Why You Have to Wear a Seat Belt, but Can Drive a Motorcycle

http://mitchkirby.com/2015/05/11/seat-belts-motorcycle-red-states/

by Mitchhhs • 11 years ago

35 74 11 years ago

Karunamon2• 11 years ago

can’t we agree that the law should at least strive to be consistent with itself when possible?

No, because putting consistency over correctness means instead of some right and some wrong, you've either got 100% right (not possible in our world) or 100% wrong.

Besides that, consider that a state's laws are supposed to be an expression of the values of their people, and it's entirely reasonable that a state might tax cigarettes and alcohol differently, or have different laws for cars and motorcycles. Depends on what the people want.

jrlocke• 11 years ago

Inconsistency implies falsity

Karunamon2• 11 years ago

Humans are not logically consistent animals.

njharman5• 11 years ago

Nope, it doesn't. Things can be inconsistent and/or false there is no inherent correlation.

JadeNB5• 11 years ago

I think that this is Karunamon (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9534654)'s point: an inconsistent collection of statements contains at least one false statement; but a collection of statements, all of which are false, is guaranteed to be consistent, so consistency is no guarantor of truth (and indeed may obtain with more falsehood in place than inconsistency).

dragonwriter3• 11 years ago

Laws are not claims, so "inconsistency implies falsity" is irrelevant in the context of law, however accurate it might be in terms of the truth values of a collection of claims.

(And, anyhow, what actually is being discussed isn't actual consistency or inconsistency in the law, but the ability to construct a consistent set of principles supporting the law that is more general than the specific laws that the principles support. The issue isn't that the laws at issue are actually inconsistent, is that the author feels that the specific laws should be justified by more general principles than the laws themselves, and that (for the laws in question) those principles should address only the degree of danger of the activity, and the more general principles the author infers from each of the laws in question, based on the premise that the justifying principle must consider only safety, are when taken together, are inconsistent. This isn't really about consistency, its about whether the actual content of the law fits a particular preference of the author which involves more than just logical consistency.)

rifung• 11 years ago

I am surprised that higher speed limits are so strongly correlated with higher mortality rates. I thought the trend was to increase speed limits, and I remember reading that at least for one of the states where they increased the speed limit, people were still pretty much driving at the same speed.

It seems that the general consensus is the speed limit should be at the 85th percentile to minimize accidents. However, this just considers minimizing accidents, and I suppose I can see how we can lower the number of accidents but also increase the mortality rate.

Also, I suppose it's not completely fair to compare different states, as what works in one might not work in another and vice versa.

lenzm• 11 years ago

My guess is that higher average speeds are the confounding factor and that the speed people drive is mostly independent of the speed limit.

fnordfnordfnord7• 11 years ago

http://priceonomics.com/is-every-speed-limit-too-low/

ska• 11 years ago

I am surprised that higher speed limits are so strongly correlated with higher mortality rates.

This really shouldn't be surprising: higher speed limits correlate with higher average speeds, and while energy goes as the square of the velocity, mitigation efforts do not.

No matter how well you engineer crumple zones, improve traction, give automated braking responses... if you are going fast enough when you actually hit something, it's the kinetic energy that is going to kill you.

Bear in mind that mortality rates and incident rates don't really reflect the same things here.

njharman5• 11 years ago

It has a lot to do with reaction times as well. At higher speeds you've already run into the idiot swerving into your lane (or whatever) by the time your brain processes image.

whoopdedo• 11 years ago

I think the point of raising speed limits is to better match the natural safe speed for a road. The old 55 MPH limit was an over-correction because of high speed accidents. But over time roads were built better and cars became safer, so drivers felt more comfortable driving as fast as 75 MPH.

And, I'm not sure but wasn't there some accidents caused by people suddenly decelerating when they saw a police car? Or am I thinking of the rear-end collisions because of red lights.

drv• 11 years ago

The 55 MPH limit in the US wasn't even instituted for safety reasons; it was a reaction to the oil crisis. Any safety impact was probably due more to the improvements in car safety that you mention.

zeroonetwothree• 11 years ago

Rural highways have much higher fatality rates. I'm not sure that actually changing the speed limit will change that, as drivers might just keep driving the same speed.

