---
title: "Progress"
chunk: 4/7
source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progress"
category: "reference"
tags: "science, encyclopedia"
date_saved: "2026-05-05T03:58:28.660757+00:00"
instance: "kb-cron"
---

This was termed the "Opening of China" in the West, and more broadly encompasses the reform and opening up. Among environmentalists, there is a continuum between two opposing poles. The one pole is optimistic, progressive, and business-oriented, and endorses the classic idea of progress. For example, bright green environmentalism endorses the idea that new designs, social innovations and green technologies can solve critical environmental challenges. The other is pessimistic in respect of technological solutions, warning of impending global crisis (through climate change or peak oil, for example) and tends to reject the very idea of modernity and the myth of progress that is so central to modernization thinking. Similarly, Kirkpatrick Sale, wrote about progress as a myth benefiting the few, and a pending environmental doomsday for everyone. An example is the philosophy of Deep Ecology.