The cellphone paradox - where are all the accidents?

[Ashton Crusher]

On Sat, 22 Aug 2015 21:28:48 -0400, "(PeteCresswell)" <x@y.Invalid>
wrote:

Per Ashton Crusher:
Interesting points. My driving experience is that things are no
different on the road now then they ever were in the past as far as
the general competency and driving behavior of other drivers.

I probably ride a bike more than 99% of the general population - and
have been for sixty+ years.

I see obvious changes in driving behavior over the years.

The most obvious: people drive faster, signal less, run more red lights,
and more people are obviously doing other things besides driving -
mostly things that were not technologically available years past.

The red light thing has developed in the past few years since our area
went over to ludicrously-long red lights plus red-in-all-directions for
a seemingly very long time plus un-timed lights.

Most people running red lights used to be trying to slip through a stale
yellow light. Now I seem them coming in at speed and not even slowing
down.

I can't say you are wrong, we may be seeing the same thing
differently. But I will say that every generation complains about
"kids today... yada yada yada" and believes the youth are going to
hell in a hand basket. And they have been saying that since Socrates
day.

“The children now love luxury. They have bad manners, contempt for
authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place
of exercise.” - Socrates

I view how most people talk about "other drivers" the same way. No
matter who you talk to it's always the same, drivers are getting
worse, politicians are getting worse, everything is getting worse. It
seems that such a "it's getting worse" view is hard wired into most
people as they age.

 

[(PeteCresswell)]

Per Ashton Crusher:

It's been less than a week and we're almost up to 500 messages. Should
I start a "left foot braking thread"???

Start a "What is the proper way to come off an on-ramp and merge with
traffic?" thread. Volume will be right up there with the infamous
"Helmet" threads in cycling fora - and you will see strongly-held yet
diametrically-opposed opinions on how to do it. Tribute, IMHO, to lack
of requirements for driver's training.
--
Pete Cresswell

 

[John-Del]

On Sunday, August 16, 2015 at 8:37:27 PM UTC-4, Ashton Crusher wrote:

Speaking of the UK, they did a study of the influence of speed cameras
(they have a LOT of them) on accidents and it showed that where there
were cameras that statistically the accidents INCREASED. They
attempted to bury the report. It was eventually released but
uniformly ignored by those in power. Further proof, as if more was
needed, that speed cameras are for revenue, not safety.

Same here in the U.S. Same result.

But this will be a temporary blip until drivers are retrained to obey traffic lights, not abuse them.

When traffic lights first came into use, there was no delay between red and green for the opposite road, that's what the yellow was for. Back then, drivers knew that when the yellow appeared, the red would follow and they would either stop or complete the drive through the intersection based on their speed and where they were when the yellow appeared.

Over the years, a delay was added for "safety" reasons. Of course, drivers took advantage of that and started slipping under the red knowing the other side wouldn't get the green for another second or two. In response, even more delay time was added and if you could believe it, drivers took advantage of the extra time delay!

The fact is, there is NO delay required. The yellow is sufficient, but drivers have now become used to running red lights knowing the delay exists.

I'm all for the traffic cams. There will be some problems initially, but drivers will again learn to use the yellow to judge when to stop, not the built in delay after the red.

 

[Stormin Mormon]

On 8/22/2015 7:19 PM, Ashton Crusher wrote:

It's been less than a week and we're almost up to 500 messages. Should
I start a "left foot braking thread"???

I'd expect this one to hit Bad Golferman's list.
Sure! I learned on a clutch car, so I'm totally
comfortable with left foot braking.

Lets hope the spammer gets spammed at his
Gmail adress. He tried to separate the email
in his posts.

