The idea that humans could and should shape their world to improve well being before death was little voiced before the sixteenth century AD. This was probably because lives were comparatively short and the ability to challenge the environment was limited, so most accepted hardship and disasters as the will of the gods or God; also, religious authorities and states typically frowned on challenges to the status quo. In the West an English statesman and theologian, Thomas More, was one of the first to publish views on how humans might develop in the early sixteenth century, in his book Utopia.