You Might Be a Zombie and Other Bad News Part 7

So, yeah . . . Suck it Suck it, enormous sky raptor of legend! We beat your a.s.s by not having enough calories! Go humanity!

FIVE WAYS YOUR BRAIN IS MESSING WITH YOUR HEAD.

SURE, our minds are being screwed with by advertisers, politicians, magicians, etc. But as it turns out, the ways in which your head is being truly and royally messed with the most are coming from inside your skull.

5. CHANGE BLINDNESS.

Change blindness is the inability to notice changes that happen right in front of you as long as you don't watch the actual change take place.

Um, what?

Focus on anyone around you. If their pants spontaneously changed color, you'd notice and probably soil your own. But if you looked away and focused on something else, then came back and found their jeans had turned to khakis, odds are you almost certainly would not notice, even if your attention was elsewhere for only a few seconds.

If your brain processed everything in your visual spectrum you would go insane, so instead it picks and chooses what to focus on. If an image changes while your brain isn't paying attention, your brain tells you the change was there all along.

It's like your brain is sitting in cla.s.s, staring out the window at a cloud that sort of looks like a p.e.n.i.s. When you call on your brain, it does the same thing you do when a teacher calls on you in those circ.u.mstances: starts bulls.h.i.tting.

Where it gets really weird . . .

Working with psychologist Susan Greenfield, the BBC decided to take this idea to a ridiculous extreme. They filmed an experiment in which one man worked the counter at a university copy center while another hid below the counter. When a student walked up and requested a form, the first man would duck down behind the counter to get it, and the previously hidden man would pop up and say, "Ah, here it is." Despite this previously hidden second person looking completely different, most of the students did not freaking notice that they were now talking to a totally different person.

This is probably what made the producers of Bewitched Bewitched think they could just switch Darrins on us. think they could just switch Darrins on us.

4. SACCADIC MASKING.

Saccadic masking is the forty or so minutes per day that you're effectively blind.

Um, what?

Look at the wall to your left. When you flicked your eyes over there, for just a moment you were blind. And you didn't even know it.

Ever watch a movie that gave you motion sickness due to the camera whipping around too fast with that "shaky handheld camera" gimmick? Your brain doesn't like those rapid changes in vision, which is why some folks ended up puking while watching Cloverfield Cloverfield.

Your eye movements are even faster and shakier than that. If you were to look closely at someone else's eye, you'd notice that it's never steady for more than a third of a second. Even when you think you're rolling your eyes, they're actually moving in a series of rapid jerky movements known as saccades. To prevent your world from looking like you're seeing it through a jerky camcorder all day, your brain shuts down your optic nerve during these tiny movements. That's why we told you to look at your friend's eyeball instead of looking at your own in a mirror. While it might have created less s.e.xual tension, everyone's own eyeball will look perfectly stationary to them because they're blind during each and every jerky saccade. That's saccadic masking.

Where it really gets weird . . .

The spooky part is the way your brain prevents you from noticing the blackness that occurs several times a second, every time you use your eyes. Estimates vary, but it's likely that you're spending around forty minutes a day with your eyes wide open, and totally blind.

Here's where saccadic masking and change blindness team up to screw with your mind. A scientist named George McConkie was able to track people's eye movements down to each individual saccadic movement. This enabled him to introduce changes in words and text without the subject noticing while they were looking directly at it while they were looking directly at it. If a change occurs during that fraction of a second when the brain is dodging calls like the optic nerve was an ex-girlfriend, you won't notice it. Even when it happens right in front of your d.a.m.ned eyes.

3. PROPRIOCEPTION.

Proprioception is your brain's map of your body, and it steers you wrong on a regular basis.

Um, what?

Proprioception is your brain's ability to sense where your limbs are. This is how you can put a sandwich in your mouth while your eyes are focused on the TV: Your brain knows where your hand is in relation to your face.

If you've ever failed a field sobriety test, you know this kind of self-knowledge is fallible. Your proprioception is like your brain's underwear: pretty much the first thing to disappear when you're any kind of drunk. Basically, the cops doing the roadside test are trying to see if your brain knows where your fingers are in relation to your nose.

Even though your brain carries around a detailed awareness of exactly where your body parts are at all times, when that awareness gets drunk enough to start lying to you, you'll ignore everything you've ever known and say, "Oh, well. Guess I've been wrong about the length of my nose all these years."

