On the other hand, I have to disclose that I sometimes (e.g., when I think about Schelling Nobel Lecture) consider a “dismal hypothesis”: given human nature, if the world hadn’t seen what happened to Hiroshima, it’s quite possible that people wouldn’t have developed the same level of aversion to nukes, and we might have had something like a nuclear WW III.
I guess people often need a concrete “proof of concept” to take risks seriously—so they can regard them as imminent . Possibly that’s an additional factor in the explanation of why we succeeded with smallpox and CFCs, and why biosecurity gained more track after covid-19.
On the other hand, I have to disclose that I sometimes (e.g., when I think about Schelling Nobel Lecture) consider a “dismal hypothesis”: given human nature, if the world hadn’t seen what happened to Hiroshima, it’s quite possible that people wouldn’t have developed the same level of aversion to nukes, and we might have had something like a nuclear WW III.
I guess people often need a concrete “proof of concept” to take risks seriously—so they can regard them as imminent . Possibly that’s an additional factor in the explanation of why we succeeded with smallpox and CFCs, and why biosecurity gained more track after covid-19.