After spending 3 days reading all of Lesswrong’s posts and comments (and sources cited) related to coronavirus, I started taking action (summarizing the information collected and planning the least harmful ways to alert my closest peers to start preparing—we only have two confirmed cases still in Brazil). In my entire network of friends, I have not yet seen a single person who even takes the matter seriously. When I show a small amount of data (2~5 minutes of reading) and its extrapolations for the next weeks/months, the natural reaction is “you are forgetting a lot, someone will invent a cure/vaccine, there is nothing to worry about”. They don’t care about the smoke.
However, by showing a reasonable amount of data (1 hour reading) about coronavirus around the planet to my girlfriend and its long-term consequences (up to a year), she was convinced that it was a pandemic, that the consequences would be very bad, and her reaction was to cry. I showed an amount of data equivalent to 30 minute reading for my closest friend, his reaction was “tell me what you gonna do and when you gonna do, I’ll do the same”
As there are a reasonable amount of people who don’t think the subject is relevant or even know anything about it, I’m creating a video for YouTube in Portuguese. But then I thought the psychological consequences for a not inconsiderable amount of people would be disastrous, as it seems to my girlfriend. However, I see a lot of valuable information that I can only find on Lesswrong and no other source in Portuguese and it seems it would be a mistake not to share. At the same time, I don’t want to be a information hazard source.
On one hand, I can simply create the video, translate it to English and share with Lesswrong community to see if the community approves.
On the other hand, you could say what you think it would be an adequate sequence to explain the subject, like: [what is coronavirus > why you should pay more than 1 minute attention to it > current number of deaths vs expected number of deaths > who is probably going to die > you have permission to be worried and take precautions > what are the precautions > what data should trigger behavior changing for more aggressive precautions > etc]
[Question] What is the appropriate way to communicate that we are experiencing a pandemic?
After spending 3 days reading all of Lesswrong’s posts and comments (and sources cited) related to coronavirus, I started taking action (summarizing the information collected and planning the least harmful ways to alert my closest peers to start preparing—we only have two confirmed cases still in Brazil). In my entire network of friends, I have not yet seen a single person who even takes the matter seriously. When I show a small amount of data (2~5 minutes of reading) and its extrapolations for the next weeks/months, the natural reaction is “you are forgetting a lot, someone will invent a cure/vaccine, there is nothing to worry about”. They don’t care about the smoke.
However, by showing a reasonable amount of data (1 hour reading) about coronavirus around the planet to my girlfriend and its long-term consequences (up to a year), she was convinced that it was a pandemic, that the consequences would be very bad, and her reaction was to cry. I showed an amount of data equivalent to 30 minute reading for my closest friend, his reaction was “tell me what you gonna do and when you gonna do, I’ll do the same”
As there are a reasonable amount of people who don’t think the subject is relevant or even know anything about it, I’m creating a video for YouTube in Portuguese. But then I thought the psychological consequences for a not inconsiderable amount of people would be disastrous, as it seems to my girlfriend. However, I see a lot of valuable information that I can only find on Lesswrong and no other source in Portuguese and it seems it would be a mistake not to share. At the same time, I don’t want to be a information hazard source.
On one hand, I can simply create the video, translate it to English and share with Lesswrong community to see if the community approves.
On the other hand, you could say what you think it would be an adequate sequence to explain the subject, like: [what is coronavirus > why you should pay more than 1 minute attention to it > current number of deaths vs expected number of deaths > who is probably going to die > you have permission to be worried and take precautions > what are the precautions > what data should trigger behavior changing for more aggressive precautions > etc]