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Speed limiters built into cars. Anti-infringement technology built into general-purpose computers. And yet, guns and ammo freely available and unrestricted outs

• dheera 1y ago
  I'm all for stronger enforcement of speed limits to save lives (e.g. ticket everyone over the speed limit with cameras automatically, no cops needed), but requiring shit to be installed into someone's car doesn't seem effective. They could just disconnect it.
  • cdchhs 1y ago
    Most modern cars phone home on lte/4g/5g. Police could auto-ticker speeders if they wanted to today. Probably don't want people to know how ubiquitous the tracking already is though.
    • A4ET8a8uTh0_v2 1y ago
      I am not sure why you are being downvoted. The potential for abuse is clearly in place. It did not happen in our timeline yet, because it would likely cause an uproar, but to me writing was on the wall, when, way back when, Elon sent an update to a Tesla during a disaster to change a battery behavior.
  • atoav 1y ago
    As an Hardware designer I don't think that is the problem nowadays. Make it physically hard to remove and add a gps tracker to the unit and if it doesn't move for a few days, have them proove to you it wasn't tampered with. Then the only way to do it is to break the thing open and simulate trips that match yours all the time, which requires you to MITM the connection between the GPS and the microcontroller. Aside from that cars phone bome anyways as ot is, so another way to crossreference data. This can be as nontrivial as you want it. The problem is rather that a state shouldn't treat its citizens like that. That is probably why they start with repeat offenders.
    • exsomet 1y ago
      You’re forgetting a step - which, being a hardware designer instead of a lawyer, is understandable. The fourth amendment means that there should never be a situation where you are arbitrarily required to provide the government access to, or information about, the ways that you use or modify private property like a vehicle.
      • steveBK123 1y ago
        Maybe. But driving is not a constitutional right. Break the law enough and you can be provided two options - revocation of license or installation of limiter.
      • atoav 1y ago
        No I did not forget it, I was responding to an technical argument with an technical answer. And I am the type of person who wouldn't design such a system if you held a gun up to my head. Of course there is a legal layer to this as well. But given how the US legal system treats other constitutional rights that ought to be valid for everybody on American soil at the moment, I thought I'd skip that for now, because apparently something being a constitutional right doesn't make it so.
      • sroussey 1y ago
        You mean, like, AT&T and phone calls?
      • toomuchtodo 1y ago
        We already require breathalyzer interlocks be installed for habitual DUI drivers in a majority of states. This is an extension of that same legal principle. Road access is a privilege (as evidenced by the requirement to have a driver’s license and vehicle tags). https://www.ncsl.org/transportation/state-ignition-interlock-laws https://www.ncsl.org/transportation/state-ignition-interlock...
      • bigbacaloa 1y ago
        [dead]
  • gpm 1y ago
    This device doesn't make it easier to catch speeders, what it does is give a way for habitual speeders to stop speeding. The primary goal is no doubt that these people will simply stop breaking the law now that there's a device there helping them do that without the need for further law enforcement. To the extent that fails though, it's a measure which makes it reasonable to increase penalties and thus increase the level of deterrence. Increasing penalties for speeding without this device has issues. It's basically impossible to prove that you intended to break the law, and that you didn't just misjudge your speed. Worse there's become a culture of mildly breaking the law, and it's even harder to prove you intentionally went beyond what's acceptable in that culture. There's a reasonable doubt that it was a honest mistake. This makes it politically, legally, and morally problematic to have significant penalties attached to speeding. But if you're caught speeding because you disabled the device that a court ordered installed to prevent you from speeding, all worries about intent go out the window. It is, beyond a reasonable doubt, a deliberate violation of the law. Not the actions of a well intentioned person who was in a hurry and bad at judging their speed. This means that, relative to speeding, penalties can be significant increased resulting in better deterrence. Specifically it looks like Virginia's new law makes it a "class 1 misdemeanor", which is the harshest class of misdemeanor in Virginia law, and the same as a DWI or simple assault. Sentencing maximums are a bit deceptive because they typically aren't what are assigned, but theoretically punishable by up to a year of confinement.
    • tsimionescu 1y ago
      I don't understand the argument about "judging your speed". Isn't there a speedometer prominently displayed in every car in the USA as well? You don't have to "judge" anything, just read the number the speedometer shows - is it above or below the speed limit?
