Coronavirus: The Real Risks and Human Biases Behind the Panic

Note: This was originally written for my monthly newsletter. You can sign up for it here.

Welcome to a special coronavirus edition of MFM, the only newsletter that refuses to cancel its flights and believes eating fruits and vegetables is more useful than wearing a face mask. Each month, this newsletter breaks down ideas that usually revolve around social psychology, cognitive biases, and some light philosophy.

This time, I’d like to use coronavirus as a case study to talk about the difference between systemic risk and individual risk, why some people are way more worried about this than others, and what sorts of cognitive biases are influencing us all.

So get your hand sanitizer ready. This is going to be a long one.

(Note: If you enjoy these newsletters, even when they aren’t about coronavirus, please consider forwarding this email to a friend and suggesting they sign up here. It’s free. And almost as useful as a hospital bed… almost.)

1. The Real Reason to Stay Home

A few weeks ago, when I wrote about coronavirus, I made two predictions given the data. First, this thing is going to spread across the planet and it’s probably inevitable that most of us get it at some point. Second, that it’s…