7 ms·

I think what's missing is any sense of perspective or judgement in the laws. Driving drunk 100 miles an hour the wrong way when kids are going to school in the

I think what's missing is any sense of perspective or judgement in the laws. Driving drunk 100 miles an hour the wrong way when kids are going to school in the morning is different than driving 40 on major roads after having a cocktail or two with dinner. Yet the law basically treats the latter like the former.

learnstats2 7y ago
I think the intent of the law is to stop people doing the latter - which surely results in more deaths.
rubidium 7y ago
That’s exactly what sentencing is for. The law is the law, but the judge and prosecutors adjust for severity.
EvanAnderson 7y ago
I don't want much judgement in the laws. If someone has ingested alcohol and it's not yet metabolized I don't want them driving. It's irresponsible, full stop. (Same goes for other driving impairments-- drowsy, under the influence of drugs, distracted, etc.) The idea that one should be making a judgement call on their degree of impairment and choosing to drive is odious to me. If you're impaired, don't drive. Edit: I'm not a molecular biologist. Let's edit this to say "If someone has ingested alcohol and it's not yet metabolized to the extent that it is unable to create a discernable impairment I don't want them driving." Edit 2: It sounds like an objective test for reflexes and response time would be a better test of impairment (of any type) rather than using blood/breath alcohol measurements as a proxy for impairment.
- jeffdavis 7y ago
  Drowsy driving causes more deaths than drunk driving plus drugged driving combined. Ever driven on less than a solid 8 hours? See _Why we Sleep_ by Matthew Walker.
  - EvanAnderson 7y ago
    Drowsy driving should be as much of a crime as drunk driving-- absolutely. There is no excuse for getting behind the wheel impaired and exposing innocent people to unnecessary risk.
    - hanniabu 7y ago
      This basically means that no night shift worker is allowed to drive home from work.
      - goodcanadian 7y ago
        I never found that driving after a night shift was much different to driving after a day shift. Of course, when working nights, I slept during the day. YMMV.
      - gowld 7y ago
        Night-shift workers should sleep during the day.
        deleted 7y ago
        [deleted]
        hanniabu 7y ago
        My guess is you've never worked night shift. It's not as easy to sleep during the day as it is at night, even with black out curtain, unless you wanted to get drugged up every day.
        astura 7y ago
        YMMV, I guess, I slept perfectly fine when I worked the night shift. (Went to bed around 5-6am)
        hanniabu 7y ago
- Maxion 7y ago
  The same goes with being tired. While the typical US DUI test does sound stupid, it at least has a chance of catching those who are tired.
- lisper 7y ago
  > If someone has ingested alcohol and it's not yet metabolized I don't want them driving. It's irresponsible, full stop. Really? I had a glass of wine last night. There are probably a few molecules of unmetabolized alcohol still in my system. Is it "irresponsible, full stop" for me to drive today?
  - EvanAnderson 7y ago
    I'm not a molecular biologist. I've edited my comment to be more precise in expressing the spirit of what I meant.
    - lisper 7y ago
      > If someone has ingested alcohol and it's not yet metabolized to the extent that it is unable to create a discernable impairment... I sympathize, but your new formulation has exactly the same problem as your first one: discernible by whom? If your BAC is 0.0001 but a police officer says that you appeared to be impaired in their subjective judgement, should that be enough to convict you of driving while impaired? And do you even want to try to distinguish alcohol-induced impairment from sleep deprivation? Do you really want to start punishing people for driving while sleepy? What are you going to use as the legal standard for that?
