From informational; it might cause anxiety. That was part of the scattered message I got from this podcast this morning.
Part of what the psychology professor there had was this idea of limiting your intake of information to avoid the mental anguish new information might provoke
What. The. Actual. Fuck?
I did have a medical provider who told me the same sort of thing.
How can you even live in that sort of world/
That there are people who do might actually cause more anxiety for me than the change in “decided” facts.
No, information comes in, and you adjust based on that new information.
This is even more true when you have notable hosts, who’ve been demonstrably wrong, are worried that the audience doesn’t trust them. Oh, I don’t know? Or, maybe?
But back to the pod, the suggestion was that taking in new information constantly causes anxiety.
This is just completely incomprehensible to me.
Whenever I’m working on an argument, I do tend to dislike using the comparisons to cars or food. I understand that it’s probably lazy, but most people can comprehend the two ideas of driving a car, or cooking something. But, back to the examples I don’t like; does glancing at the speedometer periodically give you nightmares? How about looking through the oven window to see that the cake isn’t burning?
Incredible.
Subsequent things on the playlist, like the Reason Roundtable, quelled the disgust a bit.
Am I nervous about COVID-19? Yes. Am I nervous because I consume a lot of news? No.
Would I be better off if I was ignorant of the reasons for all the things that are affecting normal life?
No.
Even moreso when you consider that I’m on immeunosuppressants, and am at a greater risk of getting sick.
But I also know that the chances of me dying, even with my chemically-weakened immune system, is pretty low.
Assuming a 10% infection rate, and a 2% death rate, I’d be looking at a 0.2% chance of dying from the disease.
That I’m not anxious about that probably means that there’s something wrong with me.
Listening to the podcast only reinforces that. I’m messed up because I’m not that freaked out.
Okay.
So I should stop from taking things in because I might be freaked out?
How do I fix that?
Also, I should be trusting Chuck Todd, because not doing so is dangerous.
Again. Okay.
It takes a lot to really get me spun up.