Malthus had quite accurately foretold the one phenomenon [population explosion], but had missed the other altogether [productivity increases]. Why? Because of the systematic pessimistic bias to which prophecy is prone. . . . They all thought they were making sober predictions based on the best knowledge that was available to them. In reality they were all allowing themselves to be misled by the ineluctable fact of the human condition that we do not yet know what we have not yet discovered.
-David Deutsch, The Beginning of Infinity
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