gun, howitzer
gun, putty bullets
Hard Science, with Zombies ! (At-Risk Survivor)
Herschel the Doberman (At-Risk Survivor)
holiday, Christmas
holiday, Fourth of July
holiday, Mother’s Day
holiday, New Year’s
homemade, anchor
homemade, bomb
homemade, cannon
homemade, green vehicle
Homemade Howitzer (At-Risk Survivor)
Hot Buns (At-Risk Survivor)
ICanSayIToldYouSo (At-Risk Survivor)
icebergs!
insurance
It ’s the Cure That’ll Kill You (At-Risk Survivor)
Killer Fuel Economy (Merits Discussion)
Killer Ser ve (At-R isk Survivor)
Left Behind: Vestigial Structures (Science Interlude)
Locker Room Humor (At-Risk Survivor)
Low-Flying Drunks (Double Darwin Award Winner)
Man Meets Manure (Darwin Award Winner)
mattress
Medieval Mayhem (At-Risk Survivor)
Meet the Author (At-Risk Survivor)
military, free time
military, sentry duty
Missed (But Not Missed By) the Bus (Darwin Award Winner)
Mock Death (Darwin Award Winner)
Mortar Fire (At-Risk Survivor)
Motorized Bar Stool (At-Risk Survivor)
Mr. Tinker (At-Risk Survivor)
Muffled Explosion (Darwin Award Winner)
My Father, the Ph.D. (At-Risk Survivor)
Mystery of Super-Toxic Snake Venom (Science Interlude)
Ninja Deer Hunter (At-Risk Survivor)
Ninja Wannabe (At-Risk Survivor)
Nitrating the Unknown (At-Risk Survivor)
Not Even Half-Baked (At-Risk Survivor)
Not Fast Enough Food (Darwin Award Winner)
One Foot in the Pool (Darwin Award Winner)
One-Track Mind (Darwin Award Winner)
oven
microwave
shrink wrap
toaster
Padre Baloneiro—Balloon Priest (Double Darwin Award Winner)
Painkiller (Darwin Award Winner)
paint, spray can
parachute
Payback (Darwin Award Winner)
Pill Pusher (At-Risk Survivor)
Pillar of Strength (Darwin Award Winner)
Pipe Cleaner (At-Risk Survivor)
plastic wrap, weight loss
Poor Decision on a Major Scale (Darwin Award Winner)
Popsicle (At-Risk Survivor)
priest, Catholic
Project Steve (Science Interlude)
Putting the Pain in Propane (At-Risk Survivors)
Putty Bullet (At-Risk Survivor)
Quorum Sensing: Secret Language (Science Interlude)
Race to the Bottooommm (Darwin Award Winner)
Rapid Evolution (Science Interlude)
RNAI: Interference by Mother Nature (Science Interlude)........
Rub the Mint (Darwin Award Winner)
safety inspector
Saw It Coming! (Merits Discussion)
SCA, Society for Creative Anachronism
Sentry Duty (At-Risk Survivor)
Sex on the Brain (Science Interlude)
She Talks Faster Than She Walks (Darwin Award Winner)
Shocking Rappel (At-Risk Survivor)
Shockingly Conductive (At-Risk Survivor)
Short Circuit (Darwin Award Winner)
Single Bud Vase (At-Risk Survivor)
Sky Rider (At-Risk Survivor)
Sky Surfer (Darwin Award Winner)
Sparkleberry Lane (Darwin Award Winner)
Spin Cycle (At-Risk Survivor)
sport, bodysurfing
sport, “controlled” rock slide
sport, digging holes
sport, hunting
sport, jumping in a dust devil
sport, kite boarding
sport, ninja
sport, pull-ups
sport, rappel
sport, skiing
sport, street skating
sport, swimming
sport, tennis
student, frat boys
student, camping trip
student, chemistry
student, just graduated
student, summer job
Survival Tips
Taser, first aid
teacher, aviation electronics
Teeming With Crocodiles (Darwin Award Winner)
Tennessee Pee (Darwin Award Winner)
The Great Fruitcake Incident (At-Risk Survivor)
The Mane Attraction (At-Risk Survivor)
The Mettle of the Kettle (At-Risk Survivor)
theft, deterrent
toilet, jailhouse
toilet, mid-air
toilet, woods
tool, air compressor
tool, chainsaw
tool, drill
tool, GPS
tool, hammer
tool, shovel
tool, washing machine
tool, wrench
tornado, monster dust devil
transportation, balloon
transportation, by kite
transportation, plane
transportation, ski boat
transportation, tornado
tree, and fish
tree, and power lines
tree, dead
tree, safety
urine, mid-air
vehicle, bar stool
vehicle, bus
vehicle, Caterpillar
vehicle, demolition
vehicle, dragster
vehicle, electrified car
vehicle, fun and games
vehicle, moped
vehicle, natural gas
vehicle, one car crash
vehicle, pickup truck
vehicle, slow
vehicle, subway train
vehicle, tractor
vehicle, train vs. sports car
Volunteer “Fire” Man (At-Risk Sur vivor)
washing machine
wasps, “pissed off”
water, crocodile-infested
water, frigid
water, rainstorm
water, spillway
water, swimming pool
water, swollen creek
Wetting the Bed (Darwin Award Winner)
Wheel of Fortune (Darwin Award Winner)
whirlwind, dust devil
Why Bother With Sex? (Science Interlude)
Why I’m the Last of Nine Children (Darwin Award Winner)
woman
and a crocodile
and electricity
falling
late for bus
late for work
on a moped
surfing
Tasered
Zap Car (Darwin Award Winner)
zombies!
