[deleted]
The most under-hyped, but most important, technology since seat belts
71–80 of 142 posts
Re: The most under-hyped, but most important, technology since seat belts
#72Earlier quoted context omitted.
On long stretches of Highway in the American West, there really isn't a whole lot of driving to do except keep the car in the lane. It's pretty clear that we're getting painfully close to fully automated highway driving.
I wouldn't describe fully automated highway driving as painful in the least. I'd be quite happy about it. After all, highway driving isn't remotely interesting from a "driving" viewpoint, so I'd hardly miss it.
"Painfully" close as in very close. I don't think he meant to say that automated highway driving was painful.
Re: The most under-hyped, but most important, technology since seat belts
#73GPS-enabled Governors should be put in all cars too, limiting your speed to that of the speed limit, adjusted for weather conditions. If you're in a 35 MPH zone, you car will stop accelerating (and ideally auto-slow when going downhill or onto slower roads) once you hit the limit for that part of the road. Speed limits would likely have to be re-adjusted in some cases as they may be too low in some area's, but it wou…
How about we put a GPS-enabled governor around your neck, in case you ever think of stepping on private property.
Re: The most under-hyped, but most important, technology since seat belts
#74Earlier quoted context omitted.
I wouldn't describe fully automated highway driving as painful in the least. I'd be quite happy about it. After all, highway driving isn't remotely interesting from a "driving" viewpoint, so I'd hardly miss it.
"Painfully" close as in very close. I don't think he meant to say that automated highway driving was painful.
Right, that's what I meant, apologies for lack of clarity.
Re: The most under-hyped, but most important, technology since seat belts
#75GPS-enabled Governors should be put in all cars too, limiting your speed to that of the speed limit, adjusted for weather conditions. If you're in a 35 MPH zone, you car will stop accelerating (and ideally auto-slow when going downhill or onto slower roads) once you hit the limit for that part of the road. Speed limits would likely have to be re-adjusted in some cases as they may be too low in some area's, but it wou…
This proposal wouldn't increase safety until all cars on the road had the GPS-governor feature, which would take 15-20 years for old cars to be phased out. In the meantime, the new cars would have an annoyance (no speeding) without providing any measurable safety improvement.
You're correct on some points, though it may slow other cars by way of simply being in the way. It wouldn't work on highways with passing lanes until a high adoption rate, but a single slow car on one-lane side roads will "bottleneck" any speeders. This alone would most likely increase safety.
Gradually as more people got the cars, things would get safer and safer. Once, say, 90% of cars on the road have governors, it'll be hard for a speeder to find the opportunity to speed.
Economic reasons could speed up adoption too. For example, insurance carriers would likely charge less for those with the device, and more for those without it. Governments could give those with the device a break on their income taxes.
But honestly, I don't think the idea has much traction. It's too emotionally charged which would make it difficult for politicians to implement it, and there are large switching costs from current cars. Self-driving cars will likely appear beforehand. Radar and governors and what-not are really all just bandaids for the real problem with cars; their human drivers.
Re: The most under-hyped, but most important, technology since seat belts
#76Earlier quoted context omitted.
(Estimated at 200k per year preventable deaths in hospitals alone.) For the United States ALONE? I don't buy it. But prove me wrong by citing an authoritative source if there is one.
Citing an authoritative source doesn't prove you wrong any more than it proves global warming is happening ;) Be that as it may, see generally To Err Is Human by the Institute of Medicine (an arm of the National Science Foundation), which put the tally at 100k back in 1999, or Dr. Chunliu Zhan and Dr. Marlene R. Miller in a research study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) in October…
The Zhan & Miller study in 2003 supported the IOM's conclusion of ~98k deaths due to medical errors. The 200k number you quoted earlier was "found" by a study by some random website and was not published in any medical journal.
Not to downplay the severity of the issue, but there is a big difference between 100k and 200k lives.
Re: The most under-hyped, but most important, technology since seat belts
#77Earlier quoted context omitted.
(Estimated at 200k per year preventable deaths in hospitals alone.) For the United States ALONE? I don't buy it. But prove me wrong by citing an authoritative source if there is one.
Citing an authoritative source doesn't prove you wrong any more than it proves global warming is happening ;) Be that as it may, see generally To Err Is Human by the Institute of Medicine (an arm of the National Science Foundation), which put the tally at 100k back in 1999, or Dr. Chunliu Zhan and Dr. Marlene R. Miller in a research study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) in October…
Thanks for the source. That was easy to Google with the clear information you provided. No, several of those causes of death would not fit the usual definition of "preventable deaths." Those patients may not have received the best care that they should have received, but it's overextrapolating to say that they died but for errors in treatment.
Re: The most under-hyped, but most important, technology since seat belts
#78Earlier quoted context omitted.
Citing an authoritative source doesn't prove you wrong any more than it proves global warming is happening ;) Be that as it may, see generally To Err Is Human by the Institute of Medicine (an arm of the National Science Foundation), which put the tally at 100k back in 1999, or Dr. Chunliu Zhan and Dr. Marlene R. Miller in a research study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) in October…
The Zhan & Miller study in 2003 supported the IOM's conclusion of ~98k deaths due to medical errors. The 200k number you quoted earlier was "found" by a study by some random website and was not published in any medical journal. Not to downplay the severity of the issue, but there is a big difference between 100k and 200k lives.
Really, in what way? How much less should we spend to fix this problem if there is only 100,00 deaths?
I feel car deaths are much worse. Most hospital deaths affect people who are already sick, and elderly, whereas car deaths can hit anyone at anytime.
Re: The most under-hyped, but most important, technology since seat belts
#79Earlier quoted context omitted.
Absolutely. The moment we develop an autopilot that is safer than average human drivers by a statistically significant margin, it should be mandatory in all cars. I am hopeful that we will see this during our lifetimes.
The introduction of such systems (probably expensive at first) would also be a great opportunity to switch from car ownership to widespread car rental (ala zipcar).
The best thing we can do is kill cars alltogether. Move to a more european style of cities, with medium to high density living, which makes public transport more practical.
Re: The most under-hyped, but most important, technology since seat belts
#80Ford is really doing a phenomenal job recently, doing its homework and engineering to try and get the company back on track. 5 years ago, I would have said they were 10-15 years behind an equivalent Japanese car. Now I think they they are only 3-5 years. Their recent offerings are really very impressive. I'd love to see Ford be a benchmark for American car companies as well as imports. They aren't quite there yet, bu…
I'm sure they are getting a lot from Mazda. The Ford Fusion, for example, is basically a rebadged Mazda 6.