I vote for wealth and higher standard of living, plain and simple. We can afford to have more people not concentrating like hell on plain survival, as we had for the better part of the lifetime of homo sapiens.
I notice he hasn’t replied to any of the responses. This is why you shouldn’t feed the trolls: 20 intelligent responses to a senseless rant.
He hasn’t even posted since 12-10-02. 
Q.E.D., that type of troll is a minor nuisance. Other trolls have as their sole purpose to stir up trouble and get attention, so the more you feed them, the more misbehave.
I don’t think this guy qualifies as a troll. Just an opinionated person posting a rebuttal to a column, then forgetting we even exist.
QED. Are you talking about me? Who is “he” then? I ain’t no troll. You think I’m fishing for an argument? I apologize if I led you to believe so. Also, I registered in January, so I couldn’t have posted December 10, 2002, nor October 12, 2002.
I didn’t know that there were responses to my response. Shoot, I didn’t even remember responding to this. Apologies all around.
Anyway… [/hijack]
To BMalion:
I don’t have any proof, but I think it’s pretty well known that the population that has existed within the past 50 years or so (certainly the last 100) is equal to or greater to the entire population that has existed since the first human beings. Take a look at the population curve during the last 2000 years.
http://users.rcn.com/jkimball.ma.ultranet/BiologyPages/W/WorldBank.gif
And take a look at this:
http://www.nyu.edu/classes/adler/cosmos/How_Many.pdf
I don’t think it’s too much of a stretch to conclude that a larger population will mean more people will be working towards the advancement of knowledge and science. And since more people have seen what knowledge and science can give us, more of us have an interest in it. My proof is common sense. There is a greater percentage of people working on the advancement of science now (since the industrial revolution) than in the past. And we have a MUCH greater population.
That said, the reason we have a larger population (and why the higher wealth and status of living) is because of the industrial revolution. But that all happened because more and more people became involved in the advancement of the human race.
You may accept a qualification of IMHO if you must, but I would be suprised if you or many should disagree. I don’t think too many people 1000 years ago, or even 400 years ago really cared too much about the advancement of science. Sure they might have used it, but they had more important things to worry about than trying to figure out how to push the human species forward.
Ummm…no, prisoner, I wasn’t referring to you at all. I meant the OP. Apologies if you got the impression i meant you, though I’m not sure how you did. 
prisoner, you present an amusing misunderstanding. “Why are you calling me a troll? And I didn’t even post on the days you state.” Um, perhaps he didn’t mean you, then, huh? I see where the confusion came from - you were the last substantive post, and a couple of us asked you a question that didn’t get answered (at the time). But my response was predicated on the understanding the troll remark concerned the OP, not you.
Thanks for the followup post. Especially the links.
Here’s some food for thought, on the culmination of the acceleration of technological advancement:
Staring into the Singularity
http://www.sysopmind.com/singularity.html
The invention of the transistor in 1948 did indeed set off a revolution in electronics. Perhaps the UFO that allegedly crashed at Roswell in 1947 brought to us the transistor, and the Bell Laboratories thing is just a cover story?
Just in case there’s anyone out there who believes that ridiculous story, if it were possible to reverse-engineer transistors and reproduce them without already knowing the theory, then transistors would have been invented immediately after crystal radios, which work on the same fundamental principle.
Bardeen and Brattain produced their first transistor in 1947, not 1948, after having worked on the concept for eight years. 1948 was the year the patent was issued
The Road to the Transistor, by Jed Margolin should dispel any nonsense about how the transistor suddenly appeared out of nowhere from alien knowledge.