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More Than 1 In 4 Car Crashes Involve Cellphone Use
schwit1 (797399) writes "Texting and driving is dangerous but a new survey finds talking on a cellphone while behind the wheel may be even worse. The National Safety Council's annual report found 26 percent of all crashes are tied to phone use, but noted just 5 percent involved texting. Safety advocates are lobbying now for a total ban on driver phone use, pointing to studies that headsets do not reduce driver distraction."
The main question is if the total accident rate has increased since cell phones became ubiquitous. As far as I know the answer is "no", the accident rate actually went down. "Tied to" doesn't mean "caused", or "increased the chance of". Usually "tied to" is a lazy qualifier from a lazy researcher or journalist.
You know what is more dangerous than cellphones in cars? Breast. No lie.
It is a fact that in over 50% of all accidents there were at LEAST 2 breasts in the car at the time. Often times 4 or more! Breasts are twice as likely to be involved in any accident that cellphone or penises. I call for an immediate ban on breasts in moving vehicles. They can be near them while the car is at rest, preferably at a car show, both otherwise they more dangerous than drunk driving!!!
That's, of course, unless you want to actually use statistics for something other than alarmism.
Holding the device always makes it worse, especially when dialing. Especially in a stick-shift.
Many drivers communicate all the time while driving, on the radio or more modern cell-phone based alternative. They have before cell phones existed. It's the driver who's dangerous, not the phone.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
Here's a question: Would the black box tell you how many of these accidents would have happened even if there was no cell phone involved? If so, let's see it. (I honestly don't know.)
Given that driving using a mobile phone seriously inhibits your ability to concentrate on driving and that the main cause of accidents is driver error, its a very good assumption.
Far better than the assumption that they would have had the accident anyway.
Your strawman depends on no other factors being involved. It's like claiming drivers are safer since the 80's because fatalities have reduced, this completely ignores the advent and rise of ABS, the seatbelt pre-tensioner as well as crackdowns on speed and drunk driving (and awareness campaigns on driver fatigue).
The figures aren't sensationalist when they're true.
And if they help morons on phones realise that they are morons for being on the phone whilst driving, it's extremely helpful.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
Far better than the assumption that they would have had the accident anyway.
The figures aren't sensationalist when they're true.
They aren't true. They are meaningless. I have a friend who is a real estate
agent who is always on his phone when he is in the car. Close to 100%.
Extrapolating out these meaningless statitics to 100% it would mean that
if everybody constantly talked on their phones while in the car like my friend
then 100% of all accidents are caused by cell phone use.
These stats are the equivalent of saying 1 in 4 accidents involve the radio
or 1 in 4 accidents involve someone drinking a soft drink while driving.
People talk on cell phones, listen to the radio, and drink soft drinks while
driving but that doesn't mean any of the 3 cause a 25% increase in accidents
anymore than saying 25% of accidents involve passengers means that
the passengers are a direct cause of the accidents.
(I know people who bitch about other people using cell phones while walking or even sitting, which poses no harm to anybody.)
Yes, people like myself who have had to dodge one too many chatterboxes that think it's okay to just step into the street in front of someone riding a bicycle. After all, Brenda has a new boyfriend and she met him on Craigslist ... ewwww!
The fact is that people are too, "well that's only other people, that's not me!" and then they proceed to dial a phone call that could have easily waited until back at the office parking lot or whatever. The false sense of urgency people have simply because they can is getting ridiculous. I can accept that probably 1% of phone calls are actually urgent. What I can't accept is the 75% of calls that people think are ugent. What's the old saying, "Your lack of planning does not constitute an emergency on my part." Until it is determined that people will behave responsibly, other people will want to legislate that irresponsible behavior away from them. I don't think it has anything to do with "not being a part of their conversation" but rather that people would prefer to live in a world where they aren't surrounded by people chatting casually on a phone and being oblivious to the world around them.
Someone flopped a steamer in the gene pool.
You ever tried driving one of the high-fidelity simulators (rFactor, etc) that let you record a professional-grade analysis of your driving? Given the known effects of alcohol on the human nervous system I find it *highly* unlikely that you drive as well drunk as sober, though there may be a "sweet spot" where your sense of flow is amplified enough to more than offset your reduced reaction times - I've certainly noticed such an effect myself. Provided of course nothing unexpected happens (one of the benefits of a racing simulator over a real road filled with a never-ending supply of reckless idiots)
My own observations have been that my lap times may improve considerably while intoxicated, at least when I'm "on", but my crashes are likewise far more... cinematic shall we say. And frequent. And not infrequently rather embarrassing - for example missing a full-throttle curve when distracted by a passing thought. There's a reason I don't drive real cars if I've had a few.
And if you don't think you're drunk then you're probably one of the people I wouldn't trust behind the wheel - recognizing just how impaired you are, despite the lack of obvious symptoms, seems to be a good 0-th order approximation of your ability to behave responsibly under the influence. Unless you're a metabolic freak your reflexes *are* severely impaired - if you're not aware of that then it means your judgement is severely impaired as well.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.