The Darwin Awards

'Only two things are infinite - the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the universe.'Albert Einstein, Scientific adviser to the Darwin AwardsOne of the best known and most frequently visited web sites is the Darwin Awards web site. Practically everyone who is on the net has received a Darwin story in their e-mail at one time or another. It is one of those legendary sites which has become part of the fabric of being on-line. Started in 1993 by biologist Wendy Northcutt she set out to collect together and authenticate stories of individuals around the world who, through their stupidity, have 'removed themselves from the gene pool' (i.e. killed themselves). These are the people for whom warnings such as 'coffee is hot' and 'this superman cape does not enable the wearer to fly' were made. This is black humour elevated to its purest commercial form. There are rules here too. The candidate must: exhibit astounding misapplication of judgement; remove himself/herself from the gene pool; be capable of sound judgement; be self selecting (i.e. it was their fault) and the event must be verifiable. The book will contain four types of stories: The Darwin Awards; Honourable mentions; urban legends; personal accounts. The introduction will explain the nature and origin of the awards then the stories will be divided into 18 chapters, ranging from Testosterone Poisoning: Men at Risk; Junk Food Junkie: Food and Drink; Dangerous Liaisons: Unsafe Sex; The Fairer Sex: Femme Fatalities; Argue with God: Science and Religion; Dirty Job: Death at Work and I Fought the Law: Stupid Criminal Tricks. Each chapter will be have a funny introduction and one in six stories will have an 'serious' discussion of its veracity. There will be over 150 stories: ten new stories and the rest from the site.