-------- Forwarded Message --------
Subject: INSTRUCTOR'S SOLUTIONS MANUAL PDF: Linear Algebra Done Right,
2nd Ed by Sheldon Axler
Date: Sat, 22 Aug 2015 22:11:32 -0700 (PDT)
From: markrainsun4@gmail.com
Newsgroups: alt.home.repair
-------- Forwarded Message --------
Subject: INSTRUCTOR'S SOLUTIONS MANUAL PDF: Linear Algebra Done Right,
2nd Ed by Sheldon Axler
Date: Sat, 22 Aug 2015 22:11:32 -0700 (PDT)
From: markrainsun4@gmail.com
Newsgroups: alt.home.repair
-------- Forwarded Message --------
Subject: INSTRUCTOR'S SOLUTIONS MANUAL PDF: Linear Algebra Done Right,
2nd Ed by Sheldon Axler
Date: Sat, 22 Aug 2015 22:11:32 -0700 (PDT)
From: markrainsun4@gmail.com
Newsgroups: alt.home.repair


--
..
Christopher A. Young
learn more about Jesus
.. www.lds.org
..
..

 

[Stormin Mormon]

On 8/22/2015 7:19 PM, Ashton Crusher wrote:

It's been less than a week and we're almost up to 500 messages. Should
I start a "left foot braking thread"???





On Sun, 16 Aug 2015 06:10:23 +0000 (UTC), ceg
curt.guldenschuh@gmail.com> wrote:

The cellphone paradox - where are all the accidents?

The Fermi Paradox is essentially a situation where we "assume" something
that "seems obvious"; but, if that assumption is true, then something else
"should" be happening. But it's not.

Hence, the paradox.


Such is the cellphone paradox.

Does braking with the left foot increase the
risk of accidents?

--
..
Christopher A. Young
learn more about Jesus
.. www.lds.org
..
..

 

[Stormin Mormon]

On 8/22/2015 7:19 PM, Ashton Crusher wrote:

It's been less than a week and we're almost up to 500 messages. Should
I start a "left foot braking thread"???





On Sun, 16 Aug 2015 06:10:23 +0000 (UTC), ceg
curt.guldenschuh@gmail.com> wrote:

The cellphone paradox - where are all the accidents?

The Fermi Paradox is essentially a situation where we "assume" something
that "seems obvious"; but, if that assumption is true, then something else
"should" be happening. But it's not.


Such is the cellphone paradox.

Does changing the radio station increase your
risk of collisions?


-------- Forwarded Message --------
Subject: INSTRUCTOR'S SOLUTIONS MANUAL PDF: Linear Algebra Done Right,
2nd Ed by Sheldon Axler
Date: Sat, 22 Aug 2015 22:11:32 -0700 (PDT)
From: markrainsun4@gmail.com
Newsgroups: alt.home.repair
-------- Forwarded Message --------
Subject: INSTRUCTOR'S SOLUTIONS MANUAL PDF: Linear Algebra Done Right,
2nd Ed by Sheldon Axler
Date: Sat, 22 Aug 2015 22:11:32 -0700 (PDT)
From: markrainsun4@gmail.com
Newsgroups: alt.home.repair
-------- Forwarded Message --------
Subject: INSTRUCTOR'S SOLUTIONS MANUAL PDF: Linear Algebra Done Right,
2nd Ed by Sheldon Axler
Date: Sat, 22 Aug 2015 22:11:32 -0700 (PDT)
From: markrainsun4@gmail.com
Newsgroups: alt.home.repair

--
..
Christopher A. Young
learn more about Jesus
.. www.lds.org
..
..

 

[Stormin Mormon]

On 8/22/2015 9:36 PM, Ashton Crusher wrote:

I view how most people talk about "other drivers" the same way. No
matter who you talk to it's always the same, drivers are getting
worse, politicians are getting worse, everything is getting worse. It
seems that such a "it's getting worse" view is hard wired into most
people as they age.

Well, some how we survived other Presidents
like Stagflation Carter. At least he didn't
give nukes to Iran, like Oh Bomb Us.

-------- Forwarded Message --------
Subject: INSTRUCTOR'S SOLUTIONS MANUAL PDF: Linear Algebra Done Right,
2nd Ed by Sheldon Axler
Date: Sat, 22 Aug 2015 22:11:32 -0700 (PDT)
From: markrainsun4@gmail.com
Newsgroups: alt.home.repair
-------- Forwarded Message --------
Subject: INSTRUCTOR'S SOLUTIONS MANUAL PDF: Linear Algebra Done Right,
2nd Ed by Sheldon Axler
Date: Sat, 22 Aug 2015 22:11:32 -0700 (PDT)
From: markrainsun4@gmail.com
Newsgroups: alt.home.repair
-------- Forwarded Message --------
Subject: INSTRUCTOR'S SOLUTIONS MANUAL PDF: Linear Algebra Done Right,
2nd Ed by Sheldon Axler
Date: Sat, 22 Aug 2015 22:11:32 -0700 (PDT)
From: markrainsun4@gmail.com
Newsgroups: alt.home.repair


--
..
Christopher A. Young
learn more about Jesus
.. www.lds.org
..
..

