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Edge cases like medical emergencies, natural disasters, terrorist attacks etc., where speeding can actually save lives. You can’t account for all of those in an

by bsza 2y ago

Edge cases like medical emergencies, natural disasters, terrorist attacks etc., where speeding can actually save lives. You can’t account for all of those in an automated system.

acdha 2y ago
Those are movie plots. We know what happens in things like natural disasters: epic traffic jams because the roads have limited capacity and once people start thinking they can violate the laws they crash and make it even worse. Medical emergencies are more plausible but it’s a collection of edge cases: you have to be somewhere a long way from the hospital, without an ambulance, no traffic, and safe road conditions for much higher speeds. If all of those aren’t true, you’re either making a bad situation much worse with a crash or running off the road (the most realistic places for this situation are rural areas where it’s often not safe to go even the posted limit around every curve) or you’re not really saving enough time to be meaningful. Even the ambulances rarely drive like that in those regions despite being much better trained, equipped, and experienced with the area. Now, contrast those extremely low probability events with the tens of thousands of people killed by drivers every year and the hundreds of thousands who have life-altering injuries. How many people are we willing to write off so a bunch of people can fantasize about having the chance to play ambulance driver some day?
- bsza 2y ago
  True, but on the other hand, it would only take one headline about people losing their lives while trying to drive off a bridge about to collapse at 20 kph to spark public outrage. We tend to be less sensitive to tragedies that occur due to an individual’s own bad decisions.
  - foxyv 2y ago
    What about the tragedies that occur every day when speeders kill strangers, friends, and family? Currently about 33 deaths per day are caused by speeding. I have yet to find a person who died because they couldn't exceed the speed limit.
foxyv 2y ago
There is a reason that, during an emergency, people are urged to walk and not run. People panicking and running like a herd of gazelle results in accidents. Accidents clog exits and roads preventing escape.

by bsza 2y ago

Edge cases like medical emergencies, natural disasters, terrorist attacks etc., where speeding can actually save lives. You can’t account for all of those in an automated system.

acdha 2y ago

Those are movie plots. We know what happens in things like natural disasters: epic traffic jams because the roads have limited capacity and once people start thinking they can violate the laws they crash and make it even worse. Medical emergencies are more plausible but it’s a collection of edge cases: you have to be somewhere a long way from the hospital, without an ambulance, no traffic, and safe road conditions for much higher speeds. If all of those aren’t true, you’re either making a bad situation much worse with a crash or running off the road (the most realistic places for this situation are rural areas where it’s often not safe to go even the posted limit around every curve) or you’re not really saving enough time to be meaningful. Even the ambulances rarely drive like that in those regions despite being much better trained, equipped, and experienced with the area. Now, contrast those extremely low probability events with the tens of thousands of people killed by drivers every year and the hundreds of thousands who have life-altering injuries. How many people are we willing to write off so a bunch of people can fantasize about having the chance to play ambulance driver some day?

bsza 2y ago
True, but on the other hand, it would only take one headline about people losing their lives while trying to drive off a bridge about to collapse at 20 kph to spark public outrage. We tend to be less sensitive to tragedies that occur due to an individual’s own bad decisions.
- foxyv 2y ago
  What about the tragedies that occur every day when speeders kill strangers, friends, and family? Currently about 33 deaths per day are caused by speeding. I have yet to find a person who died because they couldn't exceed the speed limit.

foxyv 2y ago

There is a reason that, during an emergency, people are urged to walk and not run. People panicking and running like a herd of gazelle results in accidents. Accidents clog exits and roads preventing escape.