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When is the last time that you saw something that made you say, "What...?"?
I was driving down a four lane divided boulevard around lunch time today (Monday) in light traffic, when I saw the police cleaning up a traffic accident. There was a convertible in the middle of the grassy raised medium that was turned sideways and had its passenger side smashed in by the light pole that obviously stopped it. I hoped that there wasn't a passenger in the car, because the pole was where he should have been.
I worked briefly as an accident investigator for auto insurance companies shortly after graduating with a BS in engineering, but I couldn't figure out off the top of my head how it was possible for a driver, on dry pavement and a sunny day, to do this.
Insert whatever philosophical or religious comment that you want about the fragility of life, or idiot drivers. You decide.
3 Answers
- 1 decade agoFavorite Answer
I'm a very accident prone person. So I've had lots of accidents, though most have been minor. Mostly, because I was riding really fast and some idiot decided to switch lanes just then. But the worst one I've had has been my fault totally. Hollering at someone who almost shoved you off the road, does shove you off the road.
But you talked about the philosophical thoughts about the fragility of life. One way to look at this is that we don't want stupid people left over in the gene-pool. But I don't think that way. I think that most people are more concerned with other people's lives than their own. Having the choice between running someone over and running off the road, you'll find that most people run off the road (incidentally that might have been the case here). Life is fragile because it evolved from single celled carbon based organisms. One might have a rhinoceros' skin, but in the end, a bullet will kill you. Artificial life (AI etc.) will obviously be metal (and silicon), and you can expect it to be more robust.
Why humans are the dominant species on earth is because we've developed the ability to artificially modify our surroundings so that for the most part, it doesn't matter that our bodies are fragile. We've got protection for everything. Have you ever seen someone working in a foundry or a cement kiln. The temperatures are really really high. We survive. The trieste went to the bottom of the deepest ocean, with people in it. They survived.