 

[Mayayana]

| Interesting points. My driving experience is that things are no
| different on the road now then they ever were in the past as far as
| the general competency and driving behavior of other drivers.

I wonder if my mostly urban/suburban driving might
be a factor. I see *a lot* of people on the phone,
and it's not kids. Occasionally I might see a teenager
texting at 60 mph, but mostly I see adults, of all kinds,
yapping away.

The man who sideswiped me veering into
my lane was probably 35-40 y.o. He was talking to his
friend, who in turn was dropping off her car at a repair
shop. He was engrossed in trying to follow her instructions
on which street to turn at when he hit me. A few years
earlier he would have figured out the directions before
he'd left the house. But this was about 2004 and he was
a "yuppie" on the go, with a phone glued to his ear.

When he pulled over after the accident he wouldn't
even talk to me. He called the police, then his insurance
company. I never saw him off the phone until the police
arrived. He was so much out to lunch that he'd called
the police, convinced that I'd hit him! In my experience
that's typical. As a taxpaying consumer he doesn't
feel he has to relate to the world around him, thus that
world has no business "relating" to him.

A very big change is that people don't signal anymore.
Maybe 30-50% of the time. It's crazy. They're just not
paying attention. In MA it's illegal not to signal, and it's
irritating to be behind someone and get no notice of
why they suddenly stepped on the brakes. That used to
be unheard of. Now it's almost the norm. Again, it has
nothing to do with young drivers. But it does have a lot to
do with phoners only having one freee hand.

A couple of weeks ago I was pulling out of a supermarket
and was going straight across the street, up a sidestreet.
Traffic was stopping in both directions in front of me. The
near side traffic had left a gap. A man driving on the far side,
heading toward my left, slowed down and seemed to be leaving
a gap. I started to pull out. He then turned into the supermarket
and almost hit me. I beeped. We both put down our windows.
He looked at me with a condescending smile and said, "I'm
turning in here", as though I must be an idiot. I said, "how
about a signal?!" His face dropped. It had never occurred to
him to signal. To his credit, though, he apologized.

I see the phones and the anti-social behavior as
related. For instance, where I live it's always been
customary, on a narrow road with a parked car, to
wait for an oncoming car if the parked car is on your
side. The oncoming driver then waves a thankyou. Now
it's usually a game of chicken. That's a very clear
difference in driver behavior. It's not related to phones,
but phones seem to be related to the general social
disconnection. People are no longer experiencing
themselves as being where they are.

The same is true of people walking across streets,
on cellphones or not. People used to *always* look
before crossing. Now it's common to see people cross
without breaking step, trusting that the universe is
looking out for them. Maybe many of them are the
children of "helicopter moms". At first I thought it was a
kind of passive-aggressive entitlement, but the more
it's happened, the more I'm thinking that these people
are actually entitled to the core. They're not trying to
show me who's boss. They don't even know I'm there.
It hasn't occurred to them that they could actually
suffer the indignity of being run over by a car! Maybe
that's because they've spent their lives getting trophies
for showing up? I'm not sure. It's actually a very intriguing
pattern to me.

(A friend who tutors gradeschool children recently told
me that helicopter moms have been replaced by "snowplow
moms". The kids are pushed through endless achievements,
with no breaks to just sit, reflect, get bored, discover a
bug, or even think about what they might *want* to do.)

Do you really not see any changes? When I was growing
up, kids behaved and anyone nearby was a parent. Today,
when I see kids running and shrieking in a store I don't
dare say anything. The parents are likely to be outraged.
And often as not, they're standing there proudly as their
kids act out. In a nutshell, being considerate has become
a sucker's pastime, while "self-empowerment" is considered
an important goal.

