Darwin at Work

Bill McCabe linked to this story, about a 19-year-old woman who was crushed by a train after she jumped down onto the subway tracks to retrieve her cellular phone. Bill takes issue with the media's misuse of the word "tragic."

He makes a good point.

I commented over there that anytime one of these people gets taken out of the gene pool, it's probably not that bad a thing. I mean, seriously, do we want the person who is looking so intently for a phone that she's oblivious to a train to be responsible for the upbringing of more children?

To expand on that thought a little....it's one less cell phone to go off in a movie theater, as well. I'd assume the phone was lost. It's one less person to miss completely a revolution of red, green and yellow lights because they're too involved in the conversation to even hear me laying on the horn. It's one less person to confuse me utterly and completely in a supermarket with one of those headsets that you can't see from one side...and they talk....and you think they're talking to you about going to a wedding with somebody named Fred, but noooooooo.....

That last one's more of a personal embarrassment than anything.

It almost wouldn't be so bad if the person on the phone would jump out of their conversation for a second just to say "Gotcha!"

Cellular phones. Pfah, I say.