This is another post for which the idea has been floating around in my cranium for some time. The absolute insanity surrounding the evil coronavirus and political situation has prompted me to do my best to get it written.
We are a world divided. We have the poor and rich, the white and people of color, democrats and republicans, men and women, religious and non-religious, old and young, new world and old world - or third world, and many, many other definitions and labels. Then those labelled groups have their divisions within. The religious groups are divided between Christianity, Islam, Hinduism (considered in the Eastern world to be much more than a religion, but for this we will go with the flow of Western thought), Buddhism (also not strictly a religion, it is considered one by most, again especially in Western culture), Judaism, Sikhism, and others. Then within those are many divisions. For example, within Islam are the main divisions of Sunni and Shia. Christianity has Protestant and Catholic and within those are too many to keep track of. These division are supposed to define us as people; and for many do.
One division I want to mention and briefly explore (and the jist of this post) is that between optimists and pessimists. It is obvious that there are tremendous differences in the thought processes of optimists versus pessimists. (a side note: it is scientifically proven that women are more pessimistic than men) The old "glass half-full" example is one that every one can relate to. I am going to take this to a slightly different place. Though not strictly pessimistic (especially if pessimism is looked at narrowly as the complete opposite of optimism) there appears to be a significant portion of the population that looks at society/people/the world as doomed. And, in many cases mankind is the reason/cause of this impending doom.
The coronavirus (Covid-19) "pandemic" (and I will admit that it may become one, but now is nowhere close) is a good example of this divide. The pessimists are latching on to the "doom & gloom" prognostications that are flying about. Yes, there is a chance that this will become a deadly pandemic. Again, for now it is nothing even close to that state, even in China. As I am writing this China has reported close to 80,000 cases of Covid-19. That is terrible, but a tiny portion of a tiny portion of the population of China. With 1.3 billion (BILLION - 1,000 million) people, it would take 13,000,000 (13 Million) cases to reach 1% of the population. Again, I am not making light of 80,000 cases of any disease, but it is still not that widespread, even in China if the current state of infection remains.
At this writing, about 6,000 cases have been reported in the rest of the world. Now, that will undoubtedly grow, it is just a matter of how much. If it follows the trend of China, and if China truly has peaked, that means that 400,000 to 500,000 cases will occur worldwide. That is a horrible figure indeed. However, influenza hospitalizations EACH YEAR are about that worldwide. Not the number of cases, but those bad enough to cause the patients to become hospitalized! FYI, there are millions and millions of cases of flu each season (the CDC reports @15,000,000 - 15 million - in just the US this season)
As for deaths, at this writing, China has reported just over 2,700 deaths attributed to Covid-19. Any death is horrible. I understand the burden. However the point is, this disease is not as deadly as it is being made out to be. The rest of the world has reported just over 200 deaths attributed to Covid-19.
These facts are being reported, and are out there for anyone that cares to do any research. The issue is, there are those that need to sensationalize any news. There are multiple reasons for this. One huge one is that news channels and programs need viewers to survive. Nothing drives the masses to news outlets like a good crisis (wars are great for this, especially our new media-embedded wars). The other is to use it like a tool against the a political rival. With the absolute hatred of President Trump, this is coming into play in a big way. One does not have to be a a great sleuth to see this, but after hours and hours of the almost gleeful way the media is reporting this, it cannot be denied.
Now to the pessimist versus optimist part of this issue. As mentioned above, there is a significant part of the population that seems to have an almost inherent need to see the world as being destroyed. A pandemic is something that fulfills that need greatly. The go about gnashing teeth and wringing hands, but cannot look away or hear/accept any information that mitigates the seriousness of the calamity. I understand the fear of the unknown. I accept that diseases are scary and can be a danger to all, including potentially our existence. But the sheer terror that appears to have gripped a large portion of the population over this disease is astonishing, and factually unfounded. However, I maintain that this base of pessimists latched onto this as they do every "end-of-the-world" scenario. In some way they cannot help themselves.
The pessimists that I am referring to are also greatly invested in the man-made global warming/climate change issue. They are willing to accept that we are only decades away (or less) from man destroying the climate to a point that threatens our existence. To put it in perspective, there are always seers, soothsayers, religious leaders, etc. that are predicting the end of the world. Most get followers even if they are not offering any proof other than their statements. Some get many followers, some a very large number that are willing to die with their "prophet" to support them. The idiotic statement that 97%, 98%, or even 99% of "climate scientists" agree that man-made climate change is happening is accepted, even though it has been proven to not be true (in fact the reporter/writer that first stated that figure has admitted he made it up when questioned). These "climate experts" should be laughed at just like the "religious leaders" or cult leaders are when they predict the end of the world at some arbitrary date. Just recognize - EVERY prediction that has been made about the climate regarding "end-of-the-world' type events has been false. NONE have come true.
