The quote was from the Communist Manifesto. It was published in 1848. The critics were Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Perhaps the ironic, critical attitude of our world is not all that new. 

The quote continues, however: "All that is solid melts into air," Marx and Engels observe, "and men at last are forced to face with sober sense the real conditions of their lives and their relations with their fellow men." This last bit may be what distinguished our world from Marx and Engels' world. Marx and many others in his day believed that in the chaotic collapse of the old world, a new, clearer, more scientific understanding of things would emerge. My experience is that few young people today share that confidence; few feel that the truth will emerge out from under the constant change. 

What do you think?