Today, people are living in an age of information and technology explosion. Telecommunications and computers have led to the ability to access literally billions of pages of information on virtually any subject without ever even leaving your own home. This information explosion has led to a chronic condition of information overload. It would appear on the surface that our problems have been made much more complex and challenging because of our increased knowledge and experience. However, taking a broad overview of the situation, it becomes apparent that when placed into context, human beings over the centuries have faced equally challenging problems with similar complexity.

From the beginning of time, mankind has been faced with problems. The earliest problems were focused simply on the act of survival, such as how to gather enough food to live and how to build a shelter that would keep them safe from the elements. Although these problems seem quite simple to solve for most of the world’s population today, at that time the state of technology and knowledge was not so advanced. Of course, looking back with hindsight from today’s perspective, one can say that the problems of today are much more complex and challenging. But to a civilization that had not yet discovered fire or the wheel, the problem of just surviving was as difficult for them as are any of the problems facing humans today.

Similarly, the problems throughout the ages up to today have continued to focus on survival, but with more of an emphasis on the quality of life rather than merely with just staying alive. As people learned how to build proper shelters and to grow and raise their own food, they began to want better shelter and more varieties of food. Jealousies arose between those that had more and those that had less, creating even more problems. The complexity of a society’s difficulties seems to increase in direct proportion to their level of knowledge and experience. As technologies became more developed and complex, so did the intricacies of the society’s problems. Rather than solving all of a civilization’s problems, increasing knowledge and experience actually added to those problems.

Additionally, it is axiomatic that the people that are alive today believe that their own problems are much greater than those of civilizations past. Overpopulation, the threat of AIDS, pollution of the environment and continued war in many parts of the world seem to be insurmountable problems that are unique to today’s society. Certainly our ancestors did not have to worry about privacy on the Internet or suicide hijackers slamming an airplane into a heavily populated city, nor did they have to worry about nuclear war or biological weapons being unleashed upon a city. But it doesn’t take additional knowledge or experience to understand that to those past societies, their problems seemed at the time to be equally complex and challenging.

To summarize the issue, throughout human civilization, mankind has faced problems that seemed insurmountable at the time. Problems throughout history have become more complex as human knowledge has become more complex. Increased technology has led to continuously more difficult problems while at the same time providing better tools to solve these problems. When taking the state of technology at the time into consideration, it is apparent that the problems of our predecessor’s were either equally or possibly even more challenging and complex than the problems that we face in today’s world. It does not require additional human knowledge and experience to realize that the view that our problems are more difficult is based on our own paradigm rather than the reality of the situation.

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参考译文

人们如果认为他们所面临的问题比他们的前人所面临过的问题更为复杂，更具挑战性，那么这是大错特错的。这种虚幻的认识会随着知识和经验的增加而被驱散。

今日，人们生活在信息和技术爆炸时代。电信和计算机使人们不离开房间就能够获得关于任何学科的数亿页的信息。这一信息爆炸已导致了一种长期的信息过剩状态。表面看来，我们的问题由于知识和经验的增加反而变得更加复杂，更具挑战性。然而，从广义上看待这情况，显而易见，当置于大背景中时，人类几百年来一直面临着同样复杂的，同样具有挑战性的问题。

人类从一开始起，就面临着种种问题。最早的问题集中在生存上，即如何积攒足够的食物以维持生命，如何建造一个住所能够抵挡风雨。尽管对于今天世界上大多数人来说这是非常简单的问题，但在那时技术和知识尚未达到如此进步。当然，如果我们以今天的眼光事后聪明地回头看，可以说今天的问题复杂得多，棘手得多。但是对于一个尚未发现火或轮子的文明社会来说，仅仅生存的问题已是与我们今天所面对的任何问题同等困难了。

同样，千百年来的问题仍然集中在生存上，但今天更强调的是生活质量而不是仅仅活着。随着人们学会如何建造合适的住所以及如何播种庄稼，他们开始想得到更好的住所，吃品种更多的食物。富裕者与贫困者之间产生了妒忌，从而生出更多的问题。一个社会中各种困难所能达到的复杂性，似乎与知识和经验水平成正比地增加。　知识和经验的增加，不但没有解决一个文明社会的所有问题，反而使那些问题节外生枝。

此外，今天活着的人们认为他们的问题比前人所面临的问题大得多，这是不言自明的。人口爆炸，爱滋病，环境污染，世界上许多地方连绵不断的战争，似乎成了今天的社会独有的不可解决的问题。当然，我们的祖先不需担心网络上刺探隐私，也不必担心自杀性劫机犯驾机撞入人口稠密的城市，更不必担心核战争或生物武器投向某座城池。然而，不需要更多的知识和经验我们也能认识到，对于过去的社会群体，他们的问题当时似乎是同样地复杂和棘手。

总而言之，纵观人类历史，人类在各个时期都面临着似乎难以克服的问题。随着人类的知识变得更加复杂，问题也相应地变得更加复杂。不断增加的技术不断导致更难的问题，但同时也为解决这些问题提供了更好的方法。考虑到当时的技术状况，显然我们祖先的问题比起我们今天所面对的问题或者是同样的复杂和棘手，或者是更加复杂和棘手。不需要更多的人类知识和经验我们就能认识到，认为我们的问题更为困难的观点是基于我们自已的范式，而不是基于具体的现实。