A sign of the times

[kandrathe]

By far the largest Darwinian actor of natural selection in our society is driving. Every year, teen drivers will seriously injure about 400,000 people, and about 5,000 (of ~39,000 MV fatalities) of these teens will die in traffic fatalities. Teen drivers (<20) account for 13% of all vehicle fatalities. So, yes, it's stupid for a 13 year old to douse himself with gasoline and light himself on fire. But, where I grew up I knew 17 and 18 year old teens who risked far worse (including all the other people on the road) driving their cars recklessly. In fact, I know of at least one of my class mates who (driving the wrong way on the highway) killed a car full of people, but not himself. The propensity for this type of moronic behavior is one of the reasons why once I left, I've never really wanted to return to the land of my youth.