“We can look ahead to our retirement or to a dental appointment, and we can take action today to save for retirement or to floss so that we don’t get bad news six months down the line. But we’re just learning this trick,” he says. “It’s really a very new adaptation in the animal kingdom and we don’t do it all that well. We don’t respond to long-term threats with nearly as much vigor and venom as we do to clear and present dangers.”
