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Comment by mattmaroon | Hacker News Reader

It's not that you need it to tell you that, it's that the human brain, even when focused, is relatively slow to respond. Not to mention many people have a panic impulse that causes them to yell first and then step on the brakes. In certain situations where a half second can mean the difference between death and a bruised knee, it's pretty impressive stuff.

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That may be, but I still look with suspicion on someone who says he would have gotten in 2 accidents in 11,000 miles had his car not saved him. In my experience, it's very, very rare for someone to just cut you off with no warning. I can almost always predict that someone is going to switch lanes without signaling; usually 2 or 3 seconds before they do it.

Predicting un-signaled lane changes is almost a required survival skill on a motorcycle.

No doubt. He probably Twitters while driving.

Good for you, but how about the other 95% of the population who are less attentive than you and lack predictive powers?

You think 95% of the population gets in 2 accidents a year? Scoble is either overstating his case, or he's a wretchedly bad driver.

They shouldn't be allowed a license.

This is a very good reason I prefer driving in the UK where lanes are only used for overtaking, and overtaking on the left is illegal.

Sure but that's why you pay attention and drive properly, and look out for any dangers/issues.

The best way to cut down the number of accidents is to get rid of all the crazy bad drivers, rather than any sort of technology IMHO.

It's not even remotely economical to eliminate bad drivers, not to mention good drivers who driver badly at times. My sense is that during any test, people will appear much better drivers than they are on average, since they won't be drunk or shooting off an SMS message or whatever else.

It is economical to save a lot of lives with technology. This is a good tech. I don't know if I'd go with most important since seat belts, but it could save lives.

Agreed. Even assuming people do the right thing all the time and never get behind the wheel after drinking, when emotionally heated, without enough sleep, or while distracted by phones, etc., anyone can be distracted for a split-second and cause a major accident.

That kind of "Superman" thinking that things would be great if only you tried harder is BS in a lot of cases. Most people do not want to get into road accidents, deliver code late, or build a shoddy product. Fixing the incentives or process works better.

It's an incentive for people to pay less attention when driving. It's a bad incentive IMHO.

You could make the exact same silly argument about seat belts, crumple zones, and air bags, but the fact is all 3 save many lives.

Seat belts, crumple zones, air bags don't claim to prevent accidents. People aren't likely to say "Ah well, it doesn't matter I don't need to pay attention, since I have an air bag".

Radar etc though does claim to prevent accidents. Which will likely mean people pay less attention.

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