Don't Panic!

I was reading an Article on The Register about the torino scale. This is basically a threat level scale for approaching asteroids / meteors / comets etc. They decided that the current wording could unnerve people a bit, so they decided to tone it down a bit…

This is the old maximum threat level description:

A collision capable of causing a global climatic catastrophe [which might] occur once per 100,000 years, or less often

And this is the new maximum threat level description:

A collision is certain, capable of causing global climatic catastrophe that may threaten the future of civilization as we know it, whether impacting land or ocean. Such events occur on average once per 100,000 years, or less often.

Don’t you just love scientists? Now we don’t just have a global climactic catastrophe, we also have to worry about the future of civilisation as we know it… that’s made me feel so much better!

I don’t think I’ll miss civilisation as we know it, to be honest