Sign up to get Today’s Best Articles in your inbox
Join 350,000+ subscribers and keep yourself informed with a selection of
The Week’s most interesting, enlightening and entertaining stories - plus daily puzzles.
You are now subscribed
Your newsletter sign-up was successful
Want to add more newsletters?
An account already exists for this email address, please log in.
Here's what humans would look like if we evolved to survive car accidents
They say it's what's on the inside that counts — but protecting those insides might come at a higher cost than originally anticipated. As part of a campaign to promote safe driving, the Transport Accident Commission in Melbourne, Australia, went ahead and commissioned a semi-horrifying project named Graham:
Graham is a dummy designed by sculptor Patricia Piccinini in collaboration with a team of scientists and engineers to show what humans would look like if we evolved to withstand car crashes. It's not pretty. Graham's creators have blessed him with no nose and a flat face, which is fortified with excess fatty tissue to absorb the shock of impact. He also has extra ribs for extra organ protection, knees that can bend in all directions, and the hooflike feet of Satan himself.
"Cars have evolved a lot faster we have," says road safety engineer Dr. David Logan in a video for the project. "In the modern world, we're subjecting our bodies to much higher speeds, and the body just doesn't have the physiology to absorb the energy when things go wrong."
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Join more than 350,000 subscribers and keep yourself informed with a selection of The Week’s most interesting, enlightening and entertaining stories - plus daily puzzles.
Join more than 350,000 subscribers and keep yourself informed with a selection of The Week’s most interesting, enlightening and entertaining stories - plus daily puzzles.
