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> we require seat belts and safety standards, and speed limits, but don’t demand that cars be unable to exceed the speed limit. That isn't how cars generally
by riskneutral 5y ago
> we require seat belts and safety standards, and speed limits, but don’t demand that cars be unable to exceed the speed limit.
That isn't how cars generally work. Without advanced electronic controls, it's not possible to build a car that can't exceed the speed limit. You can try to limit the acceleration but not the speed. It's basic physics. It's worrying that the author used it as an analogy (metaphor?) but doesn't seem to wonder why cars really don't have speed limits.
- edrxty 5y agoIt's actually pretty trivial to build a mechanical governor and they have existed for hundreds of years [1] Everything comes down to political will. The German manufacturers have an informal agreement to limit all their cars to 155mph as to avoid the government adding further limits to the autobahn. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centrifugal_governor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centrifugal_governor