I think my own generation, the baby boomers, actually
started with being entitled. Not all of us, but many. In
the 50s life was about kids. Baby boomers then grew up
feeling they needed to be special. They had kids. Their
kids were very special accomplishments, so many of those
kids are now hyper-spoiled and entitled. That's a unique
situation. (It's not so long ago that child labor was
considered OK and that people had kids to save money.
The kids could work the farm. They weren't cherished
possessions. They were low paid workers.)

It's certainly true that young people are more selfish
and old people are less tolerant. That's timeless. But I'm
surprised that anyone, say, over 50 doesn't see some
dramatic changes in American culture during the past
decades, which have nothing to do with young vs old.
But those changes may be less pronounced in small towns
and rural areas.

 

[(PeteCresswell)]

Per Stormin Mormon:

Does braking with the left foot increase the
risk of accidents?

From what little I have read, there is disagreement on the answer.

The traditional answer is that left-foot braking is, somehow, less safe.

I can't remember the term-of-art for it, but there is a recognized cause
of accidents that consists of the driver stepping on the accelerator
when they were trying to step on the brake.

A few months ago there was an article in the New Yorker about vehicle
defect investigation and vehicle recalls from an engineering perspective
in which it was mentioned that some people think that left-foot braking
may actually be safer because it reduces the chances of a "wrong pedal"
error to nearly zero.
--
Pete Cresswell

 

[(PeteCresswell)]

Per Mayayana:

People used to *always* look
before crossing. Now it's common to see people cross
without breaking step,

Does anybody remember being taught "The curb step" as a child?
--
Pete Cresswell

 

[Scott Dorsey]

(PeteCresswell) <x@y.Invalid> wrote:

The traditional answer is that left-foot braking is, somehow, less safe.

I cannot say, but I can make some strong arguments against braking with
your nose.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

 

[Mayayana]

| >People used to *always* look
| >before crossing. Now it's common to see people cross
| >without breaking step,
|
| Does anybody remember being taught "The curb step" as a child?

I remember "look both ways before crossing".
It sounds like you're talking about something
similar.
In my city the police got a $10K federal
grant to run a scam trap to catch drivers
who don't stop. A plainclothes woman cop
steps into the crosswalk as a car approaches.
If they don't stop they get a $200 fine. The
city made far more than the grant money in
a single weekend. I was thinking.... what
happened to "look both ways"?

 

[rbowman]

On 08/23/2015 07:13 AM, (PeteCresswell) wrote:

A few months ago there was an article in the New Yorker about vehicle
defect investigation and vehicle recalls from an engineering perspective
in which it was mentioned that some people think that left-foot braking
may actually be safer because it reduces the chances of a "wrong pedal"
error to nearly zero.

My early attempts at left foot braking were a disaster as they usually
occurred when I was trying to throw the clutch out in a car with an
automatic.

 

[Dean Hoffman]

On Sun, 23 Aug 2015 07:37:38 -0500, Stormin Mormon <cayoung61@hotmail.com>
wrote:

On 8/22/2015 7:19 PM, Ashton Crusher wrote:
It's been less than a week and we're almost up to 500 messages. Should
I start a "left foot braking thread"???





On Sun, 16 Aug 2015 06:10:23 +0000 (UTC), ceg
curt.guldenschuh@gmail.com> wrote:

The cellphone paradox - where are all the accidents?

The Fermi Paradox is essentially a situation where we "assume"
something
that "seems obvious"; but, if that assumption is true, then something
else
"should" be happening. But it's not.

Hence, the paradox.


Such is the cellphone paradox.

Does braking with the left foot increase the
risk of accidents?

Three on the tree? Four on the floor? One down, four up?

--
Using Opera's mail client: http://www.opera.com/mail/

 

[The Real Bev]

On 08/23/2015 12:40 PM, Dean Hoffman wrote:

On Sun, 23 Aug 2015 07:37:38 -0500, Stormin Mormon
cayoung61@hotmail.com> wrote:

On 8/22/2015 7:19 PM, Ashton Crusher wrote:
It's been less than a week and we're almost up to 500 messages.
Should I start a "left foot braking thread"???

On Sun, 16 Aug 2015 06:10:23 +0000 (UTC), ceg
curt.guldenschuh@gmail.com> wrote:

The cellphone paradox - where are all the accidents?

