EMAIL THIS PAGE
PRINT
RSS
Funny how we see risks in our lives. The other day, after working on my Yamaha Cruiser, I had to put the bike back in the garage, about a ½ mile away. It was a warm and sunny evening, and my black helmet looked awfully hot. So I stuck the helmet on the back of the bike and roared down to the garage with the wind pushing through my hair. Well, I don’t have much hair for wind to push through, but you get the picture. Risky, right? Who in their right mind would ride a motorcycle without a helmet? Anybody who rides a motorcycle a lot. It’s a funny thing we humans do, adapting to risk. The more time we spend with risk, the less it means to us. You do it too. Tearing down the highway at a rate of speed that would make someone from the 1930s die of fright. Texting/talking/surfing the web in traffic. We adapt to risk; it seems to diminish in proportion to the time we spend around it. In reality, of course, it’s not true. Only our perception of risk changes, not the actual risk. Kind of a dangerous proposition. Don’t believe me? Take a look around. The financial crisis is still making headlines, and no one can yet explain how such insane financial risks were ignored. Billions of dollars! Bet on pieces of paper conjured up by pin-stripe wearing twenty-somethings fresh out of business school. Crazy? Or human? It’s what we do every day. It’s what we watch others do around us. We lose track of risk in proportion to the time we spend with it. The same may be true for the BP oil disaster. How could such risks be ignored? By being around them too much. Redundant systems compensate for human error (of perception and action), multiple people looking at the same risk also alleviate the potential of problems. But you can’t eliminate the potential for disaster. Humans will always be humans, and mechanical systems don’t function without human interaction. It’s the way things work. To be honest, this explains a lot. And it’s a little scary. Are there some projects that simply carry too much inherent risk to even try? Perhaps poking holes in the earth at the bottom of the ocean is one of those things that’s just best left alone. Can we trust our inventions? Does engineering overcome our human tendencies? Right now, I don’t think so. |
Comments
ok, I have a friend who, for every negative situation, adopts a new set of rules to manage that risk. Wife's cell phone died? New rule- all cell phones are to be charged by 10pm. To me, it gets ridiculous- risk is a part of life, and to try to control every part of life is trying to catch the wind. Life IS risky. A wild adventure, but risky.
My Nathan, age 4, swings off the porch using a dog leash, thinking he's Indiana Jones. He has fallen, dropped, scraped elbows, his head, legs- you name it. But he keeps doing it. I find that fascinating. I haven't made any house "rule" about swinging off the porch, even for the number of times he's fallen. We've talked about gravity, we've talked about brick, we've looked at his bruises and cuts. In the end, I leave it up to him. I think it's a fascinating study into their development that I would not want to squelch.
I am 4,284% in favor of oil drilling, but obviously not deep ocean drilling. Just this week the government approved a new oil drilling site in the Gulf of Mexico, and in the same week that same government said it will criminally charge BP to the fullest extent of the law. The big fat difference? The risk. I'll let Nathan swing off the porch. But- not over Niagara Falls. Risk is inherent, risk is part of life, but in my opinion some risks are too great, especially when there are clear safer alternatives at hand.
Really well said, David. It's fascinating to me as well, how we live with it, ignore it, test it. That has been one of the great challenges of parenting for Ticia and I, finding ways to balance the risks we see our girls engaging (and the stakes keep getting higher!) and letting them be who they are, growing through the pain and rewards from the risks they have taken.
Hey Mark,
Great insight. I hadn't thought of it this way, but this is so true. There are things in my life that used to seem risky that, having never gotten me into trouble, seem less so now. Walking alone in NYC past midnight comes to mind. Before moving to NYC, I used to think, "I'll take a cab home if I'm out late..." But nowadays, I don't think twice about the "risk." Because I've been here for 11 years and walked alone late at night more times than I could count (especially when my home group was in the East Village and I lived in East Harlem - and we often went past 11 pm) and never had any incidents.
There are many other things in my life, big and small, that I do in increasing riskiness. Everything from eating raw cookie dough (never caught Salmonella) to pushing the speed limit past 75 when I'm on the interstate and there are no cops in sight. But I never thought about it. Thanks for the insight.
Christy
Thanks, Christy! It is amazing how we live with it, isn't it? How about that Staten Island Ferry? Is one crash a year ok? What do you think about the risks living in an urban space? Do we trade risks or take on more? So much to talk about here! : )