arndt@lymph.DEC (04/03/85)
Over the past few months I have been exercised about a growing lump on my hip. It doesn't look like a wart, a carbuckle, or anything else I can name. What it DOES look like I have been afraid to advertise. It looks like a . . . well, let me explain how I have managed to identify it. ******************* From Science Digest: "The brain drives evolution", says Allan C. Wilson of the University of California at Berkeley. "Even in an environment that isn't changing, organisms with big brains find new ways of exploiting the environment." In human evolution, behavior may underlie 99% of the anatomical change, he says. There has not (he says) been an explicit hypothesis emphasizing the idea that nongenetic propagation of new skills in large populations will significantly accelerate anatomical evolution in vertebrates other than humans. "If it was not explicitly formulated, it is implicit in work on cultural evolution," argues Stephen Gould of Harvard U. ************* From US News and World Report: About only 15% of passengers in the front seat wear seat belts. But 92% of all traffic-accident deaths are accounted for by people in the front seat! Now it's true the risks involved don't at first look big, but break it down. The chance of a single auto trip resulting in a fatal accident are 1 in 4 million! However, over a lifetime the average American takes 50,000 trips. That raises the lifetime risk of being killed to 1 in 100! The chance of being seriously injured is 1 in 3!!! ************** Well, put it together and what have you got? Bippity, boppity boo! No. A growing lump that strangely resembles an AUTO SEAT BELT!!!!! I mean it has a hard boney flap with a little square cutout in the center. It's even on my RIGHT hip! But I'm mostly a driver, so is this a practice run by Ma Evolution that's going to be 'recalled' at a later time?? Why me?? What should I do gang??? I'm afraid to pull on the flap for fear the darn thing won't retract!!! I own an Omni, you see. I mean, what if I have to go through life with this unretractable seat belt thing hanging off my hip? And how do I explain it to friends if I USE it? And how do I keep it CLEAN? I have enough trouble with my navel (the doctor took care of the other thing when I was little). Oh, merde! It's tough being a 'link'. Anyone else want to step out of the evolutionary closet?? Concerned in New Hampster. Ken Arndt