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> Let me frame it this way: “Guns don’t kill people. People do.” I think it's actually worse than your framing suggests, even though it's generally recognized

> Let me frame it this way: “Guns don’t kill people. People do.” I think it's actually worse than your framing suggests, even though it's generally recognized that widespread gun ownership is very poor for public health. Guns kill people by providing the means for people with the intent and opportunity to kill. Cars provide both the means and the opportunity, while making the intent irrelevant. Operating heavy machinery at high speeds in public spaces is an inherently risky thing. It is no surprise then, that deaths from automobiles are consistently in the top ten deaths-by-cause for every developed nation. Expecting people to maintain the degree of focus and discipline necessary to operate heavy machinery in streets shared with children, elderly and cyclists, without safety barriers, at high speeds, is obviously a bad idea, unless you're willing to accept a lot of children, elderly, and cyclists dying.

throwaway0a5e 5y ago
>I think it's actually worse than your framing suggests, even though it's generally recognized that widespread gun ownership is very poor for public health. Which is "worse" doesn't matter. He framed it that way because while cars do make it much easier for a hapless peasant to put the kinetic energy of a few thousand pounds at high speed somewhere it has no business being the overwhelming majority of cars will never be in that situation and many societies have decided that the benefits of widespread accessibility outweigh those costs. >while making the intent irrelevant. Please explain. And please do a better job than "I don't like cars so therefore we should apply really strict standards to it the way we do with hazardous activities like blasting, fumigation of dwellings, etc,". Why do you want those standards applied and why are cars so deserving?
necovek 5y ago
Your entire comment seems to suggest that pedestrians are getting killed a ton, when numbers speak otherwise[1]: vehicle occupants die an order of magnitude more in traffic accidents. Children (0-14) are also least likely to die, and it seems that young male drivers are most at risk. Elderly (65+) seem to die in the same numbers as young drivers. Now, I am open to your claim that whatever the numbers are today, they are a lot. But most deaths occur outside cities where cars are going at much higher speeds, so the essence of your argument is nothing but spreading FUD, and won't help in a reasonable debate. There are also other economic aspects (how many people would not have gotten engineering jobs, and would public transport ever evolve to this extent without the funding for private vehicles...), but I am happy to ignore that for the sake of your argument (basically, it's a what-if). [1] https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/products/databriefs/db400.htm https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/products/databriefs/db400.htm
- pasabagi 5y ago
  Where I live (Germany), the majority of deaths are non-car-occupants[0]. I'd also be interested to see the age-vs-death stats for the US split up by user group. In Germany, the pedestrians and cyclists most likely to die are over 75. [0]: https://www.itf-oecd.org/sites/default/files/germany-road-safety.pdf https://www.itf-oecd.org/sites/default/files/germany-road-sa... I think even in the US case, I would see it as unacceptable that somebody who doesn't take part in a risky practice (driving) is still exposed to the risk. The difference in likelyhood of death, after all, is not between a pedestrian and a driver, but between a pedestrian in a world with cars, and one without them. In the US case, I think there's a stronger argument for cars simply because cities have been built around them, so switchover costs would be higher. There are also arguments for using cars for deliveries. On the other hand, using them for mass transport in dense urban areas is insane.
  - necovek 5y ago
    But even in Germany, if you remove private car traffic, you are left with a big unknown: how much would public transport need to grow, how much would we need to modify roads and existing infrastructure, how should we support people's need to relocate closer to work, etc. It's like all new people joining a legacy project shouting let's refactor everything! You fix the obvious problems with the current system and reintroduce problems that the old system did well.
    - pasabagi 5y ago
      I think the roads would be well served by getting rid of cars - it would obviously cut congestion massively. You would probably have to run a lot of buses in the transition period, but my guess is that cars degrade the experience of cyclists and pedestrians - without cars, more people would cycle and walk. At the end of the day, radical change is necessary. We are facing catastrophic climate change. Cutting back (or indeed getting rid of) cars is one of the more painless things you can do in many cities. This is not like a legacy project, where it ultimately still delivers a service to customers in a buggy-but-functional manner. This is a runaway locomotive that absolutely has to be stopped somehow, and the challenge is to stop it in the least painful way possible.

throwaway0a5e 5y ago

>I think it's actually worse than your framing suggests, even though it's generally recognized that widespread gun ownership is very poor for public health. Which is "worse" doesn't matter. He framed it that way because while cars do make it much easier for a hapless peasant to put the kinetic energy of a few thousand pounds at high speed somewhere it has no business being the overwhelming majority of cars will never be in that situation and many societies have decided that the benefits of widespread accessibility outweigh those costs. >while making the intent irrelevant. Please explain. And please do a better job than "I don't like cars so therefore we should apply really strict standards to it the way we do with hazardous activities like blasting, fumigation of dwellings, etc,". Why do you want those standards applied and why are cars so deserving?

necovek 5y ago

Your entire comment seems to suggest that pedestrians are getting killed a ton, when numbers speak otherwise[1]: vehicle occupants die an order of magnitude more in traffic accidents. Children (0-14) are also least likely to die, and it seems that young male drivers are most at risk. Elderly (65+) seem to die in the same numbers as young drivers. Now, I am open to your claim that whatever the numbers are today, they are a lot. But most deaths occur outside cities where cars are going at much higher speeds, so the essence of your argument is nothing but spreading FUD, and won't help in a reasonable debate. There are also other economic aspects (how many people would not have gotten engineering jobs, and would public transport ever evolve to this extent without the funding for private vehicles...), but I am happy to ignore that for the sake of your argument (basically, it's a what-if). [1] https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/products/databriefs/db400.htm https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/products/databriefs/db400.htm

pasabagi 5y ago
Where I live (Germany), the majority of deaths are non-car-occupants[0]. I'd also be interested to see the age-vs-death stats for the US split up by user group. In Germany, the pedestrians and cyclists most likely to die are over 75. [0]: https://www.itf-oecd.org/sites/default/files/germany-road-safety.pdf https://www.itf-oecd.org/sites/default/files/germany-road-sa... I think even in the US case, I would see it as unacceptable that somebody who doesn't take part in a risky practice (driving) is still exposed to the risk. The difference in likelyhood of death, after all, is not between a pedestrian and a driver, but between a pedestrian in a world with cars, and one without them. In the US case, I think there's a stronger argument for cars simply because cities have been built around them, so switchover costs would be higher. There are also arguments for using cars for deliveries. On the other hand, using them for mass transport in dense urban areas is insane.
- necovek 5y ago
  But even in Germany, if you remove private car traffic, you are left with a big unknown: how much would public transport need to grow, how much would we need to modify roads and existing infrastructure, how should we support people's need to relocate closer to work, etc. It's like all new people joining a legacy project shouting let's refactor everything! You fix the obvious problems with the current system and reintroduce problems that the old system did well.
  - pasabagi 5y ago
    I think the roads would be well served by getting rid of cars - it would obviously cut congestion massively. You would probably have to run a lot of buses in the transition period, but my guess is that cars degrade the experience of cyclists and pedestrians - without cars, more people would cycle and walk. At the end of the day, radical change is necessary. We are facing catastrophic climate change. Cutting back (or indeed getting rid of) cars is one of the more painless things you can do in many cities. This is not like a legacy project, where it ultimately still delivers a service to customers in a buggy-but-functional manner. This is a runaway locomotive that absolutely has to be stopped somehow, and the challenge is to stop it in the least painful way possible.