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Remember what we're trying to explain here: two distinct step-ups in pedestrian fatalities occurring in just one country. Any proposed explanation needs to addr

Remember what we're trying to explain here: two distinct step-ups in pedestrian fatalities occurring in just one country. Any proposed explanation needs to address both 1) why it happened when it did; and 2) why it happened in only that one country. Cars are getting bigger everywhere and have been for decades, so that fails both tests. COVID only happened in 2020 and it happened everywhere, so that fails both tests. Smart phones were introduced in 2007 and they're available everywhere, so that fails both tests. But "U.S. police departments drastically reduced both the number of traffic stops performed and the total number of citations issued starting just after the Ferguson Report in 2015" is practically slapping you in the face. As I said, it's not dispositive, but I can't see any reason to reject it (that's not political in nature).

pastage 3y ago
You are postfixing your post saying that this "evidence" is not enough to support you case on its own. My point is that it is even worse. You miss everything that disproves your opinion. The graph does not support your argumentation at all, there is too much noise. You need to explain how citations affect accidents. We fired most of our traffic cops in the eighties here, the number of citations plumeted. The number of deaths are on a steady decline.
- dionidium 3y ago
  > You need to explain how citations affect accidents. No, I don't. You're plainly demanding a standard of evidence that you wouldn't in any other domain, especially if you were inclined to prefer the explanation. I'm going to take "citations affect driver behavior" as axiomatic, unless you can disprove it. I'm not going to wait until we have 100 studies to confirm that a commonsense mechanism does indeed function in the most parsimoniously explained way. We have to act in the world. We don't have 100 years to figure out if ticketing drivers affects their behavior to some ridiculous standard of evidence you invented just now because you would prefer that explanation weren't true. People really need to stop allowing themselves to be held hostage to this kind of special pleading.

pastage 3y ago

You are postfixing your post saying that this "evidence" is not enough to support you case on its own. My point is that it is even worse. You miss everything that disproves your opinion. The graph does not support your argumentation at all, there is too much noise. You need to explain how citations affect accidents. We fired most of our traffic cops in the eighties here, the number of citations plumeted. The number of deaths are on a steady decline.

dionidium 3y ago
> You need to explain how citations affect accidents. No, I don't. You're plainly demanding a standard of evidence that you wouldn't in any other domain, especially if you were inclined to prefer the explanation. I'm going to take "citations affect driver behavior" as axiomatic, unless you can disprove it. I'm not going to wait until we have 100 studies to confirm that a commonsense mechanism does indeed function in the most parsimoniously explained way. We have to act in the world. We don't have 100 years to figure out if ticketing drivers affects their behavior to some ridiculous standard of evidence you invented just now because you would prefer that explanation weren't true. People really need to stop allowing themselves to be held hostage to this kind of special pleading.