[codeflo]

Why would you add the lost life expectancy to the length of the trip? That doesn’t make any mathematical sense to me.

Edit (this might be wrong, see Edit 2 below -- I'm leaving this as is because otherwise, some of the responses don't make sense):

I noticed that the calculation is wrong even within the article's own logic. Supposedly, this calculates "the expected length of the trip (including dead time) at different speeds", and does so by adding the expected loss of lifetime to the total trip length.

However, you're surely not always going to die exactly at the end of the trip. In fact, you can be expected to die at the half-way point on average, meaning this "total time" in case of death is only half the trip length plus the loss of life expectancy. If you plug this into the equation, the speed that minimizes the travel time dramatically shifts to around 100 mph.

And more absurdly, near the end of your life, when your mathematical life expectancy might be measured in hours, it's "faster" according to this logic to just kill yourself and get it over with than to undertake any long trips at all. I wouldn't recommend following this line of reasoning.

Edit 2: The above line of reasoning might be wrong, I think I made an error and the calculation is correct within the article's premises. In that case, I take that part back. I still don't agree that adding loss of life expectancy to travel time is a reasonable way to look at things.

[crznp]

The advantage of driving faster is that you convert driving time into free time.

Death converts living time (including free time) into death time.

Subtracting them makes mathematical sense: you have more or less free time. Though it is napkin math. Eg: it treats all free time as equivalent. If speeding gets you to a job interview on time, which gets you the job, that is more important than speeding so that you have time to do a crossword.

Might as well do the crossword in the car, eh?

[silverbax88]

Agreed, risk of injury does not factor into how long the trip would take given faster speeds. This article is an exercise in narrative nonsense.

[margalabargala]

> This article is an exercise in narrative nonsense.

I don't think the article intended to be taken entirely seriously.

It's narrative nonsense, but I would argue that it's entertaining narrative nonsense.

I think it also serves a larger point, not about "optimizing trip speeds" but about putting into easily-digestible context exactly how dangerous driving a car can be.

[sshine]

"Time spent dead" is a lot of time added to your trip.

But only by a fraction corresponding to the probability of dying.

[8organicbits]

> In fact, you can be expected to die at the half-way point on average, meaning this "total time" in case of death is only half the trip length plus the loss of life expectancy.

If you die an hour earlier in the trip then you're dead for an hour longer.

[hansvm]

Most trips have no fatalities. Yes, you could make the point that 1/n trips should be half the length. It's a rounding error to consider that or not, and the rest of the post would still stand.

[actuallyalys]

Even if you don't want to treat increased expected loss of life as the same as time saved, it does seem like this could be a good way of (ahem) driving home how much you're risking by driving faster.