General Discussion

I do not favor car helmets, but I'm not going to pretend they wouldn't save a lot of lives, in absolute numbers.

Wrapping your head in bubble wrap would help a great deal.

The difference in 60mph-0mph in 0.01 seconds and 60-0 in 0.001 seconds is an immense difference in effect on the brain, though I may not even be able to see the difference.

This is why we have air bags. Think about it. Your are going 30MPH. You drove into an abutment and your front bumper goes from 30MPH to 0MPH almost instantaneously.

Your air bags deploy. Now then... does your head go from 30MPH to 0MPH? Yes. Even with airbags your head stops going forward... but it is also almost instantaneous.

The air bag stretches out the deceleration very slightly, but that is often enough to be a real help.

And a padded helmet would also be a real help, in addition to the airbag.

Look at it this way... football helmets greatly reduce skull fractures... almost eliminate them, but are not as good at preventing concussions. (Caused by sheer impact bouncing the brain around in the skull.) But football helmets greatly reduce the number of concussions. That 1/2 inch of foam is very useful.