Panglossian beer commercial

[sawyl]

Thanks to Dan Dennett, I now have a name for my outlook on life: Panglossian pessimism. Dennett summarises the view in a rather amusing footnote in Darwin's Dangerous Idea:

The Panglossian pessimist says, "Isn't it a shame that this is, after all, the best of all possible worlds!" Imagine a beer commercial: As the sun sets over thee mountains, one of the hunks lounging around the campfire intones, "It doesn't get any better than this!"—at which point his beautiful companion bursts into tears: "Oh no! Is that really true?" It wouldn't sell much beer.

If you haven't already read it, I seriously recommend Darwin's Dangerous Idea. Any book that manages to mention both the British Seagull outboard and Borges' fantastic Library of Babel fully deserves the moniker, tour-de-force. Or at least it does to me.