Become a prey animal by putting eyes on the side of your head. Makes you a safer driver, but also encourages packs of howling wolves to attack you, so beware!

Background:

Human vision is limited to a ~180° horizontal angle (Figure 1) and an even smaller vertical angle.

This means you can easily be blindsided by objects coming from behind you. In ancient times, this was less of a worry, but with electric cars, electric scooters, and bicycles, there are a huge number of fast-moving and potentially-lethal objects that humans must be aware of.

***Fig. 1:*** *Normal human vision only uses* ***less than half*** *of the total potentially-available visual information. Many prey animals have nearly 360º vision, so clearly this limitation is not an inherent limitation of biology.*

Proposal:

Since cars are now the “apex predator” that is ranked above humans in the food chain, humans should adapt and become prey animals. This requires a visual adaptation to allow for 360º vision, which can be accomplished as shown in Figure 2.

***Fig. 2:*** These “earmuff cameras” feed into the glasses in front, which provide a highly-warped fisheye view of the wearer’s environment. Although binocular vision may be impaired, the benefits of total visual awareness cannot be overstated.

Conclusion:

The example in figure 2 requires complicated electronics, but there’s probably a way to create an optical 360º-vision system that uses no electronics.

A similar product already exists: rear view mirror spy glasses—inexpensive sunglasses with mirrored “wings” that allow you to see behind you.

PROS: May reduce the number of deaths and injuries from accidents caused by a lack of visual situational awareness.

CONS: Can the human visual cortex handle this type of input data? Only one way to find out—experiment on some undergraduates.