Re:Alphabet's Self-Driving Cars to Get Their First Real Riders
by Spivak on Tuesday April 25, 2017 @05:02PM
(#14197985)
If you're going to actually get people to change their opinion you should really give your own position the most uncharitable phrasing.
> Road fatalities are already the number 1 killer of some age groups
You're hiding a weakness in your argument by not specifying the age groups. You're hiding a weakness in your argument by restricting to cross-sections of the population that support your argument. You're misleading your listener by hiding the fact that this statement isn't because traffic accidents are unusually high, but that other causes of death are unusually low.
> Around 40,000 in the US last year.
Careful using absolute numbers, using 40,000 which is a very small number compared to other kinds of deaths like hard disease (800,000 deaths last year) can be misleading because 40,000 sounds like a big number.
> its estimated that over a million people worldwide die on the roads every year
You're hiding the fact that the US has 4% of the world's automobile deaths but 20% of the world's cars. You're using aggregate data to smooth over deaths that are caused by dangerous driving environments, roads, or ineffective traffic laws and misleading your listener into assuming that they're caused by