Will, this is a fascinating question, and I really think that scientific ignorance in all its forms comes at a cost to society. Some are simply misinformed but are generally acting in good faith, indicating that their education in science -- which so often is cut off after AP classes and which may leave them thinking science has all the answers -- may not have fully explained the nuances and ever-evolving process of scientific discovery. Others who question science do not act in good faith, and they openly seek to undermine arguments that don't seem to support their ideas by questioning the legitimacy of the "Experts" themselves. With these people, I'm not really sure what the scientific communty itself can do to change their minds, as they are willfully ignorant of information which doesn't support their worldview.

Hey Jordan, you make a great point regarding people needing a more personal stake in something to take action or at least take something seriously. Perhaps it could be something like framing or salience effects -- the issue can often too easily be regarded as simply rising sea levels or some faraway disaster, so people not living on the coasts might believe they won't be affected at all. If we can't convince people of how their lives could be affected (perhaps due to confirmation bias), we could potentially use behavioral nudging to change peoples' behavior in a way that would benefit themselves and the world, bypassing the necessity of convincing them.

As someone who wasn't entirely sure of the difference between risk and uncertainty, I found the example of the gun and Russian roulette extremely enlightening in differentiating the uncertainty of death -- which is almost 0 in the case of a bullet entering the brain -- and risk, which is the probability that the bullet will be in the chamber fired; in this case, 1/6. I also appreciated the examples of other easily visualizable isntances of different uncertainty/risk tradeoffs, such as the living room couch for low risk/low uncertainty and space exporation (Apollo 11) for high risk and high uncertainty. These examples really helped flush out the concepts before they were applied to the low risk, high uncertainty scenario of COVID-19

Hey Andrew, this is actually an absolutely fascinating question, and I agree that I could see both possibilities playing out, although I would hope that if the extraterrestrial civilization is a genuine threat humanity could unite in defense. On the other hand, if they were friendly, I could see nations competing more intensely with each other for access to alien technology and trade, with the wealthy getting the benefits of any technological advances first. I also think it would be interesting to think about if humans were the ones to make first contact with a less developed civilization -- how would we treat them? Would we see them as civilized partners or merely as tools that could be used for labor or soemthing else?

Hey Gavin, I think you make a great point -- even though there will be more extensive records of the past, this will not eliminate the phenomenon of rosy retrospection, in part becuase we may only save and keep photos and videos from happy times. I do wonder, however, this will impact the historical record hundreds and thousands of years from now, since future generations will have more access than ever to how people thought and lived during this era.

Hey Eric, I think those are great questions to ask and I also was interested in the broader potential predictive power of genomics in the medical sphere, but also outside of it in regards to common trait such as hair color, height, etc, since certain traits do have both genetic as well as environmental factors. I would also be interested to see how an expert in genomics like Professor Church thought of the ethics of genetic prediction -- whether there was some ethical line regarding genetic forecasting and engineering that scientists should never cross even if they had the technological capability to.

Neel, you make great points about the implications regarding a possible mileage tax. I think the general idea of a VMT would be to capture more revenue, even from electric vehicles, into the Highway Trust Fund. A VMT may also be better at targeting the behavior of drivers on the extreme end who drive the most. However, I completely agree that there are many drawbacks; a VMT would require that governments track the movements of vehicles, and while there could be steps taken to track only aggregate distance and not location, such a power could easily be abused. The VMT tax would could also require installing new technology in all personal and commercial cars or would require every vehicle owner to periodically report distances driven, which would create a costly new bureaucracy and extensive audit system. Lastly, VMTs definitely have the potential to disincentivize purchases of less efficient vehicles by charging all drivers regardless of how eco-friendly their car is. As for the commuters, I could see the VMT theoretically as an incentive to use public transportation or carpool instead of driving, but given that many parts of the U.S. do not have adequate public transportation as an option, it would only increase financial burdens on commuters in practive. In all, a VMT seems intruiging at first glance but rather problematic to implement.