Where it really gets weird . . .

The best example we've found so far is "the Pinocchio illusion." Scientists have found that they can have the subject touch the tip of their nose with their finger while having their biceps electrically stimulated at the same time. Your brain "feels" your arm muscle extending, but also feels that you're maintaining contact with the tip of your nose and leaps to the immediate conclusion that your nose has suddenly grown to be about three feet long.

Incidentally, we know exactly which illusion you're about to try to induce, figuring all it'll take is a girl, a dark room, and the right equipment. Don't do it. It leads to eventual disappointment.

2. CRYPTOMNESIA.

Sometimes called subconscious plagiarism subconscious plagiarism, it's what happens when your brain rips off someone else's ideas and doesn't tell you.

Um, what?

Your brain isn't great at remembering where your ideas come from. Cryptomnesia happens when you find a really good idea and don't bother to remember that it's not yours.

Although occurrences are pretty rare, there are still some famous cases: Nietzsche accidentally didn't write quite a bit of Thus Spoke Zarathustra Thus Spoke Zarathustra, George Harrison was forced to sh.e.l.l out almost $600,000 for a song he "borrowed," and an early incident with cryptomnesia permanently ruined the celebrity-author career of Helen Keller, who wrote up a fairy tale that it turned out had been told to her years before-much to her surprise.

This occurs when your brain retains enough memory to recall an event but not the origin of the event, leading to the convenient and mistaken impression that you're the originator.

You may be wondering at this point how we know cryptomnesia exists at all. After all, how do we know those cases of "accidental" plagiarism weren't all intentional?

The answer: We don't. If you haven't experienced it for yourself, you have no way of knowing whether it's not just a big fat scam. If you have experienced it, good luck trying to convince that first group.

Where it really gets weird . . .

But there is plenty of evidence that we're really bad at remembering where our ideas come from. In 2002, the journal Psychological Science Psychological Science published an experiment in which scientists implanted a completely fabricated childhood memory in the minds of subjects. The researchers showed the subjects a doctored photograph that depicted them in the basket of a hot-air balloon. Even though the subjects had never been in a hot-air balloon, many of them constructed detailed memories to match the fake photograph. published an experiment in which scientists implanted a completely fabricated childhood memory in the minds of subjects. The researchers showed the subjects a doctored photograph that depicted them in the basket of a hot-air balloon. Even though the subjects had never been in a hot-air balloon, many of them constructed detailed memories to match the fake photograph.

So no matter how confident you are in the originality of an idea, it's worth Googling around to make sure you didn't inadvertently steal it. Also, no matter how unlikely it might seem, scientists will take the time to Photoshop you into a hot-air balloon, just to screw with your head.

1. SUBCONSCIOUS BEHAVIOR, A.K.A. BEST GUESSING.

When you're running down a flight of stairs at top speed, your brain doesn't have time to think about each and every step you take. Your feet are on autopilot, reaching out for the next step faster than your conscious mind can tell them what to do. Well, it turns out that your brain is on autopilot more often than you think. Even when you're making important choices throughout the course of your day, a part of your brain knows what you're going to do well before it lets your conscious mind in on the decision. The technical term for this: precognition precognition.

Um, what?

Your brain is constantly making guesses and predictions about what's happening or about to happen around you, and once it has a good idea of what it thinks is about to go down, it acts on that prediction before you've made a conscious choice to act. In some cases, it will move parts of your body. Other times it will screw with your perception.

If it didn't do this, we'd be the clumsiest creatures on the planet. Our brains have to make thousands of snap decisions throughout the day. Imagine if you needed to consciously decide to put one foot in front of the other while flying down those steps. Luckily, there's a part of your brain that's constantly making decisions you only find out about after they occur. The creepy part is that you don't get to decide when it's time to use autopilot.

Take the starburst illusion to the right. It takes advantage of the fact that your brain has lots lots of experience with converging lines. When we "see" the background starburst pattern in real life, we're generally traveling toward a point of convergence, on a road or down a tunnel for instance. But no matter how much you try to convince your autopilot to shut the h.e.l.l up, your brain adjusts your perception by enlarging and distorting the center, as though you were moving toward it. That's why those perfectly vertical lines look like they're bending outward in the middle. of experience with converging lines. When we "see" the background starburst pattern in real life, we're generally traveling toward a point of convergence, on a road or down a tunnel for instance. But no matter how much you try to convince your autopilot to shut the h.e.l.l up, your brain adjusts your perception by enlarging and distorting the center, as though you were moving toward it. That's why those perfectly vertical lines look like they're bending outward in the middle.

