The Washington Post writes: “The story of fallout shelters, it turns out, is partly a story about safety in the nuclear age, but it’s more about the placebo effect in times of panic. In a grimly practical way, the emotion of being inside one was a pleasant reassurance of self-deception.”

What is our contemporary fallout shelter? What measures are we taking now that in 50 years will be recognized as doing nothing much beyond calming the panic?