Why we ignore thousands of daily car crashes • Hacker News Board

Re: Why we ignore thousands of daily car crashes

#241

Post by clairity » Thu, Jul 21, 2022, 8:49 PM UTC

TylerE wrote: post #148

clairity wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the difference is the illusion of control. you can’t talk yourself past raw statistics that way. you might make a marginal difference in risk, but the bulk of the risk is beyond personal control. even with attentiveness, if you’re 1 of 100 drivers on the road, you’re at best controlling for 1% of that one risk. and i’d argue attentiveness (anti-distractedness) is the most important mass mitigation we could make, but…

It's way way higher than 1%. 30% of crashes involve a drunk driver. 30% of the drivers on the road are not drunk.

and it’s orders of magnitude higher than 100 drivers on the road with you. you’re doubling down on a misunderstanding of risk. you have no control over most of the situations and circumstances that cause collisions, injury, and death. you not drinking and driving doesn’t make all the other drunk drivers sober up miraculously. your “control” has quite marginal effects at best.

Re: Why we ignore thousands of daily car crashes

#242

Post by sebazzz » Thu, Jul 21, 2022, 8:49 PM UTC

CodeAndCuffs wrote: post #155

I was a cop for several years. I worked hundreds of crashes, and a few fatalities. If cars had a max speed limit of 85 mph, and required the seatbelt to be engaged to work, we'd cut our fatality rate in half. Most nations' DUI laws consider a 0.05 BAC as illegal. In most US states 0.08 is presumed under the influence, 0.06 - 0.079 is considered no presumption either way, and under .06 is considered not under the infl…

> If cars had a max speed limit of 85 mph, and required the seatbelt to be engaged to work

Wait, wearing a seatbelt is not mandatory?

Re: Why we ignore thousands of daily car crashes

#243

Post by eckesicle » Thu, Jul 21, 2022, 8:49 PM UTC

Here's an interesting factoid:

The annualized mortality rate of a US soldier is ~100 per 100,000.

The annualized mortality rate of the average US man between the age of 25-34 is 177 per 100,000. (It's 199 per 100k for ages 18-24).

Re: Why we ignore thousands of daily car crashes

#244

Post by rootusrootus » Thu, Jul 21, 2022, 8:50 PM UTC

umvi wrote: post #185

I think there's another reason too we "ignore" car crashes: loose coupling with politics. Say a DUI driver kills a random family of 5. Is that going to make national headlines? Probably not. Very little to be gained politically. It doesn't really enrage us because we love and celebrate alcohol too much to be capable of villainizing it like guns. So as a result, it doesn't spread very far on social media. Now say a ra…

> It doesn't really enrage us because we love and celebrate alcohol too much to be capable of villainizing it like guns

I hear a lot more ads on the radio informing me about all the ways a DUI will screw over my life, even if I don't kill anyone, but almost nothing about guns.

Now, at a national level, sure, guns dominate. But I'd say the larger differentiating factor is intent. The killer on a shooting spree sparks terror in a way that a stupid drunk driver does not, even if the latter is more of a risk.

Re: Why we ignore thousands of daily car crashes

#245

Post by WalterBright » Thu, Jul 21, 2022, 8:50 PM UTC

nextstepguy wrote: post #201

jiveturkey wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who cares if you kill yourself through your own negligence? There shouldn't be a fine at all for seatbelts. DUI, OTOH, should be treated even more harshly than it is.

Because if you don't kill yourself, insurance will care footing the bill to send you to the hospital. Maybe insurances shouldn't cover people without seatbelts and have the ambulance let them be injured at the scene.

Frankly, if the injured person wasn't wearing a belt, I wouldn't award him medical damages regardless of who was at fault in the collision.

Re: Why we ignore thousands of daily car crashes

#246

Post by whakim » Thu, Jul 21, 2022, 8:50 PM UTC

ericmay wrote: post #83

wahern wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> While a careful, attentive driver in a well-maintained vehicle certainly isn’t immune, their risk is much lower than someone who drives tired, drunk, or high in a car with bald tires and bad brakes. You could have just stopped at "control". That's the fundamental dynamic by which we can explain this differential public sentiment--a sense of control or lack thereof, independent of whether that control actually exist…

If only we could take this further. What’s more in “control” than driving? Walking and riding a bike. That’s ultimate control.