Where it really gets weird . . .

In 2008, the Wall Street Journal Wall Street Journal reported on a series of experiments being conducted with brain scanners in Germany, Norway, and the United States. The scientists found that if they hook you up to a scanner and ask you to make a decision, part of your brain lights up to take action up to ten seconds before you consciously make the decision. So when you're working out in your head whether or not to go to work tomorrow, a part of your brain has already decided to call in sick, several seconds before the voice in your head arrives at that same conclusion. reported on a series of experiments being conducted with brain scanners in Germany, Norway, and the United States. The scientists found that if they hook you up to a scanner and ask you to make a decision, part of your brain lights up to take action up to ten seconds before you consciously make the decision. So when you're working out in your head whether or not to go to work tomorrow, a part of your brain has already decided to call in sick, several seconds before the voice in your head arrives at that same conclusion.

Think about what that means for free will, and prepare to have your mind blown (it should hit you in about ten seconds).

FIVE FIGHT MOVES THAT ONLY WORK IN MOVIES.

MOVIEGOERS understand that understand that most most of what they're seeing in action flicks is bulls.h.i.t: Buses won't jump a sixty-yard gap in the highway, a fire hose is not a bungee cord, and Steven Seagal is a bigger threat to a Sizzler buffet than a gang of criminals. Objectively, our brains of what they're seeing in action flicks is bulls.h.i.t: Buses won't jump a sixty-yard gap in the highway, a fire hose is not a bungee cord, and Steven Seagal is a bigger threat to a Sizzler buffet than a gang of criminals. Objectively, our brains know know that, and yet most real-world bar fights feature at least one guy trying out a move he saw in a martial arts film-and being subsequently shocked to learn he would have been better off casting an a.s.s-kicking spell he'd found in the pages of a Harry Potter novel. that, and yet most real-world bar fights feature at least one guy trying out a move he saw in a martial arts film-and being subsequently shocked to learn he would have been better off casting an a.s.s-kicking spell he'd found in the pages of a Harry Potter novel.

5. BEER BOTTLE OVER THE HEAD.

For years, a beer bottle shattered over the head has been the visual shorthand for "this person got knocked unconscious." But when real people really smack a real beer bottle over someone's head, one of two things happens: (1) It doesn't break and they are enraged, or (2) their head gets wet. If you're lucky, you might open up a cut. If you're unlucky, it will be on your hand. Otherwise the body attached to the head it broke against can go about the business of kicking your a.s.s while still fully conscious and, if anything, somewhat refreshed.

You don't have to take our word for it: Thanks to YouTube and the contents of the beer bottles themselves, there are hundreds of easily accessible failed bottle-over-head experiments. And though each of the amateur scientists involved clearly has a soft skull, they all remain wildly undevastated by their bottle-breaking field work. No one's saying try this at home, just trust that the millions of years evolution spent building a helmet for your brain trumps an empty Bud Light every time.

The rest of Road House Road House though? One hundred percent accurate. It's basically a doc.u.mentary. though? One hundred percent accurate. It's basically a doc.u.mentary.

4. THE TWIST WITH YOUR HANDS/LEGS NECK BREAK.

Even if you do it really hard really hard and your victim is a and your victim is a completely completely incidental guard outside the enemy's base, coming up behind someone and cranking their head to the side doesn't break their neck. You probably suspected this the first time your chiropractor did it to you and you didn't wake up rolling through heaven in a wheelchair. When the spine is given a choice between simply turning in the same direction as the neck or detaching from the head, it usually picks the first one. incidental guard outside the enemy's base, coming up behind someone and cranking their head to the side doesn't break their neck. You probably suspected this the first time your chiropractor did it to you and you didn't wake up rolling through heaven in a wheelchair. When the spine is given a choice between simply turning in the same direction as the neck or detaching from the head, it usually picks the first one.

