People in the country with the shortest life span today (Sierra Leone) live longer than an American born in 1882 could expect

From Why today is the best time to live in human history by Christopher Woolf. In the modern era it is so easy to lose perspective about just how unique and distinctive are modern times in virtually all ways. We live longer, healthier, richer, more productive lives than even a generation ago. And not by small increments. Woolf has some good examples of just how far we have come.

Yes, it would have been great to hear Mozart playing live. Or maybe watch Shakespeare putting on a show. But then you've got to remember, Mozart croaked at 31, and Shakespeare shuffled off this mortal coil at just 52.

The fact is, until recently, life for most people was nasty, brutish, and above all — short.

The causes are pretty obvious: bad food, bad hygiene, bad toilet habits, and almost no understanding of infectious disease. Thank goodness for antibiotics, vaccines and modern sanitation. Sewage systems, by the way, were introduced in the 19th century, just about the same time bureaucrats started collecting big data on births and deaths.

And their stats are pretty grim. About one in four children born in America or England in the 1860s would die before their 5th birthday. And that was nationally. In crowded cities like Liverpool, in England, that figure could reach 50 percent.

Adults fared better, but even in the prime of life — in your 20s and 30s — you could expect to attend the funerals of 1 percent of people the same age as you — every year. Nowadays, for Americans, that rate is 10 times lower. And it's not just in the US and Britain that things are better.

It's everywhere.

Even in war-torn Syria, life expectancy today is actually better than in Victorian England. And even in the deadliest country on earth today — Sierra Leone — you're going to live longer than the average American born in the same year as FDR (1882.)