Everyone admits we have a problem with texting while driving. Lawmakers admit it, passing no-texting legislation across the nation. Parents and teenagers alike admit to texting while driving, despite all its dangers. Even cell phone companies admit it. Cell phone companies.
So why do we continue to do it? Even those of us that know it’s dangerous will instinctively check our phone at the slightest buzz. Even those of us that live in cities that have banned texting while driving can’t resist the ping of a new message. Is it an addiction? Paul Watters, head of motoring policy for the AA [a motoring organization in the U.K.], seems to think so:
“What we find in our research is that there’s an addiction here, to texting and using smartphones, it’s an addiction that is very hard to break even when in the car.”
However, texting while driving may be more than just an addiction. In fact, it could be the result of billions of years of evolution.
Think about it. You’re walking through the woods at the dawn of man. Suddenly, you hear a stick break behind you. Is it a saber-tooth tiger? Is it a deer? Or could it be another human… possibly a fertile mate with a high-class hut and dinner on the campfire? If you don’t look, then you’ll never know. Your evolutionary ancestors were able to eat, reproduce and survive because they looked when they heard a stick crack in the woods.
Today, the sound of a text message is our stick cracking in the woods. What could that sound be? A party? A date? A job opportunity? Mom telling you that dinner is ready? The biological urges that drove us to turn our heads in the woods billions of years ago are the same urges that drive us into distracting driving in 2014.
So where does that leave us? If the cause of texting while driving is an unconcious, biological result of billions of years of evolutionary influence, then what can we do about it? The solution is simple: Evolve.
In a world where everyone is constantly connected by their cell phones, modern man has to evolve into a species that doesn’t turn its head willy-nilly. A stick breaking in the woods or a cell phone beeping with a text are meaningless when your survival depends on driving a vehicle at 55 mph.