SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Full moons and particularly "supermoons" have been linked to increased deaths of motorcyclists:
Distracted drivers, like those who text behind the wheel, are a danger to themselves and to others. Even a brief, momentary glance away from the road can result in life-threatening consequences.
Research published Dec. 11 in The BMJ [open, DOI: 10.1136/bmj.j5367] [DX] points toward another potential distraction for motorists: the full moon, gracing the sky with its brightness around 12 times a year, and the dazzling supermoon, which comes into focus around once a year.
The researchers found that on nights illuminated by a full moon, fatal motorcycle accidents increased by 5 percent compared to nights without a full moon. On evenings when the supermoon decorated the sky, this increased to 32 percent. The study included data from the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada and Australia.
While this observational data cannot prove any firm conclusions, the researchers warn drivers of the risks of seemingly minor distractions, urging constant attention while driving at all times.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 13 2017, @02:51PM (2 children)
This is why we desperately need decent driver education and severely punish people for engaged in reckless driving. Autonomous vehicles are hardly necessary to cut the fatalities down to a huge degree.
In crashes, the reasons pretty much always break down to some combination of inattention, drugs and car maintenance. Cases where that isn't the case are more or less negligible. But, we don't send people to jail over DUIs typically until they've already been given several chances, but that DUI is pretty much always just the one time they were caught these people usually are driving dozens of times under the influence before they're caught.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Wednesday December 13 2017, @03:07PM (1 child)
Driverless Cars Could Reduce Traffic Fatalities by Up to 90%, Says Report [sciencealert.com]
Teaching a driverless car is a copy-and-paste operation. Teaching humans means teaching some normal folks along with complete idiots. And good drivers still get distracted and can't react in tens of milliseconds like a computer can, and people still do drive drunk despite knowing it's wrong.
DUI consequences vary [wallethub.com]. But even if there was a 10 year minimum sentence for being caught the first time, people would still do it, endangering everybody on the road.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by frojack on Wednesday December 13 2017, @09:50PM
Your cited study is pretty much guesswork science at best. Did you actually read it, or trace it back to the source?
Clue: There is no study. It was all speculation dating from 2015, when there were 48 such cars on the road world wide.
Lab rat cars in controlled conditions with an unknown (and tightly guarded secret) number of human interventions.
In the mean time, this super-human technology can to this day be brought to a stand still [nerdist.com] by one guy and a paint roller and a quart of cheap white paint.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.