zlacker

>>franzb+(OP)
I've seen a lot of HNers suggesting that we must over react and ramp up the war on terrorism. I'm all for cutting off immigration, but how will ramping up the wars do us any good? I don't see how another ten years "fixing" things is going to work.

>>zxcvcx+H2
How will cutting off immigration do anything? I think it's important to realize that this is something that happens and that you don't necessarily have to do anything. If you get a cold, you don't quarantine your block and divert your life savings to rhinovirus research, you just deal with it and try and take sensible precautions about hygiene.

>>x1798D+M3
Equating this with a cold virus is the height of imbecility. Governments have a responsibility to protect their citizens. The scope of this protection is up for debate, but ignoring it is not a choice that most citizens will tolerate.

>>greedo+Q6
I thought the metaphor was clear - society, as a whole, is not threatened by this sort of thing, and it is not even particularly dangerous from an expected value perspective. The point is not that nothing should be done - as I mentioned with my reference to hygiene precautions. Washing your hands and encasing yourself in an antiseptic bubble are two very different things, and the fact of the matter is that not all deaths are preventable. I was trying to make the point that the knee-jerk reaction of "something should be done" discounts the possibility that sometimes it's not worth it to do anything, either because additional action would have no effect or because the marginal cost of that action exceeds the benefits.

A fairly large number of people die from influenza every year, but we don't have a mass surveillance dragnet to try and isolate flu vectors, for good reason. We do, however, have a fairly robust vaccination system which is a sensible precaution to take.