But what if you leap up, wrap your legs around his head, and kind of twist? Surely something that awesome-looking has to be effective! Well, no. And what's worse, the mythical leg-scissors neck break actually squanders a golden opportunity to do some real real damage. If you find yourself in a position to execute a leg-around-the-head move, modern jujitsu would recommend a tight triangle choke, thus matching the puny muscles of your opponent's neck against your comparatively immense leg muscles. If you instead take your pointers from Jean-Claude Van Damme movies and just twist your hips awkwardly, you'll be astonished at how much your opponent doesn't die. In fact, you'll be lucky if you manage to give him an Indian burn with your jeans before he takes advantage of the prime p.e.n.i.s-biting position you've put him in. In short: No one will be dead and you'll both go home with a lot of explaining to do to your wives. damage. If you find yourself in a position to execute a leg-around-the-head move, modern jujitsu would recommend a tight triangle choke, thus matching the puny muscles of your opponent's neck against your comparatively immense leg muscles. If you instead take your pointers from Jean-Claude Van Damme movies and just twist your hips awkwardly, you'll be astonished at how much your opponent doesn't die. In fact, you'll be lucky if you manage to give him an Indian burn with your jeans before he takes advantage of the prime p.e.n.i.s-biting position you've put him in. In short: No one will be dead and you'll both go home with a lot of explaining to do to your wives.

3. THE STANDING ARM-BREAK.

If Steven Seagal blocks your punch, there's a really good chance you're going to be the bad type of double jointed in the very near future. Whether he's cracking arms over his shoulder or kicking knees in the wrong direction, all extremities turn to crispy breadsticks under Seagal's awesome powers. According to martial arts movies, a half pound of pressure shatters a kneecap, while according to real life Hollywood got all its information on bones well before the invention of milk.

It takes a lot more than yanking on an arm to break it. Two much more likely things happen first: Either the body attached to the arm goes in the direction you pull it, or the shoulder simply dislocates. Trying to snap the bone before one of these things happens is like trying to knock a wall down by jumping into the window.

There is actual doc.u.mentation of a forced arm-breaking, but it took more than Steven Seagal gently leaning his considerable bulk against an elbow to make it happen. At UFC 48: Payback, jujitsu expert Frank Mir locked his entire 250-pound body onto Tim Sylvia's arm and cranked it as hard as he could, while six-foot-eight Sylvia stood up and pulled in the opposite direction. His forearm snapped. To re-create these kinds of conditions outside the ring, you'd need a gallon of moonshine, a tractor, and the world's dumbest volunteer.

2. KNOCKING A NOSE INTO A BRAIN.

In 1991's The Last Boy Scout The Last Boy Scout, Bruce Willis punched a henchman so hard he died. Another henchman exclaimed, "G.o.d, he punched his nose through his brains!" From that moment on, filmmakers no longer felt the need to explain why their characters die after getting hit in the nose. In reality, the henchman's buddy might as well have screamed, "G.o.d, Bruce Willis hired elves to eat their way into his skull! They've made it into a cookie factory!"

The human nose does not contain the brain's off b.u.t.ton. It's made of soft cartilage. In the history of face punching, people have probably died, but it was not from a nose's soft tissue traveling through skull bone and lobotomizing its owner. That would be like trying to hammer a crayon through a brick wall. If you finally break through, it ain't gonna be the crayon that does the trick. That's why you could get punched all day and you'd still have a better chance of dying from a winning lottery ticket falling out of the sky and slicing your wrist open than from a face-to-brain nose missile.

1. ALMOST ANY KICK YOU'VE EVER SEEN IN A MOVIE Attackers are charging at you from both sides! Before you decide to leap into the air and kick them each at the same time, you should know that's only going to make you go out looking like a cheerleader. A kick's power is generated by your hips, and your hips can't generate any power while they're spreading in midair, thirsting for a man's touch.

Most kicks in movies are designed around aesthetics rather than effectiveness. If Jean-Claude Van Damme was trying to break down the front door of your house, he wouldn't twirl into the air and kick the door. It's easier and more effective to kick the door in like a regular person, with one foot planted firmly on the ground (also, Van Damme would just come back as Timecop Timecop and hand himself the key). The one and only strategic advantage the door has is that it's connected to something that's connected to the ground. So are you, until you leap in the air like and hand himself the key). The one and only strategic advantage the door has is that it's connected to something that's connected to the ground. So are you, until you leap in the air like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and earn every bullet of the Darwinian reckoning about to be visited on you by the drug dealer who just heard you bounce off his front door. and earn every bullet of the Darwinian reckoning about to be visited on you by the drug dealer who just heard you bounce off his front door.