      - EvanAnderson 7y ago
        Impairment is impairment. I want just as many drowsy drivers on the road as I want alcohol-consuming drivers. An objective test of reflexes / response time would be highly technically feasible. (I'd also like to see periodic re-certification for drivers with such a test too, but that's another issue.)
        lisper 7y ago
        > I want just as many drowsy drivers on the road as I want alcohol-consuming drivers. So do I. The challenge is coming up with a legal standard to decide who goes to jail and who doesn't which does not result in a ton of false positives. Do you really want to turn going to work after a bad night's sleep into a crime?
- delish 7y ago
  > If someone has ingested alcohol and it's not yet metabolized I don't want them driving. It's irresponsible, full stop. Some would say we put discretion in the legal system to account for incomplete empirical knowledge. This article is asserting incomplete empirical knowledge.
  - EvanAnderson 7y ago
    I was responding to the parent's comment re: differentiating between different "degrees" of offense. If the breath test system is flawed it should be replaced by a better test. I agree w/ the other commenter who says that sentencing is the place where degree of offense should be considered.
jacobolus 7y ago
Driving 40 miles/hour anywhere with pedestrians/cyclists is incredibly dangerous. If hit at that speed, a pedestrian/cyclist will almost certainly die. Ideally, urban streets should be limited to 20 miles/hour, and should not have drivers impaired by alcohol. (This is obviously unrealistic in the foreseeable future in most of the USA, where automobiles are treated like royalty.)
- eMSF 7y ago
  >Driving 40 miles/hour anywhere with pedestrians/cyclists is incredibly dangerous. If hit at that speed, a pedestrian/cyclist will almost certainly die. The former doesn't follow from the latter. I mean, by leaving your house, you might slip and fall and die; that does not mean leaving your house is incredibly dangerous, because we have to account for both the severity of the outcome and the probability of it.
  - jacobolus 7y ago
    Traffic accidents are one of the leading causes of death in the USA among young healthy people. Pedestrian deaths are on the rise. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/07/us/pedestrian-deaths.html https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/07/us/pedestrian-deaths.html People who are drunk should not be thinking “Oh I am only driving 40 miles/hour on an arterial road. I am not doing anything dangerous.” Driving a car is inherently one of the most dangerous things most of us do on a daily basis, and should be treated carefully and respectfully.
    - atlasunshrugged 7y ago
      It's a bit off topic but I was recently reading about alcohol taxation and found out that many pedestrian deaths also occur when the pedestrian is drunk and that it's incredibly dangerous as well, something I hadn't considered. So don't drive or walk (or bike or Lime or whatever) drunk https://www.alcohol.org/guides/walking-drunk/ https://www.alcohol.org/guides/walking-drunk/
bluedino 7y ago
>> after having a cocktail or two with dinner A drink or two won't do it. For a 180lb male, it would take 4 drinks for them to become over the legal limit
- eadmund 7y ago
