Three wild speculations from amateur quantitative macrohistory

Abstract

The article speculates on how long-term macro-historical trends in various dimensions of human well-being reveal two main drivers: productivity and political freedom. The author analyzes several metrics, including life expectancy, GDP per capita, energy capture, war-making capacity, and political freedom, and finds that the industrial revolution was a turning point in human history, as it dramatically improved these indicators. The author then speculates that future progress depends on continuing gains in productivity and political freedom, except that existential risk due to nuclear weapons has become a major concern. – AI-generated abstract.