Mitigation strategy [LWN.net]

Mitigation strategy

Posted Feb 3, 2008 22:25 UTC (Sun) by man_ls (subscriber, #15091)
In reply to: Mitigation strategy by ikm
Parent article: LCA: Bruce Schneier on the two sides of security

You point at a good strategy to make our irrational fears go away, or at least keep them under control: not knowing how something works can make us fearful. Therefore, learning how things work can take us a long way to controlling our fears. And that is exactly what engineers have been doing since before History started: learning how things work and then controlling them. That is how people learned to build boats and entered the sea; how they built huge temples which defied our sense of stability; and even how they built those megaliths which still amaze us.

The point is, even if you know the Bernoulli effect by heart, even if you understand the principles of aeronautics and have compiled flight crash statistics yourself, you may not be able to stop your palms from sweating the first time your plane lifts in the air. Or even the hundredth time. Still, it's not that bad for a grassland monkey! :D

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Mitigation strategy

Posted Feb 4, 2008 0:40 UTC (Mon) by ikm (subscriber, #493) [Link]

All fears are very rational in the end, so if your palms still sweat after the 100th time, try
another approach at understanding what you're actually afraid of :)

Mitigation strategy

Posted Feb 7, 2008 17:09 UTC (Thu) by dkite (guest, #4577) [Link]

I wouldn't like to fly with a pilot that doesn't fear what he does. In 
other words, a mistake can kill. The fact that this fear is real and 
vivid and acted upon makes air travel as safe as it is.

People act foolishly when afraid because they don't know what to do. On 
the other hand people regularly are hurt or killed at their workplace 
because they didn't know that they should be afraid.

How many times has people in this readership been afraid to apply a 
change to a working system? The fear moves you to double check, get other 
input, set up a test system, whatever.

Personally, when I fear things that I encounter regularly, I find out 
what to do. Not to allay fear, but to know how to act safely.

Derek (who in his work is regularly in situations that could kill him)