The same goes for real combat. In Ultimate Fighting, all but two kicks have become extinct: the round kick (what it sounds like) and the front kick (what you should have done to the door a few sentences ago). If you are practicing a kick that involves a word like spinning spinning, crescent crescent, flying flying, or cartwheel cartwheel, remember it'll only be useful in a real fight when you want to fall down extravagantly before getting choked.

FIVE AWESOME PLACES TO HAVE s.e.x (AND THE HORRIFIC CONSEQUENCES).

EVERY month magazines like month magazines like Cosmo Cosmo, Playboy Playboy, and b.o.o.b Fancy b.o.o.b Fancy write up t.i.tillating articles about places you just write up t.i.tillating articles about places you just have have to have s.e.x at least once in your life. All of them seem to operate on the principle that having s.e.x while, say, zooming down the Pacific Coast Highway on a motorcycle is well worth the risks involved. to have s.e.x at least once in your life. All of them seem to operate on the principle that having s.e.x while, say, zooming down the Pacific Coast Highway on a motorcycle is well worth the risks involved.

You should at least know the dangers before you get drunk enough to try five of the most popular.

5. s.e.x ON THE BEACH.

s.e.x on the beach sounds sounds pretty hot. It's so popular that there's even a drink named after it. Then again, there's also a drink named the duck fart. In any event, it's still a common motif in romantic films and books. What could be more romantic than some briny coitus between two half-naked adults while the waves crash around your suntanned bodies? pretty hot. It's so popular that there's even a drink named after it. Then again, there's also a drink named the duck fart. In any event, it's still a common motif in romantic films and books. What could be more romantic than some briny coitus between two half-naked adults while the waves crash around your suntanned bodies?

Just about anything, it turns out. As anyone who's ever had s.e.x on the beach probably already knows, if you're not extremely careful, you're going to discover what it feels like to exfoliate areas of your body you can't see without a mirror. And while places that recommend s.e.x on the beach will point out the sand issue with a little wink and a nudge, they rarely mention one important detail about the sand you're cramming into your unmentionable areas: It's often loaded with fecal bacteria.

Sand acts as a naturally occurring filth filter, so when a beach is closed due to high bacteria levels in the water, the sand is what makes it safe to swim again, collecting big, fatty loads of t.u.r.d with the ebb and flow of tides. Good news for the surfers, swimmers, and the mayor of Amity Island. It's even good for the bacteria, which live fuller, more robust lives in the sand than in the ocean. The news is less good for couples grinding sand around one another's s.e.xual organs like a human pepper mill. Exposure to the bacteria can lead to fun things like typhoid fever, hepat.i.tis A, and dysentery, all terrible diseases even when they're not focused in your nether regions.

4. IN A POOL.

Of course you could always dodge nature's poo filter by having some good clean s.e.x in a far more sanitary (looking) chlorinated swimming pool. What could be hotter than dipping your naked hide in clear azure water, while a pool noodle bobs obscenely along with your ungainly and hard-to-maintain humping?

It turns out pool s.e.x has the unwholesome side effect of teaching you just how poorly water works as a lubricant while forcing chemically treated liquids deep into easily infected regions. According to research by the University of California, Santa Barbara, if turkey basted into the wrong places, even chlorinated pool water contains enough bacteria to lead to yeast and urinary tract infections.

The aforementioned issue with lubrication leads to something science types call microtears microtears but that you're going to be more likely to call "tiny, painful rips in my junk." That's why having s.e.x in a pool greatly increases the risk of STDs and, more disastrously, pruny zombie w.a.n.g. but that you're going to be more likely to call "tiny, painful rips in my junk." That's why having s.e.x in a pool greatly increases the risk of STDs and, more disastrously, pruny zombie w.a.n.g.

If you're looking to avoid chlorine with some manner of ocean scuba s.e.x, dive researcher David F. Colvard, MD, would like you to know that having s.e.x underwater can lead to your losing track of important things like buoyancy. You could end up floating to the surface too quickly, giving yourself an embolism. Now, we're not underwater s.e.x doctors, like Dr. Colvard back there, but an embolism is probably a total w.i.l.l.y wilter.