  > For a 180lb male, it would take 4 drinks for them to become over the legal limit That's not true, but I don't blame you — I learned the same thing in school. As I recall, the 'drinks' they used were 10-ounce servings of 3.2 beer, not 16-ounce servings of 5.8% beer. And the limit now is 3/4 of what it used to be (was .12, then .10, now .08). A single good beer is enough to throw you over the limit. Just don't have a drink and then drive. Never mind whether you can drive just fine or not after one drink[0]: it's just not worth the legal consequences regardless. 0: I used to think it was okay, but I no longer do.
  - bluedino 7y ago
    12oz (1 can) of 4.5% beer https://www.tabc.state.tx.us/publications/brochures/BACCharts.pdf https://www.tabc.state.tx.us/publications/brochures/BACChart... 4 drinks for 180lb male gives .08 BAC, not accounting for time to drink (every 40 minutes lowers by .01)
    - leetcrew 7y ago
      if you drink bud light or coors, sure, this chart will work well for you. GP mentioned "a single good beer", which I take to mean that they like to drink craft beers, which are likely to be well over 4.5%. most IPAs seem to fall between 5.5 and 7%. most tripels are around 9%. cocktails can vary a lot, but my favorite (the manhattan) is about two standard drinks. a typical old fashioned is around 1.5 standard drinks depending on the choice of whiskey. if you have more than one type of beverage, especially cocktails you don't know the exact recipe for, it becomes nontrivial to estimate how much you have consumed. also, it's sort of hard to trust these charts. I've looked at four or five from various trustworthy-seeming sources and they don't really agree with each other. they make different assumptions for what a standard drink is and some of them round in different directions. I saw one assuming a 1.5oz shot of 80 proof spirit is equivalent to 12oz of 4.5% beer and another equating the same amount of spirit to 12oz of 5% beer. some charts that used the same definition of "standard drink" disagree on the BAC numbers anyway. personally I just assume everything I drink is two standard drinks, and a recommend to my friends that they do the same. I'm unpopular at parties for some reason...
Mountain_Skies 7y ago
I served on a DUI jury. Everything wasn't all bundled up into a single charge. In addition to the DUI charges, he was also charged with a long list of moving violations. In your scenarios, the list of charges would be different in each case. They'd both include DUI but the other charges would vary greatly.
- jeffdavis 7y ago
  Even without other significant violations, the difference between 0.079 and 0.08 is hugely punative.
  - brewdad 7y ago
    To get around that, my state allows you to be arrested for DUII even if you blow 0.00. If the cop says you are drunk, you are presumed drunk. In reality, I doubt many of these cases get to trial, but the arrest can never be expunged.
jacquesm 7y ago
In both cases you might drive into me and I'll be just as pissed off. How hard can it be? No drugs, no alcohol while driving. Assholes that don't understand this should have their license revoked.
- jeffdavis 7y ago
  Don't drive unless you've had a solid 8 hours of restful sleep. Drowsy driving is actually more lethal. Does is it still sound easy? No. Most people would go easy on someone who stays up late studying or has some insomnia, and still drives the next day. Or a designated driver that got to bed late because they drove their friends home. But why? They are impaired and a threat to life as much or more than someone who has a glass of wine or two with dinner and then drives.
  - jacquesm 7y ago
    You of course also should not drive when you're tired. Case in point: I'm cycling today because I did not sleep enough last night, conscious decision on my part not to drive. To me you sound very much as though you are justifying your own behavior.
umvi 7y ago
The same number of innocent people die from drunk drivers as from guns. I would wager it's partially because of dismissive attitudes like this.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