With diseases, just since 2000 we have been told that many diseases were "end-of-the-world" type diseases. West Nile virus was @2000, SARS virus was 2002-03, Bird Flu (H4/N1) was 2005 or so, 2009-10 was Swine flu (H1/N1/09), and 2016-18 it was Ebola.
As for other issues: we were to have famine by 2000 (if not sooner) due to population explosion that would overwhelm our food production capabilities. We were to have an ice age by the early 21st century (now) due to the cooling of the sun. We were using oxygen faster than it could be replaced by plants due to our various machines and processes that use combustion as well as ever increasing populations. We were to have a global radiation problem due to the increasing ozone hole in the atmosphere. We were to run out of easily obtainable crude oil and be fighting over $10 a gallon gasoline and heating oil by now. The oceans were predicted to already be covering the lowest lying islands by now. All the glaciers were to have been melted by 2020. And so on and so on.
Is the climate changing - of course it is. It always has and always will. Is man causing the change - not in any appreciable way. We do not have that kind of power short of a nuclear war.
Part of the issue is that we are looking at figures from a relative millisecond of time. Mankind has only been able to accurately measure temperatures in any large scale since the 1880s. On an Earth that is 4 billion or more years old, with mankind having inhabited it for 100,000 of those years, 140 years of measurement of something is almost irrelevant. It is a tick of the second hand comparatively. Yet these graphs (manipulated by the way - but another subject) are shown as it they cover our entire history. Any temperature shown prior to 1880 is mostly conjecture or speculation. There are scientific methods that can attempt to recreate conditions millennia ago, but they are still conjecture.
The pessimistic portion of our population takes this in and as I stated, almost "needs" to believe it. I will admit, I do not understand it. As a student of psychology I find it fascinating. As a member of the optimistic portion of society I ask you all to take a breath. The coronavirus Covid-19 will not wipe us out, nor will climate change.
We are a world divided. We have the poor and rich, the white and people of color, democrats and republicans, men and women, religious and non-religious, old and young, new world and old world - or third world, and many, many other definitions and labels. Then those labelled groups have their divisions within. The religious groups are divided between Christianity, Islam, Hinduism (considered in the Eastern world to be much more than a religion, but for this we will go with the flow of Western thought), Buddhism (also not strictly a religion, it is considered one by most, again especially in Western culture), Judaism, Sikhism, and others. Then within those are many divisions. For example, within Islam are the main divisions of Sunni and Shia. Christianity has Protestant and Catholic and within those are too many to keep track of. These division are supposed to define us as people; and for many do.
One division I want to mention and briefly explore (and the jist of this post) is that between optimists and pessimists. It is obvious that there are tremendous differences in the thought processes of optimists versus pessimists. (a side note: it is scientifically proven that women are more pessimistic than men) The old "glass half-full" example is one that every one can relate to. I am going to take this to a slightly different place. Though not strictly pessimistic (especially if pessimism is looked at narrowly as the complete opposite of optimism) there appears to be a significant portion of the population that looks at society/people/the world as doomed. And, in many cases mankind is the reason/cause of this impending doom.
The coronavirus (Covid-19) "pandemic" (and I will admit that it may become one, but now is nowhere close) is a good example of this divide. The pessimists are latching on to the "doom & gloom" prognostications that are flying about. Yes, there is a chance that this will become a deadly pandemic. Again, for now it is nothing even close to that state, even in China. As I am writing this China has reported close to 80,000 cases of Covid-19. That is terrible, but a tiny portion of a tiny portion of the population of China. With 1.3 billion (BILLION - 1,000 million) people, it would take 13,000,000 (13 Million) cases to reach 1% of the population. Again, I am not making light of 80,000 cases of any disease, but it is still not that widespread, even in China if the current state of infection remains.
