In the documentary
The Man Who Saved The World, Stanislav Petrov travels to meet Kevin Costner, his favourite actor, at home. Costner asks him, if he hadn't acted as he did, how many people would have died. You expect him to say, 50 million, or something. He says,
everyone.
Everyone on earth would've died. It's a chilling moment. (And there's been a lot more than that one near miss.) What kind of crazy species are we that we build a system that when it malfunctions (as it did that day) seems likely to kill everyone on the planet?!
Now I read on HN that the danger of nuclear war is hyped out of proportion to its true severity, and should be considered only a little. Sorry, maybe I misunderstand. I have read a similar thing on HN a few times though, people that seem to think nuclear war really would be no big deal at all.
But it always seems weird to be how some people are so worried to the point of obsession about global warming without apparently ever giving a thought to the ever-present risk of full-scale nuclear war—something infinitely worse. (Well, hardly "war", just a flurry of button-pressing for a few minutes.)
Now I read on HN that the danger of nuclear war is hyped out of proportion to its true severity, and should be considered only a little. Sorry, maybe I misunderstand. I have read a similar thing on HN a few times though, people that seem to think nuclear war really would be no big deal at all.
But it always seems weird to be how some people are so worried to the point of obsession about global warming without apparently ever giving a thought to the ever-present risk of full-scale nuclear war—something infinitely worse. (Well, hardly "war", just a flurry of button-pressing for a few minutes.)