Wednesday, May 30, 2012   © 2008 Tom Vanderbilt 402 pages   Take
a brain adapted to move a bit over a hundred pounds of flesh at
speeds under 20 miles per hour, and have it instead try to move
several tons of metal through an environment which didn’t exist
a hundred years ago, at speeds hitherto unimaginable. What
happens? Well, we’ve only had a few decades to see, but so far
the introduction of cars as the predominant form of transport
has produced interesting results, like congestion and road rage.
In Traffic: Why We Drive the Way We Do,  Tom Vanderbilt examines
the psychology of driving, and learns some lessons about being
human on the way.  Traffic is a dense book, more a survey than a
piece with a specific point to make. There are nine chapters,
each with a general theme -- "How Traffic Messes With Our
Heads", "Why You're Not as Good a Driver As You Think You Are"
-- and content spans the gamut from trivial to potent. Driving
is such an expressly different experience than our brains
evolved to take in th