5 ms·

The reality, as someone who has lived in all three of those cities, is that pedestrians are adept at making cars navigate them, because they can. It's not that

by M_Grey 10y ago

The reality, as someone who has lived in all three of those cities, is that pedestrians are adept at making cars navigate them, because they can. It's not that crosswalks (which are ubiquitous in those cities) are somehow burdensome, they just have shit to do and know that drivers don't want to hit them. These are the same people who just walk into the street without even looking, while on their cell phones.

mindslight 10y ago
> These are the same people who just walk into the street without even looking, while on their cell phones. Obviously the bad actors are going to stand out to you. There are many more people who are attentive when they informally cross, but they blend into traffic and are forgotten about. I don't know what to do about the recent phenomenon of people spaced out on their phones, but I'm pretty sure changing traffic laws so drivers can explicitly hit them is not a good answer. (crosswalks aren't burdensome, but the idea that pedestrians should only ever cross in them is, by construction. Why should a pedestrian be made to walk an extra block to simply cross a regular ubiquitous street, when they do not depend on the abstraction that would necessitate it? The "highway revolts" took place for good reason, and changing every street into a controlled access road would essentially resume that damage)
- M_Grey 10y ago
  Why should they be made to walk an extra block? So that they don't die. A fact that should be increasingly relevant as the reigns are slowly handed over to computers.
  - mindslight 10y ago
    The need to "not die" is a result of a deliberate policy choice, which you're obscuring by making it seem like the pedestrian is the only one choosing. If we're talking about metaphorical "reigns" meaning control of society, then we definitely should not be handing these over to computers. The goal should be for computers to be responsible to people [0], rather than people being controlled by computers. Otherwise, we are abdicating are own right to exist. [0] True independent AI would function as its own agent. But I would categorize that as a new "person".
    - M_Grey 10y ago
      A deliberate policy choice of... allowing cars on roads? Before that it was horse drawn carriages and people on horseback running people down. I'm not clear on the pure policy choice you're referencing. The rest of your post is a complete tangent.
      - mindslight 10y ago
        The policy choice you seem to be advocating is that cars should have complete right of way, which is decidedly not the present condition. My "tangent" directly addressed something you said.
        M_Grey 10y ago
        >The need to "not die" is a result of a deliberate policy choice... Your earlier statement. Now you're saying that policy (the one you describe as a construction designed to be burdensome earlier) is one you feel I've implied? I've done no such thing. You're the one claiming that the current system is burdensome, don't try to wriggle out of that. Your tangent meanwhile did not directly address something I said, it addressed an extension of what I said pertaining to vehicles, and expanded it to a society-wide issue. So again... tangent.

by M_Grey 10y ago

mindslight 10y ago

> These are the same people who just walk into the street without even looking, while on their cell phones. Obviously the bad actors are going to stand out to you. There are many more people who are attentive when they informally cross, but they blend into traffic and are forgotten about. I don't know what to do about the recent phenomenon of people spaced out on their phones, but I'm pretty sure changing traffic laws so drivers can explicitly hit them is not a good answer. (crosswalks aren't burdensome, but the idea that pedestrians should only ever cross in them is, by construction. Why should a pedestrian be made to walk an extra block to simply cross a regular ubiquitous street, when they do not depend on the abstraction that would necessitate it? The "highway revolts" took place for good reason, and changing every street into a controlled access road would essentially resume that damage)

M_Grey 10y ago
Why should they be made to walk an extra block? So that they don't die. A fact that should be increasingly relevant as the reigns are slowly handed over to computers.
- mindslight 10y ago
  The need to "not die" is a result of a deliberate policy choice, which you're obscuring by making it seem like the pedestrian is the only one choosing. If we're talking about metaphorical "reigns" meaning control of society, then we definitely should not be handing these over to computers. The goal should be for computers to be responsible to people [0], rather than people being controlled by computers. Otherwise, we are abdicating are own right to exist. [0] True independent AI would function as its own agent. But I would categorize that as a new "person".
  - M_Grey 10y ago
    A deliberate policy choice of... allowing cars on roads? Before that it was horse drawn carriages and people on horseback running people down. I'm not clear on the pure policy choice you're referencing. The rest of your post is a complete tangent.
    - mindslight 10y ago
      The policy choice you seem to be advocating is that cars should have complete right of way, which is decidedly not the present condition. My "tangent" directly addressed something you said.
      - M_Grey 10y ago
        >The need to "not die" is a result of a deliberate policy choice... Your earlier statement. Now you're saying that policy (the one you describe as a construction designed to be burdensome earlier) is one you feel I've implied? I've done no such thing. You're the one claiming that the current system is burdensome, don't try to wriggle out of that. Your tangent meanwhile did not directly address something I said, it addressed an extension of what I said pertaining to vehicles, and expanded it to a society-wide issue. So again... tangent.