Chapter One
Penance:
Seven Deadly Sins
The tree of life is self-pruning.
Religions have long waged war against the seven deadly sins. Here's proof thatevolution is fighting the same battle. Lust, vanity, gluttony, greed, sloth,envy, and wrath: all are fatal when carried to excess. From sensual skunk playto the vanity of amateur liposuction, indulgence in the deadly vices leads totrouble.
Discussion: Kismet, Karma, Destiny
Are you superstitious?
We enjoy believing in abstract balancing principles. Thereought to be a force that gives each what he's earned, call it kismet,karma, or destiny. And yet we also believe in the opposite—luckyslot machines and winning streaks. Don't you sometimeswalk around a ladder, or kiss your exam paper for good luck?Superstitious beliefs are imbedded in our personalities.
The Darwin Awards celebrate another sort of religion—thatof final justice according to the divine laws of nature. Darwinwinners suffer a practical form of karma. They prove ourtheory that if you don't use your head to enhance your survival,you'll be fingered by the impartial hand of fate.
There is a solid basis for the "religion" of the DarwinAwards: Charles Darwin's theory of natural selection. In a singlelifetime one finds ample proof that natural selection leadsto evolution. We've seen evolution happen before our veryeyes. Broccoli, dog breeds, nectarines, and modern corn all resultedfrom random mutations combined with natural (or artificial)selection.
Weeds provide an example of evolution happening in yourown front lawn.
Dandelions are ubiquitous and very difficult to eliminate.
A handful of wild dandelion seeds will grow into adults ofassorted heights, which scatter their seeds far and wide to beginthe process again. But weekly lawn mowing schedules area new selective pressure! We created a new environmental hazardfor dandelions. And they rose, or rather shrunk, to meetthe challenge.
Regular cutting of lawns selects for very short dandelions,ones that hug the ground too closely to be slashed by mowerblades, and send up flowers that seed within days to avoid thereaper's scythe. A new short dandelion variant is branching offthe general dandelion population. Over time the lawn dandelionsmay well diverge from the wild dandelions, increasinglyspecialized for the modern lawn environment, and a newspecies—the lawnlion?—will dawn.
Because examples of natural selection are easy to come by,the "religion" of the Darwin Awards stands on firm scientificfooting. The interesting and powerful mechanism of natural selectionis a blindly omniscient tool to increase the long-termsurvival of the human race—and provide a measure of immortalityto comfort our transient personal existence.
The stories that follow show the Darwinian repercussionsto those who ignore religious strictures, and indulge in theseven deadly sins.
Darwin Award: Vanity
Liposuction Tragedy
Unconfirmed by Darwin
September 1999, New York
David, a forty-four-year-old Mineola man, was more desperate to be rid of hisflab than most. Why not save money and allow his friend to perform amateurliposuction on him in his garage? As you might guess, using a vacuum forliposuction is not the safest of weight loss programs. David died in themakeshift medical clinic, the victim of a lidocaine overdose. Anyone foolishenough to lie back and take the medical ministrations of a unlicensedliposuctionist in his garage workshop deserves to win a Darwin for heedlessvanity.
The fake physician apologized to the man's family.
Reference: Associated Press
* More vacuum peril: Fantastic Plastic Lover, page 88
"I don't think, therefore I am not."
Darwin Award: Vanity
Perilous Pose
Unconfirmed by Darwin
September 2000, Germany
The picturesque medieval city of Rothenburg was recently the scene of a dramaticartistic effort. A fifty-three-year-old man from Baden-Würtemberg was posingnude in front of his camera, balanced atop a stone wall, when he lost hisbalance and fell sixteen feet to the ground below. Unlike its erstwhile owner,the camera remained safely settled on the tripod on the wall, and police plan todevelop the film for clues to the man's death. Darwin anticipates that thisstory will stand as a testament to the self-pruning nature of the tree of life.
Reference: Ananova.com
* Another poorly framed photograph: Enraged Elephant, page 30
Darwin Award: Wrath
Throwing Stones
Confirmed by Darwin
11 October 2000, Samaria
The violent unrest in the Middle East has created a new Darwin Award winner.Three friends went to the Eli junction to enjoy a favorite activity: throwingstones at passing cars. They scored on a truck, then one walked into the street,stones in hand, to attack a passing car. The driver tried to swerve away fromthe man, lost control of his vehicle, and overturned, killing the stone throwerand severely injuring himself. Judea and Samaria district police jointlydetermined that the accidental crash was caused by the stone-throwing young men.
Those who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones.
