On 12/27/2009 7:43 PM, Ed Pawlowski wrote:
Steve Turner wrote:

Some drivers can deal
with the multitasking WAY better than others.

True.

I can handle it just
fine, thank you very much; my mirrors, my turn signals, the road, and
the world around me continue to get my undivided attention, while the
person on the other end of the phone gets what's left.

That statement alone proves you wrong. Read what you wrote.

You know, I thought about using something other than "undivided attention", but
I decided to leave it in just to see how many people would call me on it. :-)

Fine; I'll restate. For many people, there *are* situations where driving does
not require 100% of their attention (Mario Andretti driving a Honda Civic at
28mph in a 35mph zone might be one example). If a careful and alert driver
deems the risk factor to be low enough, many can give the act of driving all
the attention it needs yet still have plenty of brain capacity left over for
other things; other people, not so much. For some, anything other than their
"undivided attention" would make them an unsafe driver.

However, some
(most?) people can't even drive correctly when they're carrying on a
normal conversation with a passenger sitting next to them, so how do
you propose that we handle that? Should we "scientifically" block
all interaction with a driver that *might* "impair" them? Unless the
activity is *actually* impairing their ability and causing them to
commit infractions, why should there be any reason to interfere with
their activities?

There is a difference between talking to a passenger and talking on the
phone. Really, there is. Talking to a passenger, you are more likely to
stop the conversation if a situation happens that needs more attention
compared to talking on the phone.

I only used that as one example of the zillion things that drivers do *instead*
of paying attention to the road. All I'm saying is that some people are such
idiots they can't even have a simple conversation with a passenger without
weaving all over the road.

Unlike the other poster, I'm not going to stop you from talking. I do it
myself. The amount of attention and likelihood of distraction depends on
many factors, Traffic, weather, who you are talking to, the subject, etc.
In light or no traffic and asking the wife what is for dinner is far
different that being in heavy fast moving traffic while trying to give
detailed technical support to a customer.

Yes, and because of that idiot, those of us who just want to call our wives in
light traffic to ask if we need to bring some milk home will be banned from
doing so.

In the past couple of years, quite a few teenagers have been killed while
driving and talking.

Teenagers have been inventing new and outrageous ways to get themselves killed
on the highway for decades.

Where do you draw the line?

By leaving the line where it is and enforcing the existing careless and
imprudent driving laws.

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