Saige's Journal: Disasterbation Abounds: More Apocalyptic Nonsense

Perhaps it's a fear of technology that's not quite understood, a reaction by people to the increasing rate of change in everyday life, or some other reason. But it seems more and more we're hearing about some person or other going on and on about the horrible things that can happen in the future. There's more disasterbation.

For those unfamiliar with the term (probably most of you), let's do a quick definition.

Disasterbation: Idle and rampant speculation about possible future disasters and catastrophies without any consideration as to the likelihood of such events, or methods of preventing such events.

In other words, coming up with as many bad things as can happen, often for alarmist purposes, but avoiding any real, rational discussion on the matter.

For example, Martin Rees, Britain's honorary astronomer royal, is claiming that the odds of an apocalyptic disaster striking the Earth are 50-50. This is definite disasterbation. Why? First of all, there's no mention of how the odds are applied. The fact is, the odds of an Earth-destroying event occuring is pretty much 100%. After all, at some point in the future the sun will go Nova, and that will very likely destroy the planet - or at least pretty much end all life on it. But that will happen a LONG time in the future. So right now, it's not important.

What is the time frame Rees is applying the odds to? 1 year? 100? 10,000? Without any mention of such, it is impossible to come up with any reasonable discussion of whether or not this statement may be correct.

Second, there's that complete and total lack of pondering anything but "oh no, this technology could lead to this terrible event!" Once again, the all-to-common idea of "grey goo" is mentioned, and once again, without any statement of how unlikely this is. (There are many, many reasons why grey goo is unlikely and extremely preventable, though "black goo", or intentionally created malicious nanobots are a different story) Or the famous spectre of how genetic engineering will make us non-human, implying must necessarily be a bad thing (something many of those with transhumanist interests find patently false).

I was going to start wondering why we can't see honest, rational debate on these possible "disasters" that takes into account the likelihood of such events which might yield plans to help protect against them and prevent them from occuring. But then I realized that we won't see such a thing in the media because we don't see ANY honest, rational debate in the media, on any issue. Soundbites and short articles seem to be what goes over best, and it seems likely that "oh no, the world might end in the future for all these reasons!" grabs much more attention than "odds of 'grey goo' scenario low, reality shows".

Just remember, next time someone starts being all alarmist about how this technology, or that scientific breakthrough, or the other experiment might lead to a horrible disaster that will destroy us all or turn humanity into something completely different - remember to take it with a grain of salt, as the pronouncement is being made so someone can make themself happy.