And yes, you’ve hit upon what I suspect is the answer. Our commutes are long, and our gas is cheap. We don’t think so much about “how much is this costing me?” when we’re driving just across town... 15 or 20 miles. We think “when am I going to have to fill up? can I make it until I get paid on Friday, or will I have to put $5 or $10 worth in it to avoid running out before then?”.
The question isn't how far is a fixed quantity of fuel going to get them, but rather how much fuel is required to go the regular commutes.
On a day-to-day basis, for most people at least, I think you are incorrect.
For most people, it’s “will this get me to Friday when I’ll get paid and can afford to fill it up? or will I have to put another $10 in it to make it to the weekend?”
My personal theory that it’s like this in the US primarily because we drive a lot and get relatively cheap gas compared to most European countries with shorter commutes and high-priced fuel.
I don’t live in San Francisco, and, as I have found that you can smell the tasty odors while driving past just about any KFC or Burger King at the right time of day (just to name a few fast food venues off the top of my head, but I’ve noticed it at real restaurants as well)... I’m skeptical of your claim.
You wouldn’t need to arbitrarily duplicate any smell. Just like a printer can’t actually arbitrarily duplicate any colour... it’s restricted to the CMY colorspace, which is pretty damn close to “any” colour but not quite.
A smell synthesizer could actually be even more limited... you might have to buy a specific “flowers” cartridge that contains half-a-dozen or so chemicals that can make a variety of flowery-smelling combinations, for instance.
Even so, it might be possible to make a reasonable impression of a wide variety of smells using a relatively small number of compounds... the question is, how well could you duplicate an odor and how few compounds could you limit the device to in order to still get a decent variety of smells it can duplicate?
The main advantage to having a limited variety is that you would only be using the ones that you need and you wouldn’t have dozens (or hundreds) of compounds that never got used but took up extra space. That would be like printing everything in blue and running out of that while having mostly-full magenta and yellow still.
I don’t think it’s possible to get a ticket for being wreck-less. Actually, I think the insurance company gives you a discount for it usually. Perhaps you meant reckless?
And what about people who get sick at the smell or sight of meat?
I guess there’s just yet another place they’d have to avoid, as well as not being able to drive on half the streets in the city anyway because of various meat smells emanating from the restaurants and fast-food places.
Then again, maybe it wouldn’t be as big a deal as you seem to think.
True enough. They just don’t think of it on an everyday basis in terms of less money spent per trip, rather they think of it as a longer time between spending money to fill up.
Most people don’t care how much money they’re burning... most people just want to know how long they can go until they have to put another $25/$40/whatever in their tank.
I want to see legislators impressed with the notion of the law of diminishing returns. They’re the ones pushing to get the mileages raised higher and higher, forcing the car companies to spend millions upon millions of dollars on something that’s getting progressively less worthwhile to pursue. Not only does it save less gasoline to improve from 33 to 50 MPG than it did to get from 10 MPG to 20, but it also costs more money to develop the technology capable of that.
When gas prices were high (up around $4/gallon), I might’ve been getting more concerned with how many gallons it was costing me every 100 miles I drove. With gas down around $2.59/gallon, I mainly want to know how long I can go between fill-ups.
In Europe, with relatively high gas prices, relatively dense cities, and relatively short commutes, the most significant part of your daily commute is the amount of gas you burn, i.e. how much it costs.
In the US, with relatively low gas prices and spread-out cities that weren’t designed to give low commutes, the most significant part of your daily commute is how long it takes to get where you’re going.
As a result, in the US you’re more concerned with “how long can I drive between fill-ups?” (miles per gallon) whereas in Europe it’s “how much will this trip cost me?” (litres per mile).
Solution: Do nothing. Who cares if people don’t understand it properly?
If you don’t see the logic in my answer, then consider the question. The question is wrong. Ask this question instead:
Which saves more gasoline, driving a car that the manufacturer boasts design improvements in recent models leading to an increase from 10 to 20 MPG, or one that boasts improvements from 33 to 50 MPG? The answer is simple: Buying the car with the highest MPG rating will save the most gasoline compared to the others.
Does it matter that the difference in the actual amount of gasoline consumed between 10 and 20 MPG is higher for a given distance than between 33 and 50 MPG? No. Not in the least. The only important comparison is the difference between 20 MPG and 50 MPG: driving a car that gets 50 MPG is better than driving one that gets 20 MPG. That is all that people need to understand. The fact that the scale is non-linear is irrelevant.
