TCNJ

19 Tell us more. Ontological security is basically the idea that we feel safe because there's nothing to make us feel unsafe. If you think about driving, for instance, you will go crazy because of all the possible things that could go wrong with your car. You're basically driving a controlled explosion that propels you at relatively high speeds, using machinery built by people you don't know. And you get onto a road built by people who may or may not have known what they were doing—there may be sinkholes, bridges can collapse. There are all these other people in boxes with controlled explosions who may or may not follow the traffic rules. If you think about driving, it's terrifying, right? It's hard to function, thinking about every little possibility. Because nothing bad happens when we drive, we start feeling like it's safe, even though the high level of complexity and the reliance on other people and their expertise in modern systems makes them pretty risky. And when there's a disruption like Superstorm Sandy, we think, "Oh wow, this is a risky system. Maybe we do need to think about these decisions." But as we go back into our daily routine, all that gets backgrounded again. You're basically explaining what happens after every crisis. We're very focused for a while—certainly what happened in Paris last November was shattering—but I'm not thinking about it every day now. Human beings are actually pretty clever at being able to survive. To not be crazy worried about these things all the time—stress does terrible things to human health, as well as human psychology—we've culturally adapted to these highly risky systems through ontological security. Everything you've said about how to analyze the pressures on the environmental health of the shore has been fascinating: the economic, sociological, and natural sciences. What will the social sciences add going forward? The good thing is that you're seeing more agreement between the natural sciences and engineers about incorporating the social sciences when seeking answers. It will allow for more practical discussions about what actually causes environmental risk and which combination of solutions might actually fix the problem rather than just provide Band-Aid solutions. Still, it won't be easy: Social scientists will require us to think about the way social systems—famously resistant to change—are organized. As I write in the book, humans are creatures of habit, and habits provide much-needed security. Restoring the shore may be important symbolically and economi- cally, but the desire to get back to normal is a siren song that drowns out the catastrophic risks inherent in dense coastal development. Renée Olson is the owner of Squint, a content shop. GETTY IMAGES, JENA ARDELL

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