      • 20after4 1y ago
        You can't keep a constant eye on both the road and the speedometer. Further, you might have missed the last speed limit change or remember it incorrectly. It's also possible for the speed sensor in your car to be faulty or out of calibration. This happens if you change the size of your wheels/tires significantly without reprogramming the ECU - and that setting isn't made available to the owner of the vehicle, at least not in most cars I'm aware of¹. In fact, most cars lie to you about the speed - reporting a speed slightly faster than reality. It's a cover-your-ass measure for the car manufacturers because it's illegal to sell a car (in the US, at least) where the speedometer is inaccurate in the other direction, that is, reading slower than actual speed. 1. Some older vehicles, including pre-1996 GM trucks (and probably others from the same era) had the speedometer calibration controlled by a resistor array on a circuit board under the dash, those can be changed with a lot of effort and a soldering iron, or by swapping out the whole circuit board with a different one that matches your tire size + rear end gear ratio.
• shermantanktop 1y ago
  I’ve never met a person taking high risk actions who thinks they are unqualified to do so. But they always think some other people are.
  • ang_cire 1y ago
    This is generally true for actions at every level of risk. Designing around how humans will actually behave is better than trying to artificially restrict everyone's behavior preemptively.
    • TeMPOraL 1y ago
      [citation needed] Preemptively restricting the space of possible (or likely) situations is the cornerstone of designing safe systems.
      • ang_cire 1y ago
        There is a difference between design that tries to prevent someone from shooting themselves in the foot (designing around how users interact), and design that seeks to influence or limit their behavior. The former is safety, the latter is manipulation or restriction. Giving system owners RBAC controls so they can choose who is an admin, versus not giving system owners admin privileges at all. But more importantly, the point of my comment is that the axiom that everyone thinks themselves competent enough, is true at every level of risk. No matter how low risk something is, someone can and will still overestimate their capabilities and muck it up. If we're using that as justification to impose restrictions, there would be no actions that someone could not justify restricting.
  • thatcat 1y ago
    That seems like the result of a normal skill level distribution that allows some people to take more advanced actions at the same risk level. Interesting how there is never a push to punish people who actually cause wrecks with this technology.
    • 1y ago
• flustercan 1y ago
  Ehh the roads are public property. I don't think its unreasonable that if you want your car to be registered to drive on a public road it needs some sort of speed limiter. Its about the same level of infringement on your personal rights as requiring a car have seatbelts. Feel free to buy a car with no limiter or no seatbelts and drive it on your own private roads as fast as your heart desires.
  • josephcsible 1y ago
    Cars have to have seatbelts, but that's different from having to not work unless they're buckled.
  • card_zero 1y ago
    Some kind of exoskeletons to control people just walking around in public, too. Stop them doing bad things. Wait, no, that's an excessively extreme level of control, while seatbelt laws are an acceptable level of control because, actually I don't know why, but anyway speed limiters are somewhere between these two levels of control, and therefore acceptable. Or not. One of those.
    • alexb_ 1y ago
      This is complete nonsense. You could say this for literally any law. Yes, we have laws that exist to control people's behavior. We have systems which exist to control people's behavior. This is intended and completely necessary to live in a society with other people. For an example that causes no controversy to anyone on this board - we have laws that control people's ability to take open-source code and use it without sharing. You're pretending like this is completely crazy by inventing a position nobody has taken, claiming "speed limiters in cars for repeat speed offenders" is the same as that insane position you just invented, and then pretending to be an idiot so that you don't have to do the work of actually justifying yourself. You should try practicing some actual thinking instead of resorting to pretending the people you disagree with are stupid.
      • card_zero 1y ago
• lostlogin 1y ago
  > I’ve got enough sense to keep it slow and safe in populated areas, yet occasionally open it up elsewhere when conditions are right. Is this a reference to your driving, or your shooting?
  • rpmisms 1y ago
    Both. Driving is much scarier in terms of kinetic energy, anyway.
    • bob1029 1y ago
      You may be surprised to learn how much kinetic energy is possible to wield in terms of man portable firearms that are also legal for purchase. A 20mm rifle is a perfect example of how velocity kills in gun terms. 60000J of energy in one trigger pull. This is equivalent to a car traveling at 15-20mph.
      • ndsipa_pomu 1y ago
        And yet pedestrians would understandably get very nervous if there were a bunch of people firing those rifles along a typical street, yet they have learnt to accept the risk that comes with car-heavy traffic.
        • mtsr 1y ago
          At 20mph in a well-designed street, there’s still a lot of opportunity for people to keep themselves safe. Not so much with guns. On badly designed streets and with bad and/or speeding drivers, on the other hand. And don’t get me started on the dangers of cars with high hoods. We’ve known for years that to keep pedestrians and cyclists safe, they need to go on top of the car, instead of under it.
      • rpmisms 1y ago
        No I wouldn't be surprised at all :) A Toyota Corolla going 65MPH is a lot of kinetic energy.
  • 1y ago
• mitthrowaway2 1y ago
  What do you mean by "when conditions are right"?
