> if we took no measures to prevent any of them then chances are most of them would increase by very small amounts; maybe doubling for the most dramatic cases.
If by behavior we can reduce heart disease and cancer by half, that extends far more lives than eliminating terrorism, homicide and suicide entirely. Even the tail risk of terrorism is on the order of 10^4/year, while heart disease plus cancer is 10^6. So adjusting for tail risk, the focus of coverage on violence remains disproportionate.
There's a more substantial tail risk in global warming, nuclear war, infectious disease or SMOD. If the coverage of those was proportional to their tail risk they would crowd out most other news.
We can delay heart disease, cancer, and strokes, but not prevent the deaths. Those 1e6 numbers aren’t moving very far.
I assume you’re calculating the tail risk of terrorism based on backtesting, and ignoring the fact that preventing terrorism is a disproportionately high priority of the governments of the world. The extent and scope of measures taken cannot be ignored when talking about the impact.
Yes global warming has tail risk; it doesn’t show up in this analysis because it isn’t causing deaths, but I think the level of coverage is pretty high considering the low death toll.
Similarly nuclear war - especially during the Cold War, thermonuclear weapons had killed fewer people than falling pianos, yet for some reason was very high on people’s mind.
If by behavior we can reduce heart disease and cancer by half, that extends far more lives than eliminating terrorism, homicide and suicide entirely. Even the tail risk of terrorism is on the order of 10^4/year, while heart disease plus cancer is 10^6. So adjusting for tail risk, the focus of coverage on violence remains disproportionate.
There's a more substantial tail risk in global warming, nuclear war, infectious disease or SMOD. If the coverage of those was proportional to their tail risk they would crowd out most other news.