learnstats2 7y ago

I think the intent of the law is to stop people doing the latter - which surely results in more deaths.

rubidium 7y ago

That’s exactly what sentencing is for. The law is the law, but the judge and prosecutors adjust for severity.

EvanAnderson 7y ago

I don't want much judgement in the laws. If someone has ingested alcohol and it's not yet metabolized I don't want them driving. It's irresponsible, full stop. (Same goes for other driving impairments-- drowsy, under the influence of drugs, distracted, etc.) The idea that one should be making a judgement call on their degree of impairment and choosing to drive is odious to me. If you're impaired, don't drive. Edit: I'm not a molecular biologist. Let's edit this to say "If someone has ingested alcohol and it's not yet metabolized to the extent that it is unable to create a discernable impairment I don't want them driving." Edit 2: It sounds like an objective test for reflexes and response time would be a better test of impairment (of any type) rather than using blood/breath alcohol measurements as a proxy for impairment.

jeffdavis 7y ago
Drowsy driving causes more deaths than drunk driving plus drugged driving combined. Ever driven on less than a solid 8 hours? See _Why we Sleep_ by Matthew Walker.
- EvanAnderson 7y ago
  Drowsy driving should be as much of a crime as drunk driving-- absolutely. There is no excuse for getting behind the wheel impaired and exposing innocent people to unnecessary risk.
  - hanniabu 7y ago
    This basically means that no night shift worker is allowed to drive home from work.
    - goodcanadian 7y ago
      I never found that driving after a night shift was much different to driving after a day shift. Of course, when working nights, I slept during the day. YMMV.
    - gowld 7y ago
      Night-shift workers should sleep during the day.
      - deleted 7y ago
        [deleted]
      - hanniabu 7y ago
        My guess is you've never worked night shift. It's not as easy to sleep during the day as it is at night, even with black out curtain, unless you wanted to get drugged up every day.
        astura 7y ago
        YMMV, I guess, I slept perfectly fine when I worked the night shift. (Went to bed around 5-6am)
        hanniabu 7y ago
Maxion 7y ago
The same goes with being tired. While the typical US DUI test does sound stupid, it at least has a chance of catching those who are tired.
lisper 7y ago
> If someone has ingested alcohol and it's not yet metabolized I don't want them driving. It's irresponsible, full stop. Really? I had a glass of wine last night. There are probably a few molecules of unmetabolized alcohol still in my system. Is it "irresponsible, full stop" for me to drive today?
- EvanAnderson 7y ago
  I'm not a molecular biologist. I've edited my comment to be more precise in expressing the spirit of what I meant.
  - lisper 7y ago
    > If someone has ingested alcohol and it's not yet metabolized to the extent that it is unable to create a discernable impairment... I sympathize, but your new formulation has exactly the same problem as your first one: discernible by whom? If your BAC is 0.0001 but a police officer says that you appeared to be impaired in their subjective judgement, should that be enough to convict you of driving while impaired? And do you even want to try to distinguish alcohol-induced impairment from sleep deprivation? Do you really want to start punishing people for driving while sleepy? What are you going to use as the legal standard for that?
    - EvanAnderson 7y ago
      Impairment is impairment. I want just as many drowsy drivers on the road as I want alcohol-consuming drivers. An objective test of reflexes / response time would be highly technically feasible. (I'd also like to see periodic re-certification for drivers with such a test too, but that's another issue.)
      - lisper 7y ago
        > I want just as many drowsy drivers on the road as I want alcohol-consuming drivers. So do I. The challenge is coming up with a legal standard to decide who goes to jail and who doesn't which does not result in a ton of false positives. Do you really want to turn going to work after a bad night's sleep into a crime?
delish 7y ago
> If someone has ingested alcohol and it's not yet metabolized I don't want them driving. It's irresponsible, full stop. Some would say we put discretion in the legal system to account for incomplete empirical knowledge. This article is asserting incomplete empirical knowledge.
- EvanAnderson 7y ago
  I was responding to the parent's comment re: differentiating between different "degrees" of offense. If the breath test system is flawed it should be replaced by a better test. I agree w/ the other commenter who says that sentencing is the place where degree of offense should be considered.

jacobolus 7y ago

Driving 40 miles/hour anywhere with pedestrians/cyclists is incredibly dangerous. If hit at that speed, a pedestrian/cyclist will almost certainly die. Ideally, urban streets should be limited to 20 miles/hour, and should not have drivers impaired by alcohol. (This is obviously unrealistic in the foreseeable future in most of the USA, where automobiles are treated like royalty.)

eMSF 7y ago
>Driving 40 miles/hour anywhere with pedestrians/cyclists is incredibly dangerous. If hit at that speed, a pedestrian/cyclist will almost certainly die. The former doesn't follow from the latter. I mean, by leaving your house, you might slip and fall and die; that does not mean leaving your house is incredibly dangerous, because we have to account for both the severity of the outcome and the probability of it.
- jacobolus 7y ago
  Traffic accidents are one of the leading causes of death in the USA among young healthy people. Pedestrian deaths are on the rise. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/07/us/pedestrian-deaths.html https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/07/us/pedestrian-deaths.html People who are drunk should not be thinking “Oh I am only driving 40 miles/hour on an arterial road. I am not doing anything dangerous.” Driving a car is inherently one of the most dangerous things most of us do on a daily basis, and should be treated carefully and respectfully.
  - atlasunshrugged 7y ago
    It's a bit off topic but I was recently reading about alcohol taxation and found out that many pedestrian deaths also occur when the pedestrian is drunk and that it's incredibly dangerous as well, something I hadn't considered. So don't drive or walk (or bike or Lime or whatever) drunk https://www.alcohol.org/guides/walking-drunk/ https://www.alcohol.org/guides/walking-drunk/

