Contrary to the collective delusion that Mother Nature is a nurturing, caring entity that cradles and protects all its forms of life, Earth is instead a giant killing machine. Holding aside all the climatic and geologic forces that would just as soon have you dead, such as droughts, floods, hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes, tsunamis, and volcanoes, there’s no end of creatures that want to suck your blood, inject you with venom, infect your physiology, or simply eat you.