gill@sri-unix (08/16/82)
After receiving some mail from some of the anti air baggers, I must say they have a very strong point: The "right" way to solve the safety problem is to make not wearing safety belts equivalent to relieving anyone of liability for your personal injury. I see three problems with this (one of which was pointed out by rabbit!ark): It is probably impossible to determine what sort of injuries the negligent driver would sustain had he worn seat belts. We might want the other party to be liable for some personal injury (of course, totally freeing him may be a good lesson to the non seat belt wearer, but it is probably overly cruel punishment). In many collisions, the injured manages to leave the car or otherwise unseat himself. The determination of whether he gets to sue the other guy would be determined by his telling the cops "I was wearing seatbelts." I somehow don't think this will work ... The cost of health care is mostly covered by health insurance nowadays. If you can't sue because you were negligent, I don't think the present health insurance companies will refuse to pay for such accidents. If you fall on a driveway you forgot to plow, do the health insurance companies refuse to pay? After mulling the issue over some more, I have decided that I wouldn't personally want them over seat belts. I always wear seat belts and now believe them to be more effective and safer than air bags. Nevertheless, I think some sort of mandatory safety mechanism is needed. Whether its implemented through air bags or changes in isurance claim law doesn't matter, though I think the air bags are a more sure fire method (they don't have the above problems). How about providing cars with both air bags and seat belts? Whenever the seat belt is not in use, the air bags are enabled. Of course, that would make it possible to turn them off by sitting on your belts, but it probably be possible to disable them anyway. The reason I don't think too many people would do this (as opposed to what they did to disable buzzers and so forth) is that not wearing your belt wouldn't cause immediate annoyance, just increased risk of ear damage (I still haven't seen any references to who proved this true). Comments? Gill Pratt alice!gill OR gill@mc
smb@sri-unix (08/16/82)
A few factual items on airbags: a) NO ONE -- not Ralph Nader, not the government -- suggests replacing seatbelts with airbags; they're held to be complementary systems. It is indeed recognized that airbags don't do much good except in head-on collisions. Furthermore, an individual who is not properly located in the passenger compartment -- i.e., not in one of the standard seats -- faces some risk of injury from the airbag; wearing a seatbelt automatically means you're safe from that. b) Studies of the cars that do have airbags show that they have a fairly good reliability record; there are very few false triggers. c) More is known than one might guess about the types of accidents that can occur to folks who don't wear seatbelts. Certain injuries essentially *never* occur to people who do wear them. d) Yes, there are risks in having airbags; there are also a few (a *very* few) accident situations where seatbelts do more harm than good. But those are quite rare; statistically speaking, you're far better off with seatbelts, and with airbags, than you are without them.
swatt (08/20/82)
I hesitate to get into this argument, but having already been on record for a major flame about motorcycle helmets, here I go ... 1) "The government should preserve freedom of choice and NOT require airbags, ... but require automakers to make them available to those who want them". I fail to see how this preserves "freedom of choice". GM offered from (I think 1976-1978, but I may be wrong), airbags as a $250 option on certain model cars. They thought they would sell several hundred thousand; they sold about 2 thousand. At that rate they LOST about $1000 for every airbag they sold. Now people often accuse the auto industry of NOT pushing safety options, but you better believe in this case GM was TRYING to sell more airbags so they could lose less money. The point is: If enough people are willing to pay the ACTUAL cost to design and install airbags, the US government doesn't have to require anything; plain old capitalist greed will suffice to make airbags available. If enough people AREN'T willing to pay the acutual cost, then requiring automakers to provide airbags to those who "want" them is forcing those who don't purchase airbags to subsidise those who do. You may call this "freedom of choice"; I call it "robbery". Perhaps in the interim since GM's early attempt, more people have decided they would pay for optional airbags and a similar offer today would be successful. I don't know, but I think that's what automakers have marketing people to tell them. 2) "Rather than require airbags, the government should require seatbelt usage. Only 10% of the drivers on the road are using their seatbelts". This was espoused by none other than Road&Track, normally staunchly anti-regulation. It's hard to imagine HOW you're going to enforce seatbelt usage without massive invasions of privacy. Roadblocks? Automatic cameras under overpasses? IF ONLY 10% OF THE DRIVERS ARE USING THEIR SEATBELTS, THEN THE 90% WHO AREN'T CONSTITUTE A MAJORITY. If you think about that for a while, perhaps you'll back off trying to force them. Second, this assumes that wearing seatbelts is generally safer. Now I believe it, and all the studies I have ever seen support this, but what gives me (or anyone) the right to force my conclusions on anyone else? I'm not God and am not omnicient; are you? Is some government agency? Is Ralph Nadar? 