bluedino 7y ago

>> after having a cocktail or two with dinner A drink or two won't do it. For a 180lb male, it would take 4 drinks for them to become over the legal limit

eadmund 7y ago
> For a 180lb male, it would take 4 drinks for them to become over the legal limit That's not true, but I don't blame you — I learned the same thing in school. As I recall, the 'drinks' they used were 10-ounce servings of 3.2 beer, not 16-ounce servings of 5.8% beer. And the limit now is 3/4 of what it used to be (was .12, then .10, now .08). A single good beer is enough to throw you over the limit. Just don't have a drink and then drive. Never mind whether you can drive just fine or not after one drink[0]: it's just not worth the legal consequences regardless. 0: I used to think it was okay, but I no longer do.
- bluedino 7y ago
  12oz (1 can) of 4.5% beer https://www.tabc.state.tx.us/publications/brochures/BACCharts.pdf https://www.tabc.state.tx.us/publications/brochures/BACChart... 4 drinks for 180lb male gives .08 BAC, not accounting for time to drink (every 40 minutes lowers by .01)
  - leetcrew 7y ago
    if you drink bud light or coors, sure, this chart will work well for you. GP mentioned "a single good beer", which I take to mean that they like to drink craft beers, which are likely to be well over 4.5%. most IPAs seem to fall between 5.5 and 7%. most tripels are around 9%. cocktails can vary a lot, but my favorite (the manhattan) is about two standard drinks. a typical old fashioned is around 1.5 standard drinks depending on the choice of whiskey. if you have more than one type of beverage, especially cocktails you don't know the exact recipe for, it becomes nontrivial to estimate how much you have consumed. also, it's sort of hard to trust these charts. I've looked at four or five from various trustworthy-seeming sources and they don't really agree with each other. they make different assumptions for what a standard drink is and some of them round in different directions. I saw one assuming a 1.5oz shot of 80 proof spirit is equivalent to 12oz of 4.5% beer and another equating the same amount of spirit to 12oz of 5% beer. some charts that used the same definition of "standard drink" disagree on the BAC numbers anyway. personally I just assume everything I drink is two standard drinks, and a recommend to my friends that they do the same. I'm unpopular at parties for some reason...

Mountain_Skies 7y ago

I served on a DUI jury. Everything wasn't all bundled up into a single charge. In addition to the DUI charges, he was also charged with a long list of moving violations. In your scenarios, the list of charges would be different in each case. They'd both include DUI but the other charges would vary greatly.

jeffdavis 7y ago
Even without other significant violations, the difference between 0.079 and 0.08 is hugely punative.
- brewdad 7y ago
  To get around that, my state allows you to be arrested for DUII even if you blow 0.00. If the cop says you are drunk, you are presumed drunk. In reality, I doubt many of these cases get to trial, but the arrest can never be expunged.

jacquesm 7y ago

In both cases you might drive into me and I'll be just as pissed off. How hard can it be? No drugs, no alcohol while driving. Assholes that don't understand this should have their license revoked.

jeffdavis 7y ago
Don't drive unless you've had a solid 8 hours of restful sleep. Drowsy driving is actually more lethal. Does is it still sound easy? No. Most people would go easy on someone who stays up late studying or has some insomnia, and still drives the next day. Or a designated driver that got to bed late because they drove their friends home. But why? They are impaired and a threat to life as much or more than someone who has a glass of wine or two with dinner and then drives.
- jacquesm 7y ago
  You of course also should not drive when you're tired. Case in point: I'm cycling today because I did not sleep enough last night, conscious decision on my part not to drive. To me you sound very much as though you are justifying your own behavior.

umvi 7y ago

The same number of innocent people die from drunk drivers as from guns. I would wager it's partially because of dismissive attitudes like this.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]