Comment Re:Horse shit (Score 1) 620
Most of these car accidents don't occur on the street, but on driveways and parking stations.
Despite the fact that a Swedish court ordered an ISP to shut down service to The Pirate Bay in August last year, the website continues to function. The website is now apparently registered in the Seychelles.
It should be pointed out that Pirate Bay does not host copyrighted material itself, but instead links to a number of torrents elsewhere on the Internet.
These two paragraphs alone highlight the futility of the recording industry's crusade against piracy. I bet it's lawyers who love to hate piracy more than anybody else.
Do you think that there may be personality traits that would lead people to join a self selecting group that buys hybrids?
That's certainly possible. Do I think those personality traits would necessarily have anything to do with driving styles? Not so much. You could however test that by seeing if hybrid cars also get into more accidents in circumstances where the engine noise made no difference. However the study conducted only found that hybrids were more likely to be in a pedestrian accident in situations when the car was traveling slowly ie when car noise would most be a factor.
Of course maybe the effects of hybrid owners' reckless personalities are limited to when traveling under 10MPH, but that seems unlikely. There will always be several explanations for the facts, but often there is one that is vastly more likely than the others.
Given that the sound level of many ICE vehicles made today is lower than the ambient noise level of many parking lots,
That doesn't mean you can't hear the car.
Well done. Yes, safety regulation is about finding the proper balance between risk and inconvenience. Do you think making hybrid cars emit a modicum of noise would be a crippling burden?
If you think it would be a waste of time, the evidence is against you. The study linked to in the article indicates that silent engines in cars doubles the likelihood of a pedestrian getting hit in certain situations. Forcing cars to emit some degree of noise is a very logical response to that problem, if it can be confirmed.
A variety of crash factors were examined to determine the relative incidence rates of HEVs versus ICE vehicles in a range of crash scenarios. For one group of scenarios, those in which a vehicle is slowing or stopping, backing up, or entering or leaving a parking space, a statistically significant effect was found due to engine type. The HEV was two times more likely to be involved in a pedestrian crash in these situations than was an ICE vehicle.
A variety of crash factors were examined to determine the relative incidence rates of HEVs versus ICE vehicles in a range of crash scenarios. For one group of scenarios, those in which a vehicle is slowing or stopping, backing up, or entering or leaving a parking space, a statistically significant effect was found due to engine type. The HEV was two times more likely to be involved in a pedestrian crash in these situations than was an ICE vehicle.
No. And really? What accidents? What factors are taken into consideration?
I don't understand what each of these sentences are referring to. The study is linked to in the article, and it concludes that cars with hybrid engines are twice as likely to hit a pedestrian in certain situations listed in my previous post.
Or does it even matter, since half the people are running around with their iPods blasting as loud as they can be? This article is B.S. - it doesn't address even half of the concerns, situations and problems.
The fact is, silent hybrid cars hit pedestrians more often; up to twice as often in certain situations. Don't try to ignore that with some babble about iPods. Read the study if you have any doubts about the conclusions or want to form an intelligent opinion on the topic. Of course the article is crap, look at the actual evidence linked to in the article instead.
It seems unnecessary to make things nosier for everyone when the number of people that need the noise is very small.
What makes you say that? Apparently there are enough people who need the sound to be statistically significant. From the study linked in the article:
A variety of crash factors were examined to determine the relative incidence rates of HEVs versus ICE vehicles in a range of crash scenarios. For one group of scenarios, those in which a vehicle is slowing or stopping, backing up, or entering or leaving a parking space, a statistically significant effect was found due to engine type. The HEV was two times more likely to be involved in a pedestrian crash in these situations than was an ICE vehicle.
A variety of crash factors were examined to determine the relative incidence rates of HEVs versus ICE vehicles in a range of crash scenarios. For one group of scenarios, those in which a vehicle is slowing or stopping, backing up, or entering or leaving a parking space, a statistically significant effect was found due to engine type. The HEV was two times more likely to be involved in a pedestrian crash in these situations than was an ICE vehicle.
A variety of crash factors were examined to determine the relative incidence rates of HEVs versus ICE vehicles in a range of crash scenarios. For one group of scenarios, those in which a vehicle is slowing or stopping, backing up, or entering or leaving a parking space, a statistically significant effect was found due to engine type. The HEV was two times more likely to be involved in a pedestrian crash in these situations than was an ICE vehicle.
In light of the above results from the study linked to in the article, I don't think it's such a crazy law. A loud noise like a broken muffler would not be necessary; just enough for people in the near vicinity.
A variety of crash factors were examined to determine the relative incidence rates of HEVs versus ICE vehicles in a range of crash scenarios. For one group of scenarios, those in which a vehicle is slowing or stopping, backing up, or entering or leaving a parking space, a statistically significant effect was found due to engine type. The HEV was two times more likely to be involved in a pedestrian crash in these situations than was an ICE vehicle.
If you could half the amount of accidents hybrids get into in these situations by adding noise emitters, don't you think it would be worth it?
Besides, lastly but not least... unless the car is accelerating the biggest noise is the road noise (pavement vs vulcanized rubber). Last I checked, electric cars don't solve this problem. If you're relying on Engine noise to determine if a car is coming, you're already fairly screwed.
Apparently not. From the study linked to from the article:
A variety of crash factors were examined to determine the relative incidence rates of HEVs versus ICE vehicles in a range of crash scenarios. For one group of scenarios, those in which a vehicle is slowing or stopping, backing up, or entering or leaving a parking space, a statistically significant effect was found due to engine type. The HEV was two times more likely to be involved in a pedestrian crash in these situations than was an ICE vehicle.
So a car without engine noise is in some situations twice as likely to hit somebody. Therefore relying on your ears is somewhat effective when dealing with normal cars in certain situations.
This isn't about morning regrets. If you find you were coerced, then it was rape. We're not talking about "he wasn't very good in bed therefore RAPE!!!!" That basically never happens.
What does happen occasionally is that a girl sleeps with somebody with whom she deeply regrets sleeping with, and so she says it was rape. Admitting as vague a concept as psychological coercion makes it easy to find grounds for a false rape accusation. I deeply empathise with the desire to broaden the ability to prosecute rape. It is by nature often very difficult to prove. But that has to be balanced with a desire to protect the innocent even at the cost of letting a guilty person go free every now and then.
If you want to put yourself on the map, publish your own map.
