Asklemmy

Yeah, Trotsky vs. Stalin. You wrote Lenin, who you probably know was a predecessor to both of those two rivals, and who died of apparent natural causes related to old age shortly after the revolution.

Even if I would accept that estimation, in those two hundred years the lives of many humans are greatly impacted, which is for me all that matters in the end.

Oh absolutely! We're not totally powerless, just nearly. In some ways that's harder, because we still have to try if there are some things we can make better.

In real life, I do activism, and I've been a vegetarian for years. What this has changed is that I focus more on the quiet background side of activism, and I don't stress out about being super ambitious. If I had money, I'd do philanthropy. If I was born into an autocracy, I'd just have to settle for being kind to whoever I come across, and supporting the less-terrible side when, outside of my control, wartime or revolution comes. And sometimes, I also try and contribute to the discussion intellectually.

The same would apply if I had been born Charles Darwin. I'm not Darwin, though, and the only thing I control are my own actions. He's just a part of history, like everyone else in that era. Many argue about the free will of individuals, but large groups definitely have no free will. For example, advertising and political campaigning, major industries, are built on top of that fact.