JoeAltmaier2• 11 years ago

"its hard to argue that society as a whole bears a significant cost as a result of people not wearing seat belts. "

Its easy to argue. Society spends 10's of thousands of dollars trying to rescue and heal those that don't wear seat belts.

Mitchhhs• 11 years ago

Or do we bear less cost because these people die, which saves heath care costs over their lives?

Similarly, you could also argue than lack of sunscreen use leads to massive costs to society, so why not mandate that we all wear sunscreen at the beach and fine those who don't?

melling• 11 years ago

Who said that they would have died without a seatbelt? Maybe just severe bodily damage, crippled, etc.

You also make it sound like people are only a cost to society. Lost taxes, scientific discoveries, families, etc., depending on their vocation. A lost parent can hurt a family, for example.

rcthompson2• 11 years ago

Also, if seatbelts weren't mandatory, it's conceivable that, in the event of a collision, you could be found liable for injuries that would have been prevented if the person wore a seatbelt. So yes, depending on the law, you could be personally affected by someone else's decision not to wear a seatbelt.

jessaustin• 11 years ago

Victim-blaming is usually considered obnoxious. (It certainly is when newspapers opine that cyclists run over by automobiles should have been wearing helmets.) I wonder why that isn't the case here?

ck2• 11 years ago

You'll still have to wear seatbelts in a driverless car.

In fact it probably will refuse to go anywhere unless you do.

I think the seatbelt laws are to get federal funding, while motorcycles have little political persuasion.

DrJokepu• 11 years ago

Just curious, I know nothing about these things, how would it know what's a human and what's e.g. a dog? It couldn't even rely on the fact that there must be a human sitting in the driver's seat because the concept of the driver's seat is meaningless in a truly self-driving car.

Nadya• 11 years ago

FRS is always a possibility.

That being said - self-driving cars will likely allow manual overrides or require a driver in the case of a manual override for the same reason space shuttles have a cockpit and give astronauts the ability to manual override the controls. People will want the ability to have control just in case.

If a system fails, or says it is failing, and you feel you know it will work or have an alternative that might work. Having manual overrides as a fail safe for software failure can be life saving.

For example, what if your brake sensor malfunctions and your car ceases to be able to operate it's brakes? A manual pedal to brake the car could save your life. Although arguably redundant it will likely remain as part of the car until enough time has passed that such fears are considered completely unfounded.

"There hasn't been a brake sensor failure in over 25 years." Such a statement could probably convince people a manual override brake system isn't needed and they can save money by ditching it.

tthayer• 11 years ago

They can use an array of sensors in the seat and passenger compartment. My car isn't terribly smart so if I leave my bag in the passenger seat it will chime at me incessantly until I shove the bag onto the floor. Cars already use a lot of this kind of information when making decisions around airbag deployment. I was in a frontal accident last year that didn't trigger any airbags because I was firmly belted in and moving at low speed.

megaman22• 11 years ago

What states, outside of New Hampshire, don't require wearing a seat belt?

Live Free or Die, motherfucker :-)

rcthompson2• 11 years ago

Live Free or Die

Or, as the evidence seems to show in this case, both.

fleitz• 11 years ago

That's why it's or not xor :)

fnordfnordfnord7• 11 years ago

You can still wear a seat belt if you want to.

pandler• 11 years ago

I like the full quote better:

Live free or die: Death is not the worst of evils.

Given that John Stark is the attributed author of the quote, I like to imagine that his sister might have added, "Valar morghulis".

herbig• 11 years ago

There's a lot of extremely biased assumptions going on here.

All of the numbers here are correlations only.

No definition is given for what "consistency" means. Taxing cigarettes but not alcohol because of health is not, in my opinion, even remotely inconsistent.

Lastly, the article starts out asking a number of interesting questions and answers none of them, including the one in the title.

