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I was lucky enough to grow up a few miles from an Air Force Base. When we did the "duck and cover" training thing, our science teacher told us it wouldn't matt

I was lucky enough to grow up a few miles from an Air Force Base. When we did the "duck and cover" training thing, our science teacher told us it wouldn't matter because we'd turn to ash almost instantly anyway. Recently there was mention of a poll of evangelical Christians and some large percentage thought the rapture would happen in their lifetime. Honestly, that's pretty much literally the same psychology at work as those who believed in impending nuclear holocaust then and imminent climate doom now.

deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
brc 14y ago
There's been a bunch of mini-dooms along the way as well, everything from y2k causing planes to drop from the sky to terrorists attacking cities more frequently. I think it's in peoples nature to mentally take trend lines straight up, or even exponentially up. So, if there were x nuclear warheads in 1987, then they assumed it would be 100 * x in 2012. The same pattern is at work with the climate now, as you've pointed out. Those who speak of the largest catastrophes get the most airtime, and it's a self-reinforcing cycle. Any room full of teenagers will inevitably predict the world will be uninhabitable by their 40th birthday, when in reality it will probably be much the same.