[ExI] The Avalanche Threat

[Lee Corbin]

Suppose that your neighbor (who's a perfect shot) manages to
sting you on the arm or the back of your head with his BB gun
once or twice a week.  I dare say that you'd be more concerned
about that than you would be about dying in an automobile accident,
even though the probability of dying in a car crash vastly outweighs
the chance of dying from one of your neighbor's BB gun shots.
Why?

Or do we just need to chalk it up to human irrationality?

I maintain that there is a parallel here, and that we are designed to
react to consciously executed premeditated threats far more than
we are to equally dangerous natural phenomena, and for good
reason.

Lee

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Emlyn" <emlynoregan at gmail.com>
To: "ExI chat list" <extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org>
Sent: Thursday, September 13, 2007 5:57 AM
Subject: [ExI] The Avalanche Threat


> The Avalanche Threat
> No one is safe
> Allan Uthman
> 
> http://buffalobeast.com/118/avalanches.htm
> 
> "More Americans have been killed in the war in Iraq than have ever
> been killed by terrorism in the history of the country. A San
> Francisco Chronicle piece puts the odds of being killed by terrorism
> as slightly lower than dying in an avalanche. How much are we spending
> on avalanche prevention? Why is there no counter-avalanche czar? How
> many news stories have you seen about the threat of avalanches? Think
> about it: "Avalanches: Are we safer than we were?" Or "Democrats: Soft
> on avalanches?" Why does the liberal media ignore the avalanche
> threat?"
> 
> -- 
> Emlyn
> 
> http://emlynoregan.com
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