If you go digging for statistical confirmation of your biases, you will find it.

tghw• 11 years ago

The argument that I've heard is that seat belts keep the driver in the seat, making it more likely that he or she will have some control of the vehicle after an abrupt maneuver, lowering the chances that the car just becomes an unguided missile, which is more likely to hit something or someone else without a driver.

Motorcycles don't really have the same issue, as they generally do a lot less damage than a car since they weigh only a fraction as much. So helmet laws are more a question of personal choice and how much influence the state government wants to have over those decisions.

sparky_z• 11 years ago

If that's the justification, then shouldn't the law only apply to the driver and not the passengers?

loco5niner3• 11 years ago

Here's an argument for that: Just like the car can become an unguided missile endangering others, an unseat-belted passenger can become an unguided missile endangering fellow passengers/driver.

rakk• 11 years ago

Unless one of the passengers knocks out the driver while bouncing around in the car..

The argument mentioned by tghw is the only reason I agree with the law on this point. Considering law's meant to protect people from themselves (and only themselves) in general I'd pick freedom over mandatory safety any day.

base698• 11 years ago

Because it's easy to continue to pilot the vehicle after your friend smashes into and breaks both your arms?

mod4• 11 years ago

The law sometimes does apply only to the driver--I think that was labeled in an image in the article, in fact.

At the very least, it does not apply to riders in the back seat very often.

alkonaut• 11 years ago

Seatbelt law without helmet law is a bit inconsistent as far as driver safety goes.

Banning motorcycle riding outright is a much more invasive law than requiring a seat belt. Costs vs benefits.

eximius• 11 years ago

Well, there is an incredibly easy and obvious answer to this.

Mothers.

Mothers of dead children have been a huge force is traffic policy in the US.

TrevorJ2• 11 years ago

It's all about reasonable safety balanced with freedom. Wearing a seatbelt keeps people a lot safer and has a really low cost in terms of impinging on freedom.

There's no equivalent on a motorcycle that checks both those boxes other than the helmet laws we already have in many places.

There's no inconsistency here, it's the same philosophy but the outcomes are different because the situations are different.

fnordfnordfnord7• 11 years ago

Wearing a seatbelt keeps people a lot safer and has a really low cost in terms of impinging on freedom.

I don't agree with that at all. There are too many opportunities for police to stop motorists, which they use to pivot and further impinge upon peoples' freedom. It is a common tactic for police to stop motorists for any of a number of reasons such as this reason as a tactic to initiate a search of their vehicle, and record the identities of driver and passengers. I am glad that cars are equipped with seat belts, and of course it is wise to use them; but I disagree that the state has much or any legitimacy in stopping a motorist who was causing no negative effect on other motorists simply because their seat belt was not visible. At its worst (and commonly) the seat belt requirement is abused by greedy entities to drum up extra revenue to which they would otherwise not be entitled.

widowlark2• 11 years ago

But are you taking into account the actual safety reasons for seatbelts? thousands of peoples lives are saved every day by a low-cost belt. Can you think of a better way to do this than the current solution?

TrevorJ2• 11 years ago

I see what you are driving at and I agree, the laws do get abused.

I think though, you may be slightly misunderstanding my point: Wearing a seatbelt doesn't significantly reduce your freedom in any real way. It's not hard to comply with the law, it doesn't cost you time or money and it doesn't effect any of our other freedoms significantly.

To your point though: NOT wearing your belt is something that can land you in situations that put you at risk of abuse to your freedoms.

jgroszko• 11 years ago

The author here seems to be making the assumption that all these laws are considered purely from a 'public health/safety' standpoint, without ever being weighed against something else. If we wanted to evaluate laws purely under a 'health/safety' aspect we'd be scrutinizing the 2nd Amendment a lot more too, or even car ownership in general. Luckily legislatures weigh these things against other interests. People weigh gun ownership, motorcycles, and smoking against their public health, because despite the risks these activities are fun to do, make you feel good, etc.

Additionally, these issues aren't evaluated in isolation, there's lots of competing interests. Auto manufacturers and consumer interest groups have influence over seatbelt laws. For motorcycles there are ABATE groups in many states that tend to lobby against motorcycle helmet laws. How much influence these groups have may not necessarily be related to how safety conscious the state is in other areas.

asuffield• 11 years ago

Every time I see an article like this, it advances the "principle" that your own death has no effect on anybody else in the world.

