Uncertainties

One of the fascinatingly unsettling aspects of living through a major health scare, such as the current one related to the spread of the coronavirus, is observing how we deal with a situation in which we simply don't know enough to predict outcomes of a very serious nature. It's a brutally useful reminder of a truth we generally blind ourselves to: we may think we know a lot but we are deceiving ourselves. Indeed, one of the most crucial things we don't know is the extent of our self-deception.

Mind you, the current on-going possible emergency is also useful as a reminder of the value of those with real knowledge and expertise, however limited that may be in the great sum of things, and how much we need what little we do know when the going gets tough.