We could ask a thousand questions in a world of uncertainty, but let us frame just two: Where is the world really heading? Does man feel better in it than in days gone by, or not? To give the two-word answer with laconic brevity: down and no.
Down
Interestingly, science and the traditional religious world view foretell a similar end for the world. At the planetary level, the Sun, as it turns into a red giant, will consume the Earth together with the life upon it, while at the cosmic level the great collapse will put an end to all manifestation. Compared with natural science's picture of annihilation, the religious world view holds out little more promise. Christian eschatology compounds the already cheerless story of the world's annihilation with a further, threatening moral burden, the Last Judgement, softened only a little by the hoped-for possibility of salvation. In plain words, by the account of science and theology alike, this world is heading towards its end, because both think in terms of linear time. The Indian tradition, which otherwise thinks in cycles, illustrates this tendency towards decay with an apt image: time, like a giant serpent, threatens to swallow the world, with past and future as the jaws of this fearsome creature.
No
Whether we feel better than in days gone by is a hard question to answer. This is not merely about well-being, though even that is no simple thing to measure. Attempts are made to measure contentment in relation to income, security of employment and livelihood, expectations and many other human factors, with modest success. It is enough for us to put the question to two segments of humanity. Let one segment be, say, a hundred people, and the other 3.6 billion. Today the wealth of the hundred richest people on Earth equals the combined material means of the poorest 3.6 billion. And I venture to say that one whose daily share is only a handful of rice and a few sips of water is not necessarily more discontented than one who is already bored even with truffles.
Poor is not he who has little, but he who longs for much.
Metaphysically, man does not feel good. Whoever feels good does not think metaphysically. And this is not a judgement but a statement of fact. Until man succeeds in returning to the primordial harmony, he can only feel bad. Granted, so many people, so many ways of answering the banal question: How are you? Despite the inherent limits of material existence, many answer favourably: fine, better and better, not too bad…
Most people, in the course of their lives, struggle not with the problem of cosmic loneliness, the ontological absurdity of existence or the near-impossibility of catching illusion in the act, but with far more prosaic conditions. Man may feel good out of ignorance, too, but beyond a certain spiritual level contentment prevails once more, now in its higher octave. Once, when a master came home from a pilgrimage, his disciples pressed him: How did you feel at the holy places? Just as anywhere else – came the laconic reply, which not only disarmed the polite yet slightly silly curiosity but also revealed a deep realisation. But however contented, say, a yogi or a saint may be, compared with how happy he could be in fullness, surely even he is discontented.