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Steering Wheel Checks Alcohol Consumption
karvind writes "According to washingtonpost, Inventor Dennis Bellehumeur has made a $600 sensor that can be installed in a steering wheel or in gloves and will test a driver's skin to determine alcohol consumption. Bellehumeur, a real estate agent and deli owner in Wilton Manors, spent 12 years developing his sensor after his then-teenage son crashed into a utility pole while driving drunk and suffered minor brain damage. He received a patent this month and the sensor should complete testing this year."
Having a light on your dashboard telling you that you're objectively too drunk to drive will probably help reduce drunk driving for rational people who overestimate their limits.
Before anyone goes off about freedom being limited, rights, etc... come on. Nobody has the right to drive drunk.
Quid festinatio swallonis est aetherfuga inonusti?
Africus aut Europaeus?
One more thing to break preventing my car from working and leaving me sober and stranded in the middle of nowhere, with a broken part that's only available from the dealer thereby leaving my car unrepairable by the local garage off the freeway in Idaho.
As the number of gadgets that have to function correctly for cars to run increases, the probability of getting from point A to B decreases to zero.
Don't you ever get tired of looking for ways to blame the parents. You do realize that no matter how much you try to educate someone there is always the possibility that no matter what they will end up doing exactly what you told them not to. Children make mistakes and the law does provide for punishment of the parents for their children's actions. This guy goes out and makes a tool that might be able to help the situation and you jump all over it. It does have uses beyond teenage drunk drives you know that right. It could be installed at the request of a judge after an ADULT gets convicted of DUI. Hell I could go out and buy one just in case I don't trust my own opinion of whether or not I'm drunk. It doesn't have to be just a tool for lazy parenting as you like to make it sound.
For the record I don't think it's lazy parenting, I think it's giving more tools to help parents. As Ronald Regan said "trust but verify"
500 dollar reward for tip(s) leading to the arrest of the person(s) who stole my sig.
I would hope that as a bartender you are aware of the concept of washing your hands :)
I can't be the only person who immediately contemplated swabbing their friends steering wheels with rubbing alcohol.
No driving for you. ONE YEAR!
this is true.
we had a big new years party 4 or 5 years ago and we bought a breathalizer so people could see what they would blow.
we used it for fun and gags, but ultimately, at the end, it saved people's lives (perhaps) and possibly even a few DUIs. towards the end of the party as the ones standing started to leave, they would blow and everyone that was over the legal limit called a taxi or worked out a ride with someone well under the legal limit.
but this device is not the savior to teen drunk driving (which sounds like the reasoning behind the invention) - although it may cut down some incidents by 20% or so.
bottom line, you just can't prevent people from being stupid - and it's not funny because most of the time it means the loss of life of another instead of the stupid one that caused it.
do you have shinyfeet?
$600 per car is not a lot to spend to ensure road safety.
Depends: on a $300 Yugo, it might not be such a good idea...
Then again, with a Yugo, you're very safe in the first place, since the bus driver is never drunk.
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
It's a priveledge, fetterd by many rules and regulations, including an allowable limit of alcohol in your bloodstream.
One shot of hard alcohol = one wineglass of wine = one bottle of beer = one FULL hour not driving.
It's a nice idea, and sounds good as a guide, *but*:
The way I pour/buy wine, one bottle gives you three glasses (250ml/glass). That means that three bottles of wine = nine full hours not driving.
Believe me, I've had three bottles of wine on an empty stomach; I was barely in a condition to stand the next morning, let alone drive.
In fact, it's perfectly possible to get drunk at night, feel fine in the morning and still be over the legal driving limit (at least in the UK, YMMV of course).
It's official. Most of you are morons.
I know I can go double the legal limit before I am impaired
That might be true, but it might also be the problem.
" It's causing unfair restrainment in a product we own."
It's unfair to you, it's more than fair for everybody else on the road.
Just remember, you own the car, you do NOT own the roads.
"Derp de derp."
His kid gets injured driving drunk and gets brain damage. He works on a device that will alert a driver that they are drunk, possibly preventing needless injuries and deaths like what happened to his son. Then he patents it, driving the cost up. Then he makes noises about wanting it standard on all cars, and they make noises about it being too expensive... Hey asshole, if you want to make an invention and make have it standard everywhere because you think it will benefit humanity, try NOT patenting it and driving the cost up so no one gets to use it, you piece of shit. If anyone should be in a position to rise above their greed and just share an idea with society, it OUGHT to be this guy. This just makes me fucking sick.
-1 Uncomfortable Truth
I don't want to pay for a $600 gadget that can be defeated by a $10 pair of gloves! Cars are expensive enough already without sticking worthless tech into them for the sake of putting on appearances.
Nothing to see here. Move along.