This is about as sensible as complaining that people misunderstand speed because they think that driving 5 MPH over the speed limit will save the same amount of time on a 65 MPH road as it will on a 25 MPH road. (Going 30 MPH instead of 25 saves 24 seconds for every mile driven; increasing from 65 to 70 MPH saves only 3.96 seconds per mile driven.)
It’s just the law of diminishing returns. Unless they’re chasing extremes, it doesn’t matter. In fact, legislators are the ones that I want to understand this, because they’re the ones chasing extremes... pushing the limits higher and higher, at some point beyond what is practical for car companies to affordably build.
Your average journalist thinks that if there were 25% more fatalities last year than this year, that means the same as saying there were 25% fewer fatalities this year than last. Your average journalist is wrong, obviously.
Or, to make a car analogy, like making it illegal to sell someone a car that goes 120 MPH as you would be aiding them in breaking the speed limits by doing so.
The point is, the drivers license is proof of identity, and once your identity has been proven your citizenship status can easily be looked up... if the law enforcement officers are so inclined to take the trouble. So it does prove your citizenship, only indirectly.
Probable cause is required for a LEO to detain someone. If somebody stopped for a traffic violation produces a valid Arizona drivers license, there is no probable cause to believe they are here illegally.
You don't get to cross-examine the radar gun whether it's held in a cops hand or not.
Actually, that’s incorrect. You can demand to be shown the reading on the gun, and you can even demand that they show calibration test results that show that the radar gun reads accurately.
Slashdot Mirror
Gas prices in Europe are about 3-4 bucks a gallon.
I was under the impression that they were more than that...
http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/international/prices.html#Motor
And yes, you’ve hit upon what I suspect is the answer. Our commutes are long, and our gas is cheap. We don’t think so much about “how much is this costing me?” when we’re driving just across town... 15 or 20 miles. We think “when am I going to have to fill up? can I make it until I get paid on Friday, or will I have to put $5 or $10 worth in it to avoid running out before then?”.
The question isn't how far is a fixed quantity of fuel going to get them, but rather how much fuel is required to go the regular commutes.
On a day-to-day basis, for most people at least, I think you are incorrect.
For most people, it’s “will this get me to Friday when I’ll get paid and can afford to fill it up? or will I have to put another $10 in it to make it to the weekend?”
My personal theory that it’s like this in the US primarily because we drive a lot and get relatively cheap gas compared to most European countries with shorter commutes and high-priced fuel.
Sounds like the exact same functionality of the simple Excel spreadsheet I keep.
Price of gas in June ’08? I paid an average $3.775/gallon (3.779 ± 0.03).
I don’t live in San Francisco, and, as I have found that you can smell the tasty odors while driving past just about any KFC or Burger King at the right time of day (just to name a few fast food venues off the top of my head, but I’ve noticed it at real restaurants as well)... I’m skeptical of your claim.
You wouldn’t need to arbitrarily duplicate any smell. Just like a printer can’t actually arbitrarily duplicate any colour... it’s restricted to the CMY colorspace, which is pretty damn close to “any” colour but not quite.
A smell synthesizer could actually be even more limited... you might have to buy a specific “flowers” cartridge that contains half-a-dozen or so chemicals that can make a variety of flowery-smelling combinations, for instance.
Even so, it might be possible to make a reasonable impression of a wide variety of smells using a relatively small number of compounds... the question is, how well could you duplicate an odor and how few compounds could you limit the device to in order to still get a decent variety of smells it can duplicate?
The main advantage to having a limited variety is that you would only be using the ones that you need and you wouldn’t have dozens (or hundreds) of compounds that never got used but took up extra space. That would be like printing everything in blue and running out of that while having mostly-full magenta and yellow still.
Or it may be written for careless or wreckless.
I don’t think it’s possible to get a ticket for being wreck-less. Actually, I think the insurance company gives you a discount for it usually. Perhaps you meant reckless?
And what about people who get sick at the smell or sight of meat?
I guess there’s just yet another place they’d have to avoid, as well as not being able to drive on half the streets in the city anyway because of various meat smells emanating from the restaurants and fast-food places.
Then again, maybe it wouldn’t be as big a deal as you seem to think.
No more so than a printer has to synthesise arbitrary coloured dyes.
True enough. They just don’t think of it on an everyday basis in terms of less money spent per trip, rather they think of it as a longer time between spending money to fill up.
Duh, after I have had seven fifths...
