With how fast we are able to communicate, I'd say it's likely to happen faster this time around. When the emperor does something that fucks over the populace, they can hear about it within minutes. During Roman times it could have taken months.
Is it? I always thought lower life expectancies were dragged down by infant mortality. Basically if you survive the crib you'd likely live into your 70s.
The problem is if the other person doesn't go higher. You can completely refute the central claim of their argument. But if they simply respond by essentially shoving their fingers in their ears yelling "I can't hear you!" the argument will go no further.
As far as institutional trust, you’ll have to decide for yourself IMO. Do you agree with the messaging from the institution? Do you generally trust the people within it? If so, progress, otherwise don’t.
Something I do for this is to look at what the "opposition" says in response to anything salacious or inflammatory. Does the other side address it directly and provide evidence? Do they ignore it? What's their track record on the subject? Consider the end of Obama's last term when all the right could talk about was him golfing. Then trump gets in office and golf's even more. Anyone who bitched about Obama and was silent for trump lose a ton of credibility. The exact same thing for the debt. The right was screaming about how much debt Obama added. Then trump goes and adds more in his one term than Obama did in two. Those same critics? Fucking silent.
Not at all. Watch some lion fights. They get very close in a display of dominance. Well within striking range of a sword. They don't understand a straight line piercing attack to their vulnerable chest and belly. This likely means they won't defend a quick thrust.
Animals are pretty predictable in their attacks. A sword would give any half intelligent armored knight the absolute edge. A competent swordsman will know a few cuts will send the lion reeling. If they're well placed, it's deadly.
States are likely to have laws against "distracted driving" or "reckless driving". Those likely encompass much of the driving while texting or fiddling with controls. Unless a cop directly saw the action this are usually charges levied after an accident happens and do nothing to prevent it. Once enough crashes are attributed to a narrower set of actions, public opinion can be swayed to support action against that narrower set. Now with a specific "no texting while driving" law, cops can pull you over simply for holding a phone. They don't need to see you do something that would constitute "distracted" or "reckless" driving to ticket you.
But they get validation. It's not just that they think their ideas and information is correct. They are correct and doctors and entire industries are wrong or corrupt. That makes them smarter than those eggheads that went to school for sometimes a decade and have spent further decades with their face in a microscope. After decades of education and dedicated research somehow Cletus from BFE, Dumbfuckistan and Google was able to best them intellectually.
With how fast we are able to communicate, I'd say it's likely to happen faster this time around. When the emperor does something that fucks over the populace, they can hear about it within minutes. During Roman times it could have taken months.