No, that still goes to far. I'd accept "humans violate the rules in ways which are very occasionally, inadvertently safe."
You do not even notice the small ones, which happen all the time. How many people cross solid lines? How many people sometimes drift a bit out of their lane? How many people scrupulously follow the speed limit like a computer does, not even accidentally drifting above it? How many people simply screw up the order of operations at a busy stop sign? How many people always scrupulously use their turn signals in accordance with the local laws? (You may use them frequently, even scrupulously, but I bet you often turn them on what is legally too late.) I've been driving through a construction zone all summer. People definitely don't drive "45 when workers are around". They don't slow down when the workers are behind the concrete barriers and a dozen feet from the road, and may drive 25 when they're sitting right next to the road with just a barrel a bit between you and them.
Even a cop tailing you and desperately hunting for reasons to pull you over still probably lets through plenty of violations. There's too many laws for the cop to keep in their head.
Meanwhile, a lot of highway on-ramps are painted with single-lane-width, high-angle merges that are dangerous to adhere to - they leave you making a ~30 degree turn while accelerating into traffic. As a result, everyone starts their merge early in the gore area, matches speed, and merges at a gentle angle.
(The road designers presumably know this, and keep the marked path narrow regardless so that drivers won't attempt to form multiple lanes.)
This is a pretty great example of what I'm describing - I don't think people make great decisions about violating driving rules, but I also don't think it's fair to call safe decisions "inadvertent". Not breaking that law is genuinely dangerous, and people violate it specifically to be safer.
Yes, there are people who carefully evaluate the situation and only roll their stops when it's safe. They make up a minuscule percentage of the population, though. Most people just do it out of laziness or selfishness, and when they do it safely, it's a happy accident, not a deliberate policy.
The problem is that humans easily misjudge what they believe to be an empty, clearly visible intersection.
The lesson: just because it's your turn to go does not mean that others will not enter the intersection when it's not their turn. I agree that rolling stops at a 4-way stop are generally safe when you can clearly see that no other cars are at or approaching the intersection. But in my experience, the fact that the other person is at fault has been little consolation for having to deal with a totaled car and a permanent backache.
At the end of the day you either trust other drivers or you don't. You're not exposing yourself to any significant addional risk by making these 'safe violations' than you do driving in general.
Who died defending his right-of-way.
He was right--dead-right--as he sailed along
But he's just as dead, as if he'd been wrong.
I just ran the math, the kinetic energy of a 2000kg car at 5mph is the equivalent of the kinetic energy of a 100kg bicycle+cyclist at 22mph.
I absolutely roll stops, but it's important to recognize what we might miss. My old commute had a series of 5 (virtually useless) stop signs in a row, an arterial with very little cross traffic but tons of 4-way stops. (should have been roundabouts). The routine of the drive, and the necessity to stop, the focus on the stop signs and stop lines, and the almost total lack of pedestrians meant that I'd occasionally start off before noticing the cross traffic or pedestrian. (yes, this is more of a boy-who-cried wolf kind of thing). Also, modern cars are amazingly difficult to see out of-- pedestrians can be hidden behind thick airbag-containing A pillars. When you're moving, however slowly, everything in your field of view is also moving. When you stop, it's much easier to spot objects that are NOT stopped.
Hell, just last week I was making a left turn on my bicycle. As I approached the intersection, I slowed, looked each way up the road several times as my sightlines improved, and just at the moment I committed to my turn and began to proceed, I saw the minivan coming from my left that was on a collision course with me; I locked up my brakes and stopped just in time. I know I looked exactly where the van was coming from, multiple times, but somehow missed it. I suspect, again, our brains are much better at seeing what's in motion when we are ourselves stopped.
I have been running for 25+ years and have on occasion been traveling at close to 10 mph and usually at least 8 mph. So California rolls are pretty much the bane of my existence.
This is primarily because the "roller" may be planning to take a right turn and are looking straight and glancing left and don't even look my way traveling from their right.
I do take responsibility for my own survival so I wear lights, and try my best to make eye contact before entering intersections etc. but I have had many close calls where they did not even see me due to their own target fixation.
Now that I am on a bike more often I feel even more insecure because my speed is so much higher.
If there are any pedestrians around then you don't.
It looks a lot more insane when you're paid well enough to outsource those behaviors (and liability) to whoever's driving your Uber.
It's like when a company makes a statement about supporting a living wage and contracts out its janitorial services who pay anything but.