LOCATION INDEX
Australia
Belgium
Belgium
Brazil
Canada
China
Croatia
France
Germany
Greenland
India
Indonesia
Iraq
Italy
Malaysia
Mexico
Philippines
Poland
Romania
Russia
Serbia
South Africa
Spain
Sweden
Switzerland
The Netherlands
United Kingdom
USA, Arkansas
USA, California
USA, Florida
USA, Indiana
USA, Iowa
USA, Louisiana
USA, Michigan
USA, Minnesota
USA, Nevada
USA, New Jersey
USA, New York
USA, North Carolina
USA, Oklahoma
USA, Oregon
USA, Pennsylvania
USA, South Carolina
USA, Tennessee
USA, Texas
USA, Utah
USA, Virginia
USA, Washington
USA, West Virginia
1
Patterson, Richter, Gnerre, Lander, and Reich, “Genetic evidence for complex speciation of humans and chimpanzees,”
Nature
441 (2006), 1103 -1108.
2
Name changed to protect the privacy of the protagonist.
3
The Stella Awards recognize the most frivolous civil lawsuits, such as the diabetic obese man who sued McDonald’s.
www.StellaAwards.com
4
Name changed to protect the privacy of the protagonist.
5
Researchers were trying to determine whether chalcone synthase (CHS) was the rate-limiting enzymatic step in anthocyanin biosynthesis, the pathway that makes petunias purple. They
overexpressed
CHS DNA in petunias, expecting more purple, or no change—but instead got white or splotchy flowers. They measured CHS protein levels; the levels were far
lower
than normal, confounding common sense! Thus, from a failed experiment, the hypothesis of gene silencing was born.
6
NP-Complete describes a large class of problems in computer science. The good news is that a solution to any one of them would provide a solution to all; the bad news is that in forty years, no one has found a solution to even one. NP-Complete problems are often easy to identify, and once a problem is shown to fall in this possibly impossible category, the researcher is spared a frustrating wild goose chase. UC-Santa Cruz professor Scott Brandt often tells his students of his last days in industry, when his boss asked him to solve a difficult problem. He quickly determined that the problem was NP-Complete, and that no solution would be forthcoming. His boss said, “That’s not good enough. Work on it some more!” Shortly thereafter, the frustrated professor returned to the academic life.
7
Sex is a choice a species can make, an evolutionary path a
species
can take. We do not intend to imply that
any
creature can choose between sexual or asexual reproduction modes. Having learned to clone mammals, humans have become the first creature that is able to make this choice on an individual, conscious basis.
9
Pause for a moment to consider what else koalas might be doing with their
enormous fleshy tube
s . . .
10
Zap Car is a play on Zipcar, the laudable car-sharing company with a fleet of low-emisson vehicles.
12
HapMap Project: A catalog of genetic differences among populations around the world. Three million point mutations have been identified; medical advances are one of the many benefits expected to emerge from the HapMap Project. ScienceDaily has a fascinating article about the project:
http://tinyurl.com/23qpymp
13
See “Evolving Cancer” (p. 171) for more about the battles our bodies wage against cancer.
14
Sounds like a rehab program: “New Beginnings.”
15
In fact, humans are evolving faster than ever before.
For more on human evolution, read Rapid Evolution, p. 211.
16
Note the beauty of this number.