. Studying history shows that things have been far worse (politically, socially geopolitically, etc) and we’ve come out the other side numerous times.

So I think “ups and downs” is probably the right way to look at this. I do worry about the impact of modern technology on this equation.

It’s all cycles within cycles, hopefully. If you study dynamic systems then you realize it’s cycles of good and bad, and within those cycles more smaller cycles of ephemeral good and bad.