We are in perilous times, yet Canada is silent on the proliferation of nuclear weapons

[John Hollins]

In today's Globe and Mail, a sequel to earlier CACOR comments on this subject.

[Garth Mihalcheon]

Thanks for this John. Isn’t it fascinating how many of us have habituated to the nuclear threat. According to many disarmament experts, including the good folks at the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, the world has never been at greater risk of nuclear war. However, I have often heard the line, from people who should know better, that “I don’t worry about nuclear war because I can’t do anything about it anyway.” What sloppy thinking! 

We achieved significant nuclear disarmament way back in the 80s so to me this proves it is possible, certainly more doable than halting the climate crisis. Yet, out of sight, out of mind. Why is this? 

Well, it’s a human tendency to prioritize the the risk of things in which we are interested and which we are knowledgeable about, while we tend to discount the things that don’t interest us that we don’t understand. To a hammer, everything looks like a nail. (It’s called the Availability Heuristic.) It bears repeating that Nature could care less about what humans pay attention to.

An excellent primer on how nuclear war could start: