If You Were a Terrorist, How Would You Attack?

[jason]

Originally published at Lemmingworks. You can comment here or there.

This is steven levitt speaking not me. He wrote Freakonomics. Check out the comments at the end. It has a very Michael Moore feel.

[What would I] do to maximize terror if I were a terrorist with limited resources. I’d start by thinking about what really inspires fear. One thing that scares people is the thought that they could be a victim of an attack. With that in mind, I’d want to do something that everybody thinks might be directed at them, even if the individual probability of harm is very low. Humans tend to overestimate small probabilities, so the fear generated by an act of terrorism is greatly disproportionate to the actual risk.

If You Were a Terrorist, How Would You Attack? - Freakonomics - Opinion - New York Times Blog