That’s improper!
Most people don’t care how much money they’re burning... most people just want to know how long they can go until they have to put another $25/$40/whatever in their tank.
Americans are funny people sometimes.
Agreed.
I want to see legislators impressed with the notion of the law of diminishing returns. They’re the ones pushing to get the mileages raised higher and higher, forcing the car companies to spend millions upon millions of dollars on something that’s getting progressively less worthwhile to pursue. Not only does it save less gasoline to improve from 33 to 50 MPG than it did to get from 10 MPG to 20, but it also costs more money to develop the technology capable of that.
When gas prices were high (up around $4/gallon), I might’ve been getting more concerned with how many gallons it was costing me every 100 miles I drove. With gas down around $2.59/gallon, I mainly want to know how long I can go between fill-ups.
litres per mile
Er... what the hell was I thinking?
Let’s all just pretend I said litres per hundred kilometers...
It’s a matter of what’s important.
In Europe, with relatively high gas prices, relatively dense cities, and relatively short commutes, the most significant part of your daily commute is the amount of gas you burn, i.e. how much it costs.
In the US, with relatively low gas prices and spread-out cities that weren’t designed to give low commutes, the most significant part of your daily commute is how long it takes to get where you’re going.
As a result, in the US you’re more concerned with “how long can I drive between fill-ups?” (miles per gallon) whereas in Europe it’s “how much will this trip cost me?” (litres per mile).
Solution: Do nothing. Who cares if people don’t understand it properly?
If you don’t see the logic in my answer, then consider the question. The question is wrong. Ask this question instead:
Which saves more gasoline, driving a car that the manufacturer boasts design improvements in recent models leading to an increase from 10 to 20 MPG, or one that boasts improvements from 33 to 50 MPG? The answer is simple: Buying the car with the highest MPG rating will save the most gasoline compared to the others.
Does it matter that the difference in the actual amount of gasoline consumed between 10 and 20 MPG is higher for a given distance than between 33 and 50 MPG? No. Not in the least. The only important comparison is the difference between 20 MPG and 50 MPG: driving a car that gets 50 MPG is better than driving one that gets 20 MPG. That is all that people need to understand. The fact that the scale is non-linear is irrelevant.
This is about as sensible as complaining that people misunderstand speed because they think that driving 5 MPH over the speed limit will save the same amount of time on a 65 MPH road as it will on a 25 MPH road. (Going 30 MPH instead of 25 saves 24 seconds for every mile driven; increasing from 65 to 70 MPH saves only 3.96 seconds per mile driven.)
It’s just the law of diminishing returns. Unless they’re chasing extremes, it doesn’t matter. In fact, legislators are the ones that I want to understand this, because they’re the ones chasing extremes... pushing the limits higher and higher, at some point beyond what is practical for car companies to affordably build.
You seem to think that rich people don’t drink... in fact, their choice in alcoholic beverages tend to be expensive, so they probably do pay more...
Your average journalist thinks that if there were 25% more fatalities last year than this year, that means the same as saying there were 25% fewer fatalities this year than last. Your average journalist is wrong, obviously.
I think he meant,
(Disclaimer - If you're in UK [the above applies], [otherwise] of course reverse the above to avoid mass confusion and panic).
It doesn’t quite say the same thing without those words, though.
A minor quibble of semantics.
It’s the difference between merely brandishing a gun and shooting someone with it.
But "tripping off the curb" was not the behavior specified. "Public drunkenness" was.
“Public drunkenness” includes the threat of attempting to walk down the sidewalk and tripping off the curb.
Or, to make a car analogy, like making it illegal to sell someone a car that goes 120 MPH as you would be aiding them in breaking the speed limits by doing so.
...and you got a Funny mod for all that. I’m still trying to figure out whether you were really trying to be funny, or actually being serious.
You seemingly don’t have the slightest idea what that means.
The point is, the drivers license is proof of identity, and once your identity has been proven your citizenship status can easily be looked up... if the law enforcement officers are so inclined to take the trouble. So it does prove your citizenship, only indirectly.
Probable cause is required for a LEO to detain someone. If somebody stopped for a traffic violation produces a valid Arizona drivers license, there is no probable cause to believe they are here illegally.
You don't get to cross-examine the radar gun whether it's held in a cops hand or not.
Actually, that’s incorrect. You can demand to be shown the reading on the gun, and you can even demand that they show calibration test results that show that the radar gun reads accurately.