Over the last 500 years, there has been an incremental improvement over time. However, most of the progress is about what does not happen. It’s about all the things that could have happened that didn’t happen today. It’s about a two-year-old child who did not die of smallpox. However, these stories don't make the headlines.

Steven Pinker, the cognitive psychologist and bestselling author of upbeat books about human progress, shows that life, health, prosperity, safety, peace, knowledge, and happiness are on the rise, not just in the West but worldwide. According to Pinker, “People tend to approach challenges in one of two ways—as problem-solving or as conflict.”

So, Why are so many people pessimistic?

Bad things happen faster than good things. Good things take time.

The causes of progress, Pinker posted, are reason, science, and humanism. “When people deploy their brainpower to try to make their fellows better off … then you can see increased human well-being. And that’s what we call progress.”