Topic: [The Guardian] What if Covid-19 isn't our biggest threat?  (Read 1268 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

[The Guardian] What if Covid-19 isn't our biggest threat?
« on: April 27, 2020, 01:17:14 AM »
What if Covid-19 isn't our biggest threat?

Experts who assess global peril saw a pandemic coming, but they have worse worries for humanity

When eventually the coronavirus crisis begins to recede and we return to an approximation of normality – no matter how socially distanced or how much handwashing it involves – we can expect some kind of international initiative to prevent, or at least limit, the spread of future lethal viruses. As a species we are pretty good at learning from recent experience. It’s what’s known as the availability heuristic – the tendency to estimate the likelihood of an event based on our ability to recall examples.

But as the moral philosopher Toby Ord argues in his new book, The Precipice, we are much less adept at anticipating potential catastrophes that have no precedent in living memory. “Even when experts estimate a significant probability for an unprecedented event,” he writes, “we have great difficulty believing it until we see it.”

Continue reading...
Source: What if Covid-19 isn't our biggest threat?

Feeds culled from https://www.theguardian.com/uk/rss

 

Related Topics

  Subject / Started by Replies Last post
0 Replies
2315 Views
Last post March 17, 2020, 01:11:31 AM
by The Guardian
0 Replies
1833 Views
Last post March 18, 2020, 01:07:08 PM
by The Guardian
0 Replies
1647 Views
Last post April 27, 2020, 01:03:38 PM
by observer
0 Replies
1733 Views
Last post April 30, 2020, 01:05:11 PM
by The Guardian
0 Replies
1571 Views
Last post May 16, 2020, 01:08:18 AM
by The Guardian
0 Replies
1639 Views
Last post September 05, 2020, 01:04:31 AM
by The Guardian
0 Replies
1159 Views
Last post October 23, 2020, 01:01:43 PM
by The Guardian
0 Replies
1201 Views
Last post June 16, 2021, 01:09:24 AM
by PulseNG
0 Replies
1352 Views
Last post June 23, 2021, 01:11:37 AM
by The Guardian
0 Replies
359 Views
Last post July 23, 2025, 01:28:22 AM
by flukky-1