Yes, but the GP wasn't talking about some objective notion of "control" - they were talking about some subjective "feeling" of control and how that translates to perceptions of risk and danger. Driving a car feels like you're in control because you're the one doing the driving and are isolated from your environment even though (as a sibling comment notes) you're at the mercy of a huge number of factors that you don't perceive. That's why folks don't perceive driving as risky. (Consider airplanes as a contrasting example - extremely safe, but you certainly don't feel "in control".) In that context, cycling doesn't feel like you're "in control" because you're surrounded by large multi-ton vehicles moving significantly faster than you. Walking in urban areas feels safe because of the incredible amount of infrastructure that exists to support pedestrians and the normalcy of walking in those areas.

Re: Why we ignore thousands of daily car crashes

#247

Post by mauvehaus » Thu, Jul 21, 2022, 8:50 PM UTC

jiveturkey wrote: post #174

CodeAndCuffs wrote: post #155

I was a cop for several years. I worked hundreds of crashes, and a few fatalities. If cars had a max speed limit of 85 mph, and required the seatbelt to be engaged to work, we'd cut our fatality rate in half. Most nations' DUI laws consider a 0.05 BAC as illegal. In most US states 0.08 is presumed under the influence, 0.06 - 0.079 is considered no presumption either way, and under .06 is considered not under the infl…

Who cares if you kill yourself through your own negligence? There shouldn't be a fine at all for seatbelts. DUI, OTOH, should be treated even more harshly than it is.

First, you're welcome to move to New Hampshire if you feel this way and drive around with your seatbelt unbuckled. You're also welcome to ride your motorcycle without a helmet there.

Second, part of the purpose of the seatbelt is to keep you in the driving position for the entire duration of the crash so that you can maintain as much control of your vehicle as possible until it comes to a complete stop. If the first impact of a crash throws you out of the position required to drive the car, you're no longer capable of controlling the vehicle in such a way that reduces the severity of or prevents further impacts. As some of these further impacts stand to involve persons not involved in the initial impact, it follows that wearing a seatbelt stands to protect them as well as you.

Third, We are in absolute agreement that DUI should be treated more seriously.

Re: Why we ignore thousands of daily car crashes

#248

Post by mrep » Thu, Jul 21, 2022, 8:50 PM UTC

HideousKojima wrote: post #219

Aunche wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are plenty of crazy, dangerous people on the road too. Psychologically, you feel more separated than them, even if they may be statistically be more dangerous.

They can't mug me or grope me or blast music on their phone 3 feet away from me though. To be fair occasionally there will be idiot drivers blasting their bass so loud it vibrates nearby cars, but that's far less common than inconsiderate assholes blasting music on their phones on public transit.

Yeah, basically every girl I have ever dated avoids public transit at all cost because of assholes/creeps.

Re: Why we ignore thousands of daily car crashes

#249

Post by paulpauper » Thu, Jul 21, 2022, 8:51 PM UTC

flaque wrote: post #96

There’s an audio version of the same point here: https://podcast.strongtowns.org/e/the-drip-drip-drip-of-traf... A ”best effort” summary of this article: if thousands of people die in once place, it’s one of the great tragedies in American history. However if thousands of people die in thousands different places, it is ignored and considered a fact of life. When a plane or train crashes, we stop everything and redesi…

Like covid. THoussands of deaths daily became background noise

Re: Why we ignore thousands of daily car crashes

#250

Post by dmead » Thu, Jul 21, 2022, 8:51 PM UTC

sebazzz wrote: post #242

CodeAndCuffs wrote: post #155

I was a cop for several years. I worked hundreds of crashes, and a few fatalities. If cars had a max speed limit of 85 mph, and required the seatbelt to be engaged to work, we'd cut our fatality rate in half. Most nations' DUI laws consider a 0.05 BAC as illegal. In most US states 0.08 is presumed under the influence, 0.06 - 0.079 is considered no presumption either way, and under .06 is considered not under the infl…

> If cars had a max speed limit of 85 mph, and required the seatbelt to be engaged to work Wait, wearing a seatbelt is not mandatory?

They are, but cars will function without them being used.