At this moment, a savage microbe is holding the human world hostage, forcing nearly 4 billion of our industrious, gallivanting kind into a society of shut-ins. Confined to our homes — if we’re lucky enough to have them — we’re banding apart, hoping to slow the spread and deprive a greedy pathogen of any more human hosts. COVID-19 already has plenty.
Indoors indefinitely, we watch the outside world through our screens. We see New York’s wrapped bodies stacked and refrigerated, army trucks carrying off Italy’s dead, rising curves, health care workers weeping, politicians clinging to poise, and we wonder: Should I buy more canned goods? Is my family safe? Can I still smell stuff? Did our lockdown come too late? Will there be jobs when it’s over? When will it be over? Is it okay to walk the dog?
Humans are not well designed for this slow-burn brand of threat. We’re better equipped for one-off attacks than abstract menaces. Give us muggers, hurricanes, sabre-toothed tigers, hazards that compel us to battle or run for our lives — not the protracted uncertainty of a contagion that has killed tens of thousands and counting.
So just how is the human brain responding to all this?
“It’s screaming,” says Susan Krauss Whitbourne, a professor of psycho logical and brain sciences at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. “I know, it’s a very technical term,” she jokes. “But, in our brains, there’s a lot of screaming going on right now.”
Diese Geschichte stammt aus der June 2020-Ausgabe von The Walrus.
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Diese Geschichte stammt aus der June 2020-Ausgabe von The Walrus.
Starten Sie Ihre 7-tägige kostenlose Testversion von Magzter GOLD, um auf Tausende kuratierte Premium-Storys sowie über 8.000 Zeitschriften und Zeitungen zuzugreifen.
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MY GUILTY PLEASURE
I WAS AS SURPRISED as anyone when I became obsessed with comics again last year, at the advanced age of forty-five. As a kid, I loved reading G.I. Joe and The Amazing Spider-Man.
The Upside-Down Book
In her new novel, Rachel Cusk makes the case for becoming a stranger to yourself
Pick a Colour
BACK HERE, I can hear a group of women trickle in. Filling the floor with giggles and voices.
Quebec's Crushing Immigration Policy
Familial separation can have devastating consequences on mental health and productivity
The Briefcase
What I learned about being a writer from trying to finish a dead man's book
In the Footsteps of Migrants Who Never Made It
Thousands have died trying to cross into the US from Mexico. Each year, activists follow their harrowing trek
Blood Language
Menstruation ties us to the land in ways we've all but forgotten
Dream Machines
The real threat with artificial intelligence is that we'll fall prey to its hype
Invisible Lives
Without immigration status, Canada's undocumented youth stay in the shadows
My Guilty Pleasure
"The late nights are mine alone, and I'll spend them however I damn well please"