3) "People who are injured in accidents while not wearing seatbelts shouldn't be allowed to collect damages". This makes the same assumption as (2). Further, even if we accept the studies that show statistically that the class of automobile occupants wearing seatbelts suffer less and fewer injuries than the class of automobile occupants NOT wearing seatbelts, what does this tell us about the PARTICULAR accident in which a PARTICULAR individual is injured? Nothing. Again, I'm not God and I cannot know for sure in any given accident whether seatbelts benefitted or harmed the wearer. If the car catches fire, it MIGHT have been better to be thrown through the windshield rather than stay restrained inside the car. What if the injured person not wearing a seatbelt were permanently crippled. Would you still withold the right to sue? How about if the other driver was clearly at fault? Drunk? Drunk with a suspended license for previous drunk driving? I can sit here for hours and dream up situations such that I don't care what the law is, any lawyer worth his salt in front of any human jury could get an award. Further, I doubt the right to sue could be taken away from an individual without due process. 4) "People who don't wear seatbelts should pay higher insurance premiums". As someone else already noted, the auto insurance I pay is not for personal injuries, but liability and collision. MY seatbelt usage has no affect on how much damage I might cause to someone else. Further, MY insurance company doesn't have a contract with a person suing under MY coverage. It's hard to see how any agreements between my insurance company and me could be made binding on the plaintiff. Thomas Jefferson once said words to the effect that there are always individuals who think people need saving from some evil or another enough to justify compromising the principles of Democracy. People who spend a lot of time worrying about what to do about automobile accidents should read a little history too. They will discover that in EVERY period of recoded history there has always been some group of damn fools who thought all you had to do to so solve any "problem" was pass a law requiring one thing or prohibiting something else. The present is no different. Harry Truman once said "The only thing new is history you haven't read". How true. - Alan S. Watt
wagner (08/20/82)
I assume it was a typo, but Alan Watt said "in every period of RECODED history" (emphasis mine). My first impression, before I realized that it was a typo, was that he was going to talk about the quality of public school textbooks. Michael Wagner, UTCS
wagner (08/20/82)
By the way, DECVAX outage seems to have destroyed continuity in this newsgroup (and possibly others too). Note the Re at the top of this article? We never saw the original. This has been happening a lot. Could someone re-issue the original article, please? Thanks. Michael Wagner, UTCS
gill (10/08/82)
#R:utcsstat:-31100:physics:14200003:000:1745
physics!gill Aug 21 13:31:00 1982
Though I originally wrote "Cool air on bags," I can no longer
find a copy. It didn't mention anything that hasn't been said in
the last few day's of articles.
I'm pro-bags for the non belt wearing pubblic, but not for myself (I
wear seatbelts, and after being "convinced" by several articles in
net.auto, don't think supplimental air bags worth the risks). I
proposed the use of a bag disabler when the seat belts were in use, thus
freeing the safety minded of the risks of ear damage or random activation.
I don't think the seat belt / negligence argument is valid. It is usually
impossible to prove you were wearing a seat belt when injured (most
people leave the car immediately if they can). Also, determining what
partial liability to impose in the case of negligence is extremely difficult.
I see mandatory air bags (or perhaps passive seat belts) as a necessity,
since the cost of the public driving unsafe cars is imposed on everyone
in very real terms (like car and hospital insurance rates).
I ALMOST fell for the "headlights" article. My sympathies go to rabbit!jj
and all others who unleashed their big guns against this satire. I think
the last line gave it away ("so what if their death rate is 3 times ...
they can't drive anyway ..."). Bravo to the mcnc!ge.
I haven't seen someone practice this art for a long time. In
fact, I began to send a flamy response myself before feeling a bit funny
and looking the offending article over once more. Unfortunatly, notes began
to send my return-fire despite my caution, causing a very amusing panic
to stop the article before it got out. We (Pace Willisson,another of the
physics gurus, and myself) managed to do it just in the nick of time.
Gill Pratt
...alice!gill OR gill@mcwagner (10/12/82)
Gil: I do not agree with the idea of asigning guilt in car accidents based on who had their seat belts on (unless, as was pointed out earlier, lack of seat belt can be shown to be a contributing cause), but I do have to disagree with your comment that one cannot tell afterwards if participants had their seat belts on. In an accident of any magnitude, unfortunately, the people themselves carry evidence of their seat belt use in the form of skin abrasions where the seat belt restrained them. While it is better than being unrestrained, it can be quite significant. Michael Wagner, UTCS