The future is brighter than you think

By Peter Diamandis, Special to CNN 

(CNN) -- I've been talking to corporate groups a lot lately about the idea that the future is going to be better than many of us think -- that we will live in a world of abundance made possible by new technology. Repeatedly, I'm thanked by the audiences for giving them a positive outlook.
People are getting tired of doom and gloom conversations that persist through much of mainstream America. It's no wonder, given that the world presented to us by the media 24 hours per day, seven days a week is a rather distorted view of reality; it's focused predominantly on the negative news and doesn't represent anything like a balanced view.
Here are some of the things that aren't getting attention:
I'll start with poverty, which has declined more in the past 50 years than the previous 500. Over the last 50 years, in fact, even while the Earth's population has doubled, the average per capita income globally (adjusted for inflation) has more than tripled.
We're not just richer than ever, we're healthier as well. During the past century, maternal mortality has decreased by 90%, child mortality has decreased by 99%, while the length of the average human life has more than doubled. 

As Steven Pinker has lately made clear in his new book, "The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined," since the middle ages, violence on Earth has been in constant decline. Homicide rates are as much as a hundredfold less than they were when they peaked 500 ago. So we're not only healthier, we're safer as well. 

http://edition.cnn.com/2012/05/06/opinion/diamandis-abundance-innovation/index.html?hpt=hp_c2