[a_humean]

They are just saying that if you assume this following:

* There is a rough fixed % of people that are capable of doing interesting things and maybe useful things

* There are minimum levels of resources, time, and comfort that enables you to do interesting things

* The current population that enjoys those resources isn't actually that different from the population at large in terms of that %

Assuming all of that, if you increased the welfare of the entire population to that minimum level (would be nice to do this anyway) then the absolute number of people doing interesting and maybe useful things would increase. I would say that most of human history and esp the past few hundred years has probably proven that to be true.

It is pretty clear from the photos that this young man is very fortunate to have well off and supportive parents. Very few working age adults in full time employment could afford the things shown in those photos let alone someone still in education.

[xw3098]

You should read this shorty story:

https://www.abelard.org/asimov.php

[fuzzfactor]

Excellent choice.

Asimov in the 1950's was quite a visionary. I always liked this.

But I never heard him referred to as "shorty" before ;)

Don't want to be a spoiler but in his visions for an increasingly advanced technological future once the 21st century would arrive, here the dystopian elements that had unfortunately accrued had to be fed to an increasingly conformist society as a utopia instead. No surprise considering the attitude during the Cold War. While the outliers having the true creative potential were subjected to an artificially dystopian environment by comparison, from which only the most-ambitious few would have to break out of on their own accord, against all odds, motivated only by their own committment, to take their rightful place as professionals.

Didn't have to wait until the 65th century to make significant progress in this direction.

>It is pretty clear from the photos that this young man is very fortunate to have well off and supportive parents.

Good observation, and maybe that's about all that's going to be having such an early start for some time to come now. But we don't need photos to be well aware he is vastly outnumbered by tons of more fortunate youngsters who have accomplished absolutely nothing at that age, if not perpetrated destructive efforts instead. Photos of their "accomplishments" outnumber this type of posting a million to one.