On Wednesday, August 19, 2015 at 9:33:09 PM UTC-5, rickman wrote:
On 8/16/2015 2:03 PM, ceg wrote:
On Sun, 16 Aug 2015 05:16:39 -0700, trader_4 wrote:

Click on your link
and there is a listing for "distracted driving":

You have to realize what you just intimated.

Bear in mind, it's the PARADOX that we're trying to resolve.

If distracted driving statistics were reliable (they're not), then the
paradox is EVEN WORSE!

Remember, the accidents don't seem to exist in the reliable statistics.
The accidents only exist in the highly unreliable statistics, and they
don't show up in the reliable ones - so - you and I both know what that
means.

Even so, if, as you and I assume, cellphone use causes accidents, then we
should be able to *see* those accidents in the aggregate statistics.

But we don't.

The fact that it's virtually impossible to determine whether a cellphone
was the primary (or even secondary) cause of an accident isn't really
part of the equation - because the accident count is going down (not up).

Hence the paradox.
Where are the accidents?

How many accidents does it take? Some years back there was a rather
horrific head-on accident on Rt 28, south of Manassas, VA. I think
everyone involved died and they found the solo driver of one vehicle was
talking on his cell phone when it happened. It resulted in that stretch
of road having a cell phone ban which surprised the drivers who were
subsequently charged. This was largely because the four occupants of
the van that was hit by the solo driver were all local politicians.

I don't know for sure, but I suspect the person the driver was talking
to knew he was in the accident when the call was cut short. The
investigators would have been able to tell who crossed the line by the
skid marks on the road. I expect this is not a unique situation. As
you point out, not all accidents would be identifiable as "caused" by
cell phone usage, so I expect the number is actually underestimated.

The fact that accidents overall are going down is irrelevant.

--

Rick

I would make a SWAG that overall accidents are down because vehicles are safer and when the economy is down, people are driving less. My 20 year old Jeep has anti-lock brakes and handles better than my 40 year old Plymouth which actually handled very well and allowed me to avoid quite a few accidents. The last time I was involved in an accident, it was when I was hit by some idiot who ran a red light. It disabled my vehicle and the creep took off so I couldn't catch him. Another guess I'll make is that no one will admit to having an accident because they were using their cellphone. Unless police confiscate cellphones from drivers involved in an accident in order to check them, how could it be reported as an accident caused by distracted driving due to cellphone use?. o_O

[8~{} Uncle SWAG Monster