hughcasey: why worst-case scenario thinking is dumb, lazy and dangerous:Worst-case thinking means generally bad decision making for several reasons. First, it's only half of the cost-benefit equation. Every decision has costs and benefits, risks and rewards. By speculating about what can possibly go wrong, and then acting as if that is likely to happen, worst-case thinking focuses only on the extreme but improbable risks and does a poor job at assessing outcomes.Read. Glean. Behavior like this was one of the big things that drove me nuts about my hospital job that I quit in 2008: my office was littered with people who automatically assumed most things would go to crap and not work and cause disaster. It was draining to be around. It was so relentless. So I'm simpactico with what Bruce Schneier said there.
Second, it's based on flawed logic. It begs the question by assuming that a proponent of an action must prove that the nightmare scenario is impossible.
Third, it can be used to support any position or its opposite...
Fourth and finally, worst-case thinking validates ignorance. Instead of focusing on what we know, it focuses on what we don't know...