The Science of Fear

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“Fear is implanted in us as a preservative from evil; but its duty, like that of the other passions, is not to overbear reason, but to assist it.”

—SAMUEL JOHNSON

Prologue: 1,595

Anyone who saw it will never forget it. And almost everyone saw it. When the first jet darted out of that crisp blue September sky and crashed into the World Trade Center, only a single television camera—on the street filming city officials doing some mundane task now long forgotten—captured the image. But as the tower burned, alerts flashed through wires and airwaves. The world’s electronic eyes turned, opened, and waited. When the second plane streaked in, an immense audience— perhaps hundreds of millions—saw the jet, the angry explosion, the gushing smoke, the glass and steel raining down like confetti in a parade. They saw it live. It was so clear, so intimate. It was like watching the whole awful spectacle through the living-room window.

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