Asteroid Risk Greatly Overestimated By Almost Everyone

StartsWithABang writes: When it comes to risk assessment, there's one type that humans are notoriously bad at: the very low-frequency but high-consequence risks and rewards. It's why so many of us are so eager to play the lottery, and simultaneously why we're catastrophically afraid of ebola and plane crashes, when we're far more likely to die from something mundane, like getting hit by a truck. One of the examples where science and this type of fear-based fallacy intersect is the science of asteroid strikes. With all we know about asteroids today, here's the actual risk to humanity, and it's much lower than anyone cares to admit.

Comments

Do people really take this risk seriously?

[Anonymous Coward]

I disagree with the premise of the article. I don't think most people are even remotely concerned about an asteroid strike.

Re:Do people really take this risk seriously?

[Anonymous Coward]

that is on average 100 people per year, which is small, but still much larger than they imply.

So you're in fact agreeing with the facts of the article. That's the exact number they give in the article. 100 per year.

RTFA FTW.

Re:Do people really take this risk seriously?

[careysub]

Right, and this is one threat that if we do detect it far enough in advance, we can actually prevent it from happening! And having a good detection system is the key, if we detect the threat many decades in advance even the largest "planet killers" can be deflected for modest amounts of money.