One of the challenges we all currently face is how to think about what is happening as our world is suddenly turned upside down. This is especially the case since we tend to have certain blind spots when it comes to understanding numbers, as well as the way things like exponential growth really operate. In a way this is a special case of cognitive biases, which we might call math blindness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Here are two very different approaches to addressing math blindness The first one is an article that deals with the mathematics of exponential growth as it applies both to the spread of the Corona virus known as COVID-19 and the still looming issue of climate change. The second is the website of an artist named Chris Jordan whose work directly addresses the problem of making very large numbers seem more real to us. Many of the problems we face as a society have to do with the fact that the scale of human life and its impacts is so vast that we cannot get our heads around it. Jordan’s work helps us to actually see what is happening in a stark and compelling way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What the Coronavirus Curve Teaches Us About Climate Change<\/a><\/h4>
The coronavirus pandemic-sadly-has introduced or reintroduced many people to the concept of an exponential curve, in which a quantity grows at an increasing rate over time, as the number of people contracting the virus currently is doing. It is this curve that so many of us are trying to “flatten” through social distancing and other mitigating measures, small and large.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n