Read a book from a century ago. You’ll see which worries were timeless and which were just that year’s panic.

Old books are accidental records of what people were frightened of. Some of it reads like it was written yesterday: money, love, whether the young are turning out badly. The rest is fear about one specific invention or scandal that turned out to matter very little. Seeing the two side by side gives you a way of sorting today’s noise without waiting a century for the answer.

Borrow something written well before you were born and read a few chapters. Mark the worries that still land and the ones that have evaporated. Then look at whatever is currently alarming everybody and guess which pile it belongs in.