Reference: Ha'aretz, Itim
* Throwing snowballs: Snowball's Chance in Hell, page 73
Darwin Award: Greed
Crystal Daze
2000, Mexico Confirmed by Darwin
Chihuahua, Mexico, is home to two hot caverns containing the largest naturalcrystals known to man. "Walking into either of these caves is like stepping intoa sweltering, gigantic geode," described one awed observer. Some of the clearcrystals of selenite are over twenty feet long.
The newly discovered caverns buried twelve hundred feetbelow the surface of the earth carry a curse for those who seekto plunder their riches. A man recently tried to steal one of themagnificent crystals from the roof, and might have succeeded ifhe hadn't stood directly beneath it while chopping it free. Hewas crushed by the sparkling stalactite as it heeded the call ofgravity.
Reference: Discovery Channel News
* Another thief thwarted by a natural force:
Ferguson 2, Thieves 0, page 162
"To be or not to be ..."
Darwin Award: Sloth
Sleepfalling
Confirmed by Darwin
19 June 1999, Amsterdam
On a warm summer night in the Netherlands, an Italian resident who had picked upthe habit of sleeping in the open air during sweltering Mediterranean summernights decided to bed down on the roof. He climbed to the top of his apartmentand arranged a comfortable bed, but paid little heed to the slope of the roof.Perhaps the night would have ended more happily if he had tucked himself insecurely. Instead he fell asleep on top of his blanket, rolled down the incline,and plunged to his death.
Reference: Mobile Alabama Press Register
* Another fateful snooze: Sheep Sleep, page 116
A high IQ doesn't make up for
a lack of common sense.
Darwin Award: Envy
Flames of Passion
Confirmed by Darwin
17 November 1999, Germany
Germany's image as a peaceful utopia has been tarnished by an acrimoniousdivorce. After bitter legal proceedings, Uwe of Brandenburg found that he hadlost everything but his lederhosen knickerbockers. Among other possessions, thesettlement demanded that Uwe turn over ownership of his house to his newlyestranged wife.
Enraged by his wife's unmitigated legal victory, the forty-year-oldman decided to follow the sage advice of an obscureGerman proverb: "If life gives you lemons, burn them."
Descending into the basement with his trusty drill, Uwe proceededto bore several holes into a rather large oil tank. He thenset fire to the fuel as it poured in erratic streams onto the floor.To his delight, the entire basement was engulfed in flameswithin seconds.
His joy turned to ashes, however, when he realized that hewas now in the middle of a Hindenburg-sized house fire. Despitea valiant effort to save himself, Uwe died in the flames ofhis own vengeance. His wife got the last laugh.
Reference: Düsseldorf Express
* More revenge gone wrong: Aircraft Airhead, page 35
Darwin Award: Envy
Moscow Marauder
Confirmed by Darwin
8 September 2000, Russia
A man who threatened to "deal with" his wife and her lover, instead dealt withhimself in a revenge attempt gone wrong. He blew himself up with a homemade bombin the far eastern Russian city of Khabarovsk. The device exploded when the mantried to attach it to the door of the lovers' not-so-secret apartment boudoir.
Reference: Reuters, Tass
* More men playing with bombs: Shell Shot, page 133
Darwin Award: Gluttony
Ethanol Schmethanol
Unconfirmed by Darwin
May 2001, England
We'll soon find out if I'm a scientist or not!
I'll drop a pellet of the compound I created
into this test tube ...
— Stan Lee's Spiderman, November 1963
With those murmured words, a Russian professor quaffed an aliquot of clear fluidfrom a beaker ... and slowly succumbed to alcohol poisoning. The OxfordUniversity professor had been in the habit of drinking laboratory ethanol, untilhe unwittingly poured his last drink from a bottle of methanol.
According to Usenet scientists, methanol is a common labsolvent that looks and smells like ethanol but is "five times astoxic and five times less intoxicating." Those who drink it invariablydrink too much.
The forty-four-year-old professor of ecology was said to havehad poor vision, and probably misread the label.
Reference: solstice.crest.org, London Telegraph
* A gopher's experience with mind-altering substances:
Revenge of the Gopher, page 203
The line between genius and stupidity is very fine.
Honorable Mention: Gluttony
Men Eating Chili
Unconfirmed by Darwin
May 1999, Philippines
Three men attempting to land in the Guinness Book of World Records werehospitalized in Legaspi after eating excessive amounts of chili peppers. Theywere treated for acute gastritis and high blood pressure, and released with awarning to moderate their intake.
Reference: UPI, The Star
* Another try for the Guinness Book of World Records: Rubbish, page 31
* Another serious case of indigestion: The Last Supper, page 199
Continues...
Excerpted from The Darwin Awards IIby Wendy Northcutt Copyright © 2003 by Wendy Northcutt. Excerpted by permission.
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