3. IN A CAR.

The idea of getting nasty in a car, or road head, road head, as Mom used to call it, is a staple of the not-so-exotic fantasy life of many people. Back in the 1950s, everyone was taking their girl up to make-out point to pump her full of babies on luxurious leather upholstery. As time went on, people apparently decided parked-car s.e.x simply didn't endanger enough lives and moved on to having s.e.x while driving. Hey, who doesn't like a little eroticism to break up the monotony of steering a fast-moving chunk of metal and flammable liquids? as Mom used to call it, is a staple of the not-so-exotic fantasy life of many people. Back in the 1950s, everyone was taking their girl up to make-out point to pump her full of babies on luxurious leather upholstery. As time went on, people apparently decided parked-car s.e.x simply didn't endanger enough lives and moved on to having s.e.x while driving. Hey, who doesn't like a little eroticism to break up the monotony of steering a fast-moving chunk of metal and flammable liquids?

How about the innocent bystander, whose last memory is being plowed into by a Subaru full of naked humping yuppie? When a Connecticut woman was charged with causing a car wreck that killed a man, she tried to use the fact that she was mid-blow-job in her defense. While it's unclear what reaction she was hoping for ("Oh, she had a d.i.c.k in her mouth, well, happens to the best of us I suppose!"), the argument only helped convince the jury that her mother and father had failed as parents.

Even humping in the back of a taxi carries risks beyond making a cameo on HBO. Unless you're grotesquely double jointed, it's pretty hard to wear a seat belt while having s.e.x, and those come in handy when the cabdriver's attention is being split between the road and the plate-gla.s.s divider full of squeaking pink a.s.s directly over his right shoulder.

2. ON AN AIRPLANE.

The mile high club is the ultimate fantasy for everyone who's still stuck in the 1970s and has a limited imagination. If p.o.r.n is any indication, stewardesses of yore were tall, s.k.a.n.ky, and wholly unqualified to do their jobs. Even in the nonp.o.r.no universe, you're in an exotic place, high above the earth, and sharing close quarters with nothing to do. Who can blame you for getting a little amorous?

Well, the police for starters: You can be arrested for joining the mile high club. There are also the potential safety risks. Plane s.e.x is the only item on this list that combines the reckless risks of having s.e.x in a car with the potential diseases of having s.e.x in a location that's teaming with p.o.o.p. A twofer!

And we're pretty sure the payoff isn't worth it. Airplane bathrooms aren't famous for their roominess. Joining the mile high club is like having s.e.x in a kitchen cabinet, if your kitchen cabinet has a bunch of faucets and handles inside and an audience of total strangers sitting within earshot of your clumsy, apologetic humping.

1. THE WOODS.

Few things are more romantic than packing up for a weekend, heading to the great outdoors, getting a fire going, pitching a tent, and then crawling inside with your honey for some awkward, claustrophobic s.e.x on uneven ground.

Unfortunately, while nature enthusiasts may enjoy the freedom of humping under the stars, park officials say there's some cause for alarm. See, you won't just look look like two sausages trying to fit in the same casing as you hump away in your sleeping bags. There are parts of the food chain where that s.h.i.t smells like dinner. like two sausages trying to fit in the same casing as you hump away in your sleeping bags. There are parts of the food chain where that s.h.i.t smells like dinner.

Specifically, the bear part.

Park rangers in bear country caution against having s.e.x for the same reason they caution against dipping a fresh salmon in honey and putting it down your pants. A bear thinks the juices your body produces during s.e.x smell delicious. The better the s.e.x, the more likely that sound you just heard isn't "just the fire settling in for the night."

And while we apologize for how difficult that's going to make it to ever achieve an o.r.g.a.s.m in anything even resembling an outdoor setting, why would you want to? While some s.e.x may be worth getting arrested by an air marshal, we're hard pressed to present a single s.e.xual experience on record that's worth a bear attack.

FIVE AWESOME THINGS YOU DIDN'T KNOW COULD MAKE YOU SICK THANKS to dedicated doctors and researchers, the number of common objects and activities you must fear has multiplied a thousandfold. Every day, medical professionals work toward a humanitarian goal centuries old: to catalog every possible way you can get sick and die. to dedicated doctors and researchers, the number of common objects and activities you must fear has multiplied a thousandfold. Every day, medical professionals work toward a humanitarian goal centuries old: to catalog every possible way you can get sick and die.