Never have I seen this justified in any plausible sense.

mod4• 11 years ago

Perhaps so, but to say that seat belt laws are to protect the society from those who don't wear seat belts is equally unjustified.

Not to mention they can, and do, find all kinds of other ways to kill themselves, both accidentally and intentionally--and almost none of those are regulated in a similar fashion.

njharman5• 11 years ago

There are innumerable and obvious societal impacts to your personal death/injury. From direct costs of EMS/Fire/medical care, to the minor economic disruption/traffic, to the esoteric person who kills themselves not wearing seat belt cut short their potential contribution to society.

derefr• 11 years ago

If you assume otherwise, you get into all sorts of weird utilitarian edge-cases where your friends and family should be able to force you (or at least have a vote in) whether you're able to do things like eating candy or taking on a career in Fire & Rescue.

It's not that that value is incoherent or anything—it's actually not a bad idea in isolation—it's just that we seem to value self-determination strictly more.

vacri• 11 years ago

If the repercussions of not wearing seat belts only affect the decision maker, its hard to argue that society as a whole bears a significant cost as a result of people not wearing seat belts.

So... occupants of cars aren't mothers? Or fathers? Or run businesses? Or manage church bake sales? They aren't students with promising careers in medicine ahead of them? They aren't passionate lovers or mentors or good friends or musicians or even civil liberties lawyers?

When someone dies or is badly hurt, it doesn't affect just them. The author has a pretty disturbed view on human interaction to make this assertion in the first place. The argument that 'harm due to speed also hurt other people' and 'harm due to lack of seat belts only hurts the non-wearer' is specious.

njharman5• 11 years ago

Can't imagine how author pulls out of his ass the notion that speed limits are less impinging on liberty than seat belts.

I also find it hard to believe author is not being disingenuous stating "repercussions of not wearing seat belts only affect the decision maker".

The last couple paragraphs are opinions stated as facts and very much want the reader to agree with them I can't help but feel the whole article/data was just a means for author to push his opinion.

derekp7• 11 years ago

The big thing that a lot of these articles overlook, is that seatbelts keep the driver in front of the steering wheel and potentially in better control of a car during an accident -- whereas without one, it is possible to be thrown to a different part of the car, and it keep going in a random direction (thereby affecting others).

eweise• 11 years ago

Comparing wearing a seat belt to driving a motorcycle is not really a fair comparison. One is used for safety and the other is a transportation device. If the comparison is between cars and motorcycles then clearly cars are safer. If the comparison is between safety devices then seat belts are better than helmets if you are in a car but worse if you are on a motorcycle.

tzs• 11 years ago

This submission raises an interesting question about HN submission policy with regard to titles.

The actual title of the article is "Drive In A Red State? You’re More Likely To Die. Here’s Why" (and there is an earlier submission using that title [1]).

However, it appears that the submitter may be the author of the article.

Does the rule about not changing titles apply when it is the author of the article doing the submission?

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9532196

dang• 11 years ago

The HN guidelines ask a submitter not to use the original title when it's linkbait, so the point seems moot in this case.

In general, though, we're a bit more tolerant of title alterations when the author of the article is the one posting it, because the concerns around editorializing are less pressing.

leni536• 11 years ago

What about public transport? We don't have seat belts, we can even travel standing on a crowded bus. It doesn't seem to bother anyone apparently.

shalmanese• 11 years ago

What I find is that people tend to vastly underestimate the role that path dependence has on explaining history and then work to come up with just-so stories that explain the result, absent path dependency.

Nobody ever sat down and rationally assessed the relative risk of motorcycles vs seat belts and crafted a law to take the two into account. Instead, what happened was at one point in time, a group of people lobbied and succeeded in changing one status quo and at another point in time, some other group of people lobbied and failed to change another status quo.

Why You Have to Wear a Seat Belt, but Can Drive a Motorcycle

Related Stories