At this writing, about 6,000 cases have been reported in the rest of the world. Now, that will undoubtedly grow, it is just a matter of how much. If it follows the trend of China, and if China truly has peaked, that means that 400,000 to 500,000 cases will occur worldwide. That is a horrible figure indeed. However, influenza hospitalizations EACH YEAR are about that worldwide. Not the number of cases, but those bad enough to cause the patients to become hospitalized! FYI, there are millions and millions of cases of flu each season (the CDC reports @15,000,000 - 15 million - in just the US this season)
As for deaths, at this writing, China has reported just over 2,700 deaths attributed to Covid-19. Any death is horrible. I understand the burden. However the point is, this disease is not as deadly as it is being made out to be. The rest of the world has reported just over 200 deaths attributed to Covid-19.
These facts are being reported, and are out there for anyone that cares to do any research. The issue is, there are those that need to sensationalize any news. There are multiple reasons for this. One huge one is that news channels and programs need viewers to survive. Nothing drives the masses to news outlets like a good crisis (wars are great for this, especially our new media-embedded wars). The other is to use it like a tool against the a political rival. With the absolute hatred of President Trump, this is coming into play in a big way. One does not have to be a a great sleuth to see this, but after hours and hours of the almost gleeful way the media is reporting this, it cannot be denied.
Now to the pessimist versus optimist part of this issue. As mentioned above, there is a significant part of the population that seems to have an almost inherent need to see the world as being destroyed. A pandemic is something that fulfills that need greatly. The go about gnashing teeth and wringing hands, but cannot look away or hear/accept any information that mitigates the seriousness of the calamity. I understand the fear of the unknown. I accept that diseases are scary and can be a danger to all, including potentially our existence. But the sheer terror that appears to have gripped a large portion of the population over this disease is astonishing, and factually unfounded. However, I maintain that this base of pessimists latched onto this as they do every "end-of-the-world" scenario. In some way they cannot help themselves.
The pessimists that I am referring to are also greatly invested in the man-made global warming/climate change issue. They are willing to accept that we are only decades away (or less) from man destroying the climate to a point that threatens our existence. To put it in perspective, there are always seers, soothsayers, religious leaders, etc. that are predicting the end of the world. Most get followers even if they are not offering any proof other than their statements. Some get many followers, some a very large number that are willing to die with their "prophet" to support them. The idiotic statement that 97%, 98%, or even 99% of "climate scientists" agree that man-made climate change is happening is accepted, even though it has been proven to not be true (in fact the reporter/writer that first stated that figure has admitted he made it up when questioned). These "climate experts" should be laughed at just like the "religious leaders" or cult leaders are when they predict the end of the world at some arbitrary date. Just recognize - EVERY prediction that has been made about the climate regarding "end-of-the-world' type events has been false. NONE have come true.
With diseases, just since 2000 we have been told that many diseases were "end-of-the-world" type diseases. West Nile virus was @2000, SARS virus was 2002-03, Bird Flu (H4/N1) was 2005 or so, 2009-10 was Swine flu (H1/N1/09), and 2016-18 it was Ebola.
As for other issues: we were to have famine by 2000 (if not sooner) due to population explosion that would overwhelm our food production capabilities. We were to have an ice age by the early 21st century (now) due to the cooling of the sun. We were using oxygen faster than it could be replaced by plants due to our various machines and processes that use combustion as well as ever increasing populations. We were to have a global radiation problem due to the increasing ozone hole in the atmosphere. We were to run out of easily obtainable crude oil and be fighting over $10 a gallon gasoline and heating oil by now. The oceans were predicted to already be covering the lowest lying islands by now. All the glaciers were to have been melted by 2020. And so on and so on.
Is the climate changing - of course it is. It always has and always will. Is man causing the change - not in any appreciable way. We do not have that kind of power short of a nuclear war.
Part of the issue is that we are looking at figures from a relative millisecond of time. Mankind has only been able to accurately measure temperatures in any large scale since the 1880s. On an Earth that is 4 billion or more years old, with mankind having inhabited it for 100,000 of those years, 140 years of measurement of something is almost irrelevant. It is a tick of the second hand comparatively. Yet these graphs (manipulated by the way - but another subject) are shown as it they cover our entire history. Any temperature shown prior to 1880 is mostly conjecture or speculation. There are scientific methods that can attempt to recreate conditions millennia ago, but they are still conjecture.
The pessimistic portion of our population takes this in and as I stated, almost "needs" to believe it. I will admit, I do not understand it. As a student of psychology I find it fascinating. As a member of the optimistic portion of society I ask you all to take a breath. The coronavirus Covid-19 will not wipe us out, nor will climate change.
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