In the last few days I've taken a few Waymo's around SF and driven back and forth on I-80.
I-80 is definitely a hotbed of aggressively dangerous driving and the violent use of vehicles against others that aren't driving how you want them to (and I'm a fast driver).
Have those two experiences very much back to back, I joked about how once we get robo-taxis we'll never go back. Human drivers are dangerous enough of the time -- it's not like I've ever driven on I-80 and NOT seen crazy, pants- staining driving. It's every mile or two of the whole stretch.
(Waymo feels so much more mature and pleasant than the last FSD Beta I tested.. Elon should be embarassed.)
I'd argue that the main issue on US highways is a lack of discipline.
US drivers get away with murder in terms of undertaking, tailgating, camping in fast lanes under the speed limit, not to mention driving vehicles that are in such states of disrepair that it's a miracle the drivers get anywhere.
I'm way more relaxed cruising at 160km/h in Europe than literally any stretch of the I-5.
> US drivers get away with murder in terms of undertaking, tailgating, camping in fast lanes under the speed limit, not to mention driving vehicles that are in such states of disrepair that it's a miracle the drivers get anywhere.
Great, so why aren't those things ever candidates for this kind of automated enforcement? Why is it always "speeding"? In addition to the ones you listed, there are so many distractions now, too. Take a ride down any US freeway as a passenger in some kind of elevated vehicle (like a double decker bus) such that you can see down into people's cars: Probably 1/2 or more are totally out of it, distracted zombies scrolling on their phones. Nobody is calling for this to be cracked down on either.
It's always just "speeding". Like if we solve that, we're done.
Speeding is a lot easier to solve than distracted driving. It is pretty trivial to measure it objectively from outside the offending vehicle. Speeding also makes everything else worse due to stopping times and kinetic energy. It is also a black and white thinking fallacy to argue that just because someone promotes one thing that they necessarily demote everything else.
> I'd argue that the main issue on US highways is a lack of discipline.
That is a fair point, but unfortunately there is no good solution to that... otherwise we wouldn't need laws and their enforcement in the first place.
It's all about risk... if people are speeding too often and too fast that it's becoming dangerous (which I 1000% agree with), then I think more strict enforcement is warranted.
Conversely, we don't outlaw going outside just because someone could run you over... the risk is not high enough. But I think the risk of injury or death from speeding is very high.
If I go in a crowded night club and start swinging a golf club around, but not at any specific individual, is the end result violence? Was my action violent?
To me it's an extremely clear yes. The only reason I can see why we view this differently is just because we've all agreed this doesn't apply to choices made while driving. But I can't see why that would be the case.
On your first point, that sounds like violence to me, sure. It's almost guaranteed to cause harm, and the club swinger probably knows that.
On your second point, the likelihood that speeding will cause actual harm to another person is vastly lower, and certainly not an outcome expected or intended by drivers generally speaking. Seems silly to call that "violence" when we can just call it irresponsible, negligent, etc.
The risk of pedestrian death in a collision goes from about 10% at 25mph to over 50% at 40mph, and this level of speeding is absolutely normal in the american city I live in.
A pedestrian dying because of a driver's decision to speed in this way is predictable, absolutely expected. Shit I doubt my odds with a golf club at a party are anywhere near 50%. So why is one violence and the other not? I think only because we have decided it is not. But again that decision is exactly what I'm challenging. Calling it silly is not a convincing argument to me.
Those things aren't really equivalent though. The percentage of pedestrian deaths in a collision at given speeds is starting from a 100% rate of incidence. So whilst it's predictable, it's not necessarily probable. How many pedestrians is a driver actually likely to hit driving at 40mph? Generally speaking, zero. How many people is a lunatic swinging golf club likely to hit in a crowded club, quite a lot more than zero.
Nevertheless, I appreciate your point. I was thinking only of speeding on highways. Speeding is an issue and shouldn't be minimised.
I-80 is definitely a hotbed of aggressively dangerous driving and the violent use of vehicles against others that aren't driving how you want them to (and I'm a fast driver).
Have those two experiences very much back to back, I joked about how once we get robo-taxis we'll never go back. Human drivers are dangerous enough of the time -- it's not like I've ever driven on I-80 and NOT seen crazy, pants- staining driving. It's every mile or two of the whole stretch.
(Waymo feels so much more mature and pleasant than the last FSD Beta I tested.. Elon should be embarassed.)