The Fermi Paradox is essentially a situation where we "assume"
something that "seems obvious"; but, if that assumption is
true, then something else "should" be happening. But it's not.

Hence, the paradox.

Such is the cellphone paradox.

Does braking with the left foot increase the risk of accidents?

Three on the tree? Four on the floor? One down, four up?

European or Japanese?


--
Cheers, Bev
"At the core of liberalism is the spoiled child,
miserable, as all spoiled children are, unsatisfied,
demanding, ill-disciplined, despotic and useless.
Liberalism is a philosophy of sniveling brats."
PJ O'Rourke

 

[Dean Hoffman]

On Sun, 23 Aug 2015 14:53:16 -0500, The Real Bev <bashley101@gmail.com>
wrote:

On 08/23/2015 12:40 PM, Dean Hoffman wrote:
On Sun, 23 Aug 2015 07:37:38 -0500, Stormin Mormon
cayoung61@hotmail.com> wrote:

On 8/22/2015 7:19 PM, Ashton Crusher wrote:
It's been less than a week and we're almost up to 500 messages.
Should I start a "left foot braking thread"???

On Sun, 16 Aug 2015 06:10:23 +0000 (UTC), ceg
curt.guldenschuh@gmail.com> wrote:

The cellphone paradox - where are all the accidents?

The Fermi Paradox is essentially a situation where we "assume"
something that "seems obvious"; but, if that assumption is
true, then something else "should" be happening. But it's not.

Hence, the paradox.

Such is the cellphone paradox.

Does braking with the left foot increase the risk of accidents?

Three on the tree? Four on the floor? One down, four up?

European or Japanese?

I got to ride a Norton once, long ago. I think there was some
odd critter with an actual hand gear shift.

--
Using Opera's mail client: http://www.opera.com/mail/

 

[Ashton Crusher]

On Sun, 23 Aug 2015 08:54:02 -0400, "Mayayana"
<mayayana@invalid.nospam> wrote:

| Interesting points. My driving experience is that things are no
| different on the road now then they ever were in the past as far as
| the general competency and driving behavior of other drivers.

I wonder if my mostly urban/suburban driving might
be a factor. I see *a lot* of people on the phone,
and it's not kids. Occasionally I might see a teenager
texting at 60 mph, but mostly I see adults, of all kinds,
yapping away.

The man who sideswiped me veering into
my lane was probably 35-40 y.o. He was talking to his
friend, who in turn was dropping off her car at a repair
shop. He was engrossed in trying to follow her instructions
on which street to turn at when he hit me. A few years
earlier he would have figured out the directions before
he'd left the house. But this was about 2004 and he was
a "yuppie" on the go, with a phone glued to his ear.

When he pulled over after the accident he wouldn't
even talk to me. He called the police, then his insurance
company. I never saw him off the phone until the police
arrived. He was so much out to lunch that he'd called
the police, convinced that I'd hit him! In my experience
that's typical. As a taxpaying consumer he doesn't
feel he has to relate to the world around him, thus that
world has no business "relating" to him.

A very big change is that people don't signal anymore.
Maybe 30-50% of the time. It's crazy. They're just not
paying attention. In MA it's illegal not to signal, and it's
irritating to be behind someone and get no notice of
why they suddenly stepped on the brakes. That used to
be unheard of. Now it's almost the norm. Again, it has
nothing to do with young drivers. But it does have a lot to
do with phoners only having one freee hand.

A couple of weeks ago I was pulling out of a supermarket
and was going straight across the street, up a sidestreet.
Traffic was stopping in both directions in front of me. The
near side traffic had left a gap. A man driving on the far side,
heading toward my left, slowed down and seemed to be leaving
a gap. I started to pull out. He then turned into the supermarket
and almost hit me. I beeped. We both put down our windows.
He looked at me with a condescending smile and said, "I'm
turning in here", as though I must be an idiot. I said, "how
about a signal?!" His face dropped. It had never occurred to
him to signal. To his credit, though, he apologized.

