We often hear anecdotal support for little “gifts of fear” in the form of personal or “I have a cousin” stories. These stories often take the form of: “Joe was at this bar and he had a bad feeling about this guy giving him the eye and sure enough before the night was done that guy tried to break a bottle over his head.” In my example story, fictional Joe’s “gift of fear” was proven correct and that would be the only reason for Joe (or his cousin) to pass along the story. But if we are to give credence to gifts of fear we must also give credence to all gifts of fear.
By this I mean, Joe’s story is passably interesting only because something occurred after his initial tingle of suspicion but, what if Joe experienced the tingle and the guy never went for the bottle? No story and chances are Joe would forget the fear-tingling incident ever occurred. As a matter of fact, most little tingles of fear we get are for naught (we’ll get to why this is in a bit). The nerves (fear) before a speech seldom signal that the crowd is going to attack. If everyone who ever experienced an “unsettling feeling” before boarding a plane acted on that feeling we would be looking at the collapse of the airline industry. I offer that, more often than not, our miniature gifts of fear are mistakes in perception and easily forgotten because nothing occurred. We humans love a good story and may occasionally give too much weight to after the fact stories of precognition. Those far smarter than I label this logical fallacy “post hoc ergo propter hoc” (approximate Latin for “after this, therefore because of this”).
So, am I saying that we should ignore our gifts of fear? Not necessarily. But first a little about why we are so damn fearful. The human animal evolved in an environment where there were many things to “be on the look out for”—venomous snakes, inclement weather (even mild inclemency is problematic in sparse or zero shelter), quadrupedal predator species, bipedal predators (competing humans), wounded but still dangerous kill, and a myriad other dangers associated with Paleolithic hunting and nomadic existence. In short, fear in this environment was (and is, when thrust back into these conditions) a necessary part of survival.
Time travel to now and, assuming that the majority of us live in fairly safe conditions, (I trust that if you have the safety and leisure to read this article life is okey-dokey for you at the moment) and we find conditions far different from those enjoyed by our Stone Age ancestors. Our current environment and conditions may be vastly different than what our Paleolithic forebears dealt with but our brains are essentially the same. Our brains still seek potential threats and hidden dangers (not a bad thing, mind you, with a little prudence—we’ll get to that). The problem is our Stone Age brains still look for threats in the past environment—more people are afraid of spiders and snakes than of driving or riding in a car when the odds far and away are in favor of the car injuring and/or killing you. More people fear the stranger when crime statistics show that you are much more likely to be harmed (assaulted, raped, or murdered) by someone you know. Our 21st century lives are still influenced by Paleolithic concerns and these primitive concerns are often translated into little gifts of fear that may no longer have context. Context, by the way, is the key.
Environment, both physical and emotional, is our great context provider. Environment provides us with the cues or clues that inform us as to whether or not to be more alert to our miniature gifts of fear. Environment can let us know whether to stay alert or stand-down. For example, mobs can be dangerous and they can also be benign, the environmental context will assist you in determining how much credence to lend to any anxiety you may experience. A mob of educators at a teachers’ convention is one thing; a mob of Neo-Nazis at a rally is something altogether different. We can keep the physical environment example and alter the emotional environment. Picture the same Neo-Nazi rally where the Neo-Nazi focus is on a Neo-Nazi family picnic complete with sack races and a mass water balloon fight—doesn’t change the distasteful political stance of the group but, it does leaven your perceived threat a bit. Back to the teachers’ convention, let’s assume that mandatory merit pay has just been announced and tenure has been done away with and the teachers don’t seem to care for that a bit—a little different now, huh?
Physical and emotional environments will provide our context for fear cues. No, we should not ignore all fear cues but we must (if we are to be rational as well as safe) evaluate them for what they might possibly be—a remnant of a survival system from long ago that may not be relevant in the current environment. And we also must remember the human propensity to “remember the hits and forget the misses” (again: post hoc ergo propter hoc) when it comes to our little gifts of fear stories. Of course, this was all said much better by Mark Twain, and I paraphrase: “I’ve had many troubles in my life, most of which have never happened.”
