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Comment by nostromo | Hacker News Reader

This is taken as an obvious truth, but when you look at actual collision data, there seems to be no effect whatsoever.

In fact, our roads have continued to become safer in the 10 or so years since the release of the iPhone.

Car fatalities are down because the passenger compartment has become safer. Pedestrian fatalities are up because idiots are still plowing into them [0]

[0] https://www.npr.org/2017/03/30/522085503/2016-saw-a-record-i...

Could you supply said data? Also, in what way is it safer? Less collisions? Less damage? Less fatalities?

Small nit you may not be aware of: use 'fewer' for nouns which can be counted (collisions, fatalities), and 'less' for nouns which can't (damage).

That's purely the personal preference of one curmudgeon from 1770. "The OED shows that less has been used of countables since the time of King Alfred the Great -- he used it that way in one of his own translations from Latin -- more than a thousand years ago (in about 888). So essentially less has been used of countables in English for just about as long as there has been a written English language."

http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/003775.h...

While you seem to have started a grammar war complete with grammar Nazis, I appreciate the feedback.

Stop nitpicking this. There's nothing unclear or ambiguous about 'less'. It refers to a smaller quantity of something. There's no reason not to use it. This is just pointless grammar Nazism.

Debating grammar is perhaps one of the best ways to actually learn grammar and otherwise sharpen language skills. I don't think it's a coincidence that grammar and language discourse has been a past time of the learned for millennia around the world.

Not interested in weighing in on less/fewer, but not sure architects of genocide is the comparison we want for grammar sticklers, even if it's become a common turn of phrase. Cheapens the real thing, doesn't it?

I can't find it right now, but I recall there was a study that suggested the trends in total collisions followed total miles driven fairly well, and that distracted driving was not needed to explain the recent increase in collisions. (Or something like that.)

I have no idea if this study's conclusions are controversial or not. If someone could identify the study, I'd be appreciative.

Is it that smartphones are having no impact, or that they're offset by other factors such as widespread availability of sensors?

I wonder how much autonomous braking and lane correction systems are contributing to obviating distracted driving?

Traffic fatalities in the US have been trending up since 2014.

Edit: corrected to 2014, not 2015.

This is my understanding as well. Supporting data:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motor_vehicle_fatality_rate_in...

Note that fatalities per 100M population has not just been trending up, but it is doing so after trending down for many previous years.

That’s because the data is garbage. If I’m standing on the corner holding a bag with a 6 pack and you run me over, it’s an alcohol related accident.

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