Re: Mega-Tsunami Threatens To Devastate U.S. Coastline

From: John Clark (jonkc@worldnet.att.net)
Date: Tue Sep 04 2001 - 09:38:46 MDT


Mike Lorrey <mlorrey@datamann.com> Wrote:

> When exactly? Oh, sometime in the next 200,000 years, give or take a few
> dozen kiloyears. One of those immediate threats.

Lets assume for the sake of argument your optimistic estimate is correct, that
would mean there is one chance in 200,000 of it causing 10 trillion dollars of damage
next year, so on that basis alone we would be justified in spending 50 million every year
investigating it. Look at it another way, there is one chance in 200,000 of it killing
200 million people next year. Thus your chances of this thing killing you next year
are better than your chances of dying in a airline crash even if you're a frequent flyer.
Airline crashes don't kill anywhere near a thousand people a year yet we spend far
more than 50 million a year trying to prevent them.

    John K Clark jonkc@att.net



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