The air and surface waters of the United States are a lot cleaner in 2014 than they were in 1970. Flying into LA forty years ago, you could see (and smell) the smog layer at least 50 miles out. LA air is pretty breathable most days. Same basic story for NYC, which has some brilliant blue skies on a fairly regular basis.

Tetra ethyl lead is (almost) out of gasoline in the USA, the rest of the industrialized nations followed , and the concentration lead in our tissues is way down. Which is a very big deal. Watch last week's Cosmos Episode for the whole story.

There are a lot fewer suds in my boyhood streams, the phosphates are out of household detergents. But, a lot of those streams are channelized now, and species diversity is way down. The landscape I grew up in is much more fragmented, from commercial and residential development, under construction, in use, and frequently abandoned.

I could go on, there is, some real progress, but I can't help thinking what might have been. Long term, I'm worried. As a species, I think we are nearing carrying capacity and perilously close to a global population crash sometime late in this century, or the next. Not extinction mind you, more like another Dark Age, brought on by resource depletion aggravated by climate change. Which most Americans don't take seriously. There is a lot of whistling past the graveyard.

We had the resources to put things right relatively easy back in the 70s. We could have been a predominately renewable resource based society by now. We squandered that prospect on war, big cars, big houses.

Back in 1970s or so, the counter culture used the phrase "smart but not wise" to characterize mainstream thinking near the end game phase of the industrial revolution. It was a "fair cop" IMHO.

Hippies had a lot of sound big ideas (plus a lot of stupid big ideas best forgotten). Among the pearls, peace is better than war. Maximizing profits doesn't necessarily optimize happiness, personally or collectively. Being happy and or sensual isn't inherently sinful.

Still, implementation was never the counter culture's strong suit. As a movement, it was "Wise, but not smart." I think that's a fair cop too.