I think for HN it's worth noting, perhaps in the title, that this article is written by Bruce Schneier.
Also, almost every link in the article is back to one of Schneier's essays on schneier.com
The Boston Marathon Bombing: Keep Calm and Carry On
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Re: The Boston Marathon Bombing: Keep Calm and Carry On
#52Its too bad that most people don't have a basic appreciation of statistics or probability. Its too bad Schneier only spends a tiny paragraph on it: "Even though this will be in the news for weeks, we should recognize this for what it is: a rare event". The chance that a person will die from a bombing, or be shot, or their plane crash, or a hurricane kill them is so small that there is almost NO reason to be afraid of…
People don't react to terrorism because they're afraid of being blown up personally. They do it because they're afraid of the precedent that might be set by not responding. It's statistically unlikely that you'll be the victim of gang violence, but does that mean it's irrational prosecute and punish gang members? No, because the activity threatens social stability vastly out of proportion with the probability of any…
That does not explain why people stopped flying after 9/11.
People are terrible at estimating risk.
Re: The Boston Marathon Bombing: Keep Calm and Carry On
#53Speaking of which, here's the results. They are notable because a non-Kenyan won for the first time in 3 years.
Men
Lelisa Desisa (Eth): 2:10:22
Micah Kogo (Ken): 2:10:27
Gebregziabher Gebremariam (Eth): ?
Women
Rita Jeptoo (Ken): 2:26:25
Meseret Hailu (Eth)
Sharon Cherop (Ken)
Re: The Boston Marathon Bombing: Keep Calm and Carry On
#54Probably going to get very well down voted for this, but it hasn't stopped me before. It's not through terrorism they beat us. But through politics. Either twisting the minds of the current leaders, or infecting political parties and slowly implementing sharia - happening in Sweden, with our own tax money. Forget gay and female civil rights.
Seivan, I apologize deeply for getting your comment off track, and I hope others will not follow this further from your main point.
However, I would just offer a quick point of advice. Don't spend keystrokes saying you might be down-voted for something. It's actually bolder to just say what you're going to say. When you reference downvoting, you stigmatize it and influence people not to do so. I would rather know if people are going to have a downvote reaction to my comment than shame them into not downvoting me. I've had the exact same tendency to observe "well I might get downvoted for this," but I think it's a tendency that should be resisted.
Re: The Boston Marathon Bombing: Keep Calm and Carry On
#55Finally some common sense in a world where common sense isn't so common. Don't let fear rule you, i'm glad not all media is out to scare people.
Re: The Boston Marathon Bombing: Keep Calm and Carry On
#56Its too bad that most people don't have a basic appreciation of statistics or probability. Its too bad Schneier only spends a tiny paragraph on it: "Even though this will be in the news for weeks, we should recognize this for what it is: a rare event". The chance that a person will die from a bombing, or be shot, or their plane crash, or a hurricane kill them is so small that there is almost NO reason to be afraid of…
More people died on black friday every year. Shit more people die every year falling out of bed.
Re: The Boston Marathon Bombing: Keep Calm and Carry On
#57"Keep Calm and Carry On". This phrase from the British has peaked in recent times.
http://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=Calm%20and%20Carry%20...
A week hardly passes that I don't see it on a shirt, a coworkers wall, or in a meme.
Re: The Boston Marathon Bombing: Keep Calm and Carry On
#58Bruce mentions that one of the reasons why people should stay calm is that terrorists are dumb. However, this could be the actions of a new Unabomber (let us hope it isn't), who managed to go on a bombing streak for 18 years without being caught. It's really too early to start making assumptions.
I say, don't keep calm and carry on, take this as an example that life can end any second, just like that, out of nowhere. Live your life enjoying what you do. Most of us don't, which is sad. If you're enjoying life to the fullest, carry on. If you aren't living your life to the fullest, then no, don't just 'carry on'. Life is fragile, and this should be a reminder. I for one know, I shouldn't 'carry on'. I need to improve my life.
Make the most out of your precious time.
Re: The Boston Marathon Bombing: Keep Calm and Carry On
#59Earlier quoted context omitted.
You really think that could bring "The Fall of New Rome"? An attack a hundred times more deadly (which would be something like 3% of NYC's population dead, if my mental math does not betray me, or something a little less than 10x The Blitz.) than 9/11 would be a tragedy with only a few parallels in history. It would be an astronomically staggering blow to our economy. Hell, the mangled remains of the economy after su…
No red dawn fantasies, just realpolitik ones. I would consider it a destruction of our society if our economy was not "recognizable as an economy at all." Indeed, the current recession only wiped out about $600 billion of GDP at the worst, and look at how much suffering it caused. I'm willing to vote for the US to send quite a few more drones to Pakistan to avert a possible 10x 9/11 event, even if we could technicall…
You define "society" far too narrowly. A society is not an economy, a government, or even a piece of land enclosed by a border. It is an abstract idea, a sort of shared culture and basic methodology.
Here is the real trick though, this "New Rome" is not a city. We don't have a seat of power from which we derive our identity and shared culture, or any sort of sackable cultural Mecca which we define ourselves by. You could level NYC and kill every last person in it, dismantle the government and turn dollars into papiermarks, but you would not have dismantled the society.
Remaining you would still have hundreds of millions of Americans with no invading army to eradicate them and what they beleived in. More importantly, you would still billions of others, across the world, who would continue to make up bulk of our society. The worldwide shared culture of the 21st century, of which Americans represents but a fraction. A culture of appreciation for scientific progress, the arts, and political theories. A collective history, solemly remembering the same wars, sharing the same accomplishments. A Library of Alexandria that (thanks to dramatic advances in publishing and distribution since the last) cannot be burned.
A few well placed bombs by a few extremists who want nothing to do with any of this could never put an end to all of this. This is a society that cannot be taken, cannot be sacked; we can only give it up. Only we present an existential threat to ourselves.
Could there be massive lose of life, and would that be worth preventing? Absolutely. Are these people the Germanic hoards, posed to sack us? Are they in a position to dismantle our society? No.
Re: The Boston Marathon Bombing: Keep Calm and Carry On
#60Earlier quoted context omitted.
What exactly are you envisioning here? If not a sacking of the country by terrorist hoards, what exactly are you proposing the parallels between the fall of Rome and our modern society will be? I can envision terrorist attacks doing major irreversible damage to our society, but only through the fear, spiraling out of control, that they have the potential to cause. A fear so excessive that it could figuratively drive…
With modern technology, you don't need to sack New York to cause tremendous damage. People downplay the magnitude of 9/11, but as I noted somewhere else today, it involved more deaths than Pearl Harbor, and economic damage of almost $100 billion (without accounting for the economic impact on the stock market). Is a terrorist attack ten times stronger inconceivable? An attack on a nuclear power plant could cost into t…
The worst terrorist attack in US history managed to be about as bad as a strong hurricane hitting a densely populated area. That's noteworthy for sure, but not something that sane people would compare with civilization-destroying forces. It doesn't even compare to the "wars" of recent decades, let alone truly large-scale warfare of the sort that many countries have engaged in repeatedly without suffering the fate of the Roman Empire.