Be Alarmed, But Don’t Panic

In the last few decades there have been a succession of panics, each of which has for a while attracted much attention, been taken seriously by much of the media and even parts of academia, and in some cases influenced public policy. One fondly remembered example was the Y2K panic in which it was thought that the advent of the millennium would result in the general collapse of computers and automated systems due to a design fault in their operating software and mechanics. Another was the belief that temperate forests and waterways would be wiped out by acid rain. Both of those faded away, rather suddenly in the case of Y2K.

Others recur such as the notion that we are all suffering a range of mysterious ailments because of the accumulation of ‘artificial’ toxins in our bodies – this one gets an outing every few years. There are some panics that never really get off the ground, such as the idea that the wireless transmissions of the mobile telephone system are causing widespread health problems. While there is no shortage of this, panic debunkers such as the British peer and writer Matt Ridley have a fulltime job on their hands debunking them.

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Πηγή: aier.org