• bluecalm 1y ago
  Speeding kills much more people than guns. It also kills much more innocent outsiders (a lot of gun death are suicides or gang infightings). It also introduces atmosphere of terror on public roads making walking or cycling dangerous. It's a way bigger problem than guns.
  • branko_d 1y ago
    Gun deaths: 46,000 Car deaths: 40,901 Gun utility: small Car utility: large (data from CDC and NHTSA for 2023)
    • digianarchist 1y ago
      I feel like intentional self-inflicted gunshot deaths should be removed. Not to say you still aren’t correct.
      • Cthulhu_ 1y ago
        If you want to make a fair comparison, then one-sided car accidents should be removed too.
        • cutemonster 1y ago
          No, they're not intentional, they're accidents. And can be reduced by traffic laws and speed limits. Suicides (that is, guns) are intentional.
          • digianarchist 1y ago
            Exactly. People rarely purposely kill themselves in their cars.
          • shpongled 1y ago
            Most car "accidents" are intentional - drivers are choosing to speed (35%), drive intoxicated (30%), or scroll tiktok (15%) rather than pay attention to the road.
• dmurray 1y ago
  There are lots of restrictions on guns. Depending on the state, you can't own a gun with a barrel of a certain length, or a certain magazine capacity, or you can't own a gun if you're a felon, or you can't sell a gun without doing a background check on the purchaser, or you need to hide your gun when you leave your home, etc. You might think guns should be regulated more strictly and cars should be regulated less, but it's dishonest to represent the situation as you have. America has decided as a society that both guns and cars are valuable enough to let people use, yet dangerous enough to control the use of.
• bigbacaloa 1y ago
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• jonathanlydall 1y ago
  The problem is people who as matter of course travel above the speed limit regardless of if any other motorists are around them, as they are “playing by different rules”, making them more unpredictable and stressful for those around them. Just two days ago I did a long distance trip and in general I could engage cruise control at the speed limit allowing me to focus more on other potential hazards around me. Occasionally I would need to move out the left lane (I live in country where we drive on the left side of the road) to overtake someone travelling slower than me, and somewhat often while in the process of overtaking, someone who was going 20+km/h over the speed limit would drive at a completely unsafe following distance behind me until 30s later or so when it would be possible for me to move back into the left lane. I don’t care much if other people want to speed past me, but I’m not going to slow down or unlawfully speed for them to do so, so this makes these situations way more and needlessly stressful. No doubt at least some of these other drivers regard me as the unsafe driver in these situations. If people would rather just generally use cruise control themselves at the speed limit, the roads would be more predictable, it would be safer and stress free. They’re at most saving 10s of minutes on 7hour trip, it’s not worth the cost. Speed limiter seems justified for people who are repeatedly endangering others.
  • mschuster91 1y ago
    The question is, if everyone is speeding, would it not make sense to raise the speed limit?
    • ndsipa_pomu 1y ago
      That's just drivers normalising the breaking of the speed limits. If you raise the limits just because drivers are going faster, then the drivers will just increase their speeds until again, a majority of drivers are breaking the limit. Speed limits should be defined to reduce the harm from the inevitable crashes e.g. we have a lot of 20mph limits here in the UK in cities such as Bristol which are designed to reduce pedestrian deaths. Personally, I think roads are poorly designed - they often prioritise speed which then encourages drivers to go faster (e.g. long sight lines, sweeping corners etc) and then a speed limit is applied. I think the better alternative s to design roads so that drivers naturally travel slower, or at least the careful ones do.
• ErigmolCt 1y ago
  We haven't really figured out how to balance personal freedom with public safety when it comes to cars
• aqme28 1y ago
  I agree with you that guns are a an insane problem. However, that shouldn't discourage us from solving other unrelated problems when the solutions present themselves.
• A4ET8a8uTh0_v2 1y ago
  << And yet, guns and ammo freely available and unrestricted outside of automatic weapons and the like? Yeah. Can’t wait to move off-grid someday. (Yes, obviously American) Have you actually tried to purchase guns or ammo lately? There are genuinely few states, where freely available and unrestricted can be used without an asterisk attached.
• Clubber 1y ago
  >And yet, guns and ammo freely available and unrestricted outside of automatic weapons and the like? They are not. This is a very common misconception. I suggest you go purchase one at a gun store.
• 13_9_7_7_5_18 1y ago
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• shpongled 1y ago
  Firearms are a constitutionally enshrined right - driving is not. For the vast majority of Americans, cars represent a significantly higher threat than assault by gun [1]. We also let drivers flagrantly and repeatedly break the law and negligently kill people with essentially near-impunity. The same cannot be said for firearms. [1] https://injuryfacts.nsc.org/all-injuries/preventable-death-overview/odds-of-dying/ https://injuryfacts.nsc.org/all-injuries/preventable-death-o...