IT Conversations: Bruce Schneier – Beyond Fear

by Lars Pind on September 8, 2004

http://www.itconversations.com/shows/detail119.html

It strikes me how Bruce Schneier applies the exact same logic to security – am I getting my money’s worth – as Bjørn Lomborg does to the environment.

He’s pointing out that more people died from malnutrition in 2001 than died in the terrorist attacks. Yet, the US has spent truckloads securing airlines, and none helping malnutrition. Basically, both Bruce and Bjørn are asking for how cost-effective the various measures of saving human lives against the varios threats surrounding us are, and then picking the ones with the most bang for the buck first. It would seem logical, yet what we’re doing is quite something else.

As an aside, to illustrate how bad we are at evaluating risk, he points out that more people are killed every year by pigs than by sharks. I’d like to see just how those pigs kill those people. Anyone got any pictures?

{ 5 comments }

Guan Yang September 8, 2004 at 10:48 pm

Pictures of pigs killing people

Here are some horrifying pictures:
http://www.3dayseminar.org/06study/detail_shim.html

/Guan

Thomas-Xavier Martin September 8, 2004 at 10:48 pm

Pigs are dangerous

I spent a significant part of my childhood on a (French) farm. There were no pigs on the premises, but the neighbour had some in a pen, and every adult around us was extremely wary of letting any of us children near the pigpen.

You have to remember that pigs are not really different from boars. They have a nasty temper, and also very large teeth and a very strong jaw muscle. I remember hearing stories about people who had lost fingers, a hand or a foot to an enraged pig…

Warner Bros and Disney may have depicted the animal as shiny, pink, cuddly and somewhat slow, but truth is still that anybody who has any experience with that kind of free-range animals tends to be quite wary of it.

And if you are interested in weird deaths by animals, several people die every year in French Normandy by being crushed to death in their car by a falling (900 kg) cow…

Boris Doesborg September 8, 2004 at 10:48 pm

Kracht

There is a Dutch movie called "Kracht" in which one of the principal characters is being eaten by pigs.

<http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0099950/>

Enjoy :)

d.brockis@ntlworld.com September 8, 2004 at 10:48 pm

A strange coincidence. The enraged pig attacked the nurse on Brockis Hill Road. The name Brockis, (formerly Brocas (French) is rare..

I am just writing articles on The Beast of Gevaudan, described as hyena or pig like, which killed people in 18th century France. They never caught it. Derek Brockis

Derek Brockis September 8, 2004 at 10:48 pm

Did they ever catch the pig that attacked the nurse?

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