I see the phones and the anti-social behavior as
related. For instance, where I live it's always been
customary, on a narrow road with a parked car, to
wait for an oncoming car if the parked car is on your
side. The oncoming driver then waves a thankyou. Now
it's usually a game of chicken. That's a very clear
difference in driver behavior. It's not related to phones,
but phones seem to be related to the general social
disconnection. People are no longer experiencing
themselves as being where they are.

The same is true of people walking across streets,
on cellphones or not. People used to *always* look
before crossing. Now it's common to see people cross
without breaking step, trusting that the universe is
looking out for them. Maybe many of them are the
children of "helicopter moms". At first I thought it was a
kind of passive-aggressive entitlement, but the more
it's happened, the more I'm thinking that these people
are actually entitled to the core. They're not trying to
show me who's boss. They don't even know I'm there.
It hasn't occurred to them that they could actually
suffer the indignity of being run over by a car! Maybe
that's because they've spent their lives getting trophies
for showing up? I'm not sure. It's actually a very intriguing
pattern to me.

(A friend who tutors gradeschool children recently told
me that helicopter moms have been replaced by "snowplow
moms". The kids are pushed through endless achievements,
with no breaks to just sit, reflect, get bored, discover a
bug, or even think about what they might *want* to do.)

Do you really not see any changes? When I was growing
up, kids behaved and anyone nearby was a parent. Today,
when I see kids running and shrieking in a store I don't
dare say anything. The parents are likely to be outraged.
And often as not, they're standing there proudly as their
kids act out. In a nutshell, being considerate has become
a sucker's pastime, while "self-empowerment" is considered
an important goal.

I think my own generation, the baby boomers, actually
started with being entitled. Not all of us, but many. In
the 50s life was about kids. Baby boomers then grew up
feeling they needed to be special. They had kids. Their
kids were very special accomplishments, so many of those
kids are now hyper-spoiled and entitled. That's a unique
situation. (It's not so long ago that child labor was
considered OK and that people had kids to save money.
The kids could work the farm. They weren't cherished
possessions. They were low paid workers.)

It's certainly true that young people are more selfish
and old people are less tolerant. That's timeless. But I'm
surprised that anyone, say, over 50 doesn't see some
dramatic changes in American culture during the past
decades, which have nothing to do with young vs old.
But those changes may be less pronounced in small towns
and rural areas.

Which is what every older generation says. If this continual
degradation of the 'young' were true we'd be back in the stone age.
Don't take my next comment personally, it could apply to me too, but
have you considered that all that bad stuff you see that causes you
problems is because when you were younger it simply didn't bother you
and/or your defensive driving skills and ability to "see ahead" and
avoid those situations was better. So what you think of as everyone
else getting worse is at least partly due to you getting worse at
avoiding those positions?

Like you, I see bad drivers all around but I"m not convinced that on
average it's any worse particularly when the accident rates keep going
down.

 

[J Burns]

On 8/23/15 8:37 AM, Stormin Mormon wrote:

On 8/22/2015 7:19 PM, Ashton Crusher wrote:
It's been less than a week and we're almost up to 500 messages. Should
I start a "left foot braking thread"???





On Sun, 16 Aug 2015 06:10:23 +0000 (UTC), ceg
curt.guldenschuh@gmail.com> wrote:

The cellphone paradox - where are all the accidents?

The Fermi Paradox is essentially a situation where we "assume" something
that "seems obvious"; but, if that assumption is true, then something
else
"should" be happening. But it's not.

Hence, the paradox.


Such is the cellphone paradox.

Does braking with the left foot increase the
risk of accidents?

It greatly reduces the risk of brake failure. I can't use that method
with my car because they're no hole in the floor.

 

[Ashton Crusher]

On Sun, 23 Aug 2015 09:27:22 -0400, "(PeteCresswell)" <x@y.Invalid>
wrote:

Per Mayayana:
People used to *always* look
before crossing. Now it's common to see people cross
without breaking step,

Does anybody remember being taught "The curb step" as a child?

I have one single memory from when I was perhaps 18 months old and
it's having to climb up a tall curb step in Albany NY in the winter.
It seemed VERY tall and someone holding my hand helped me levitate up
to the top.

 

[Michael A. Terrell]

J Burns wrote:

It greatly reduces the risk of brake failure. I can't use that method
with my car because they're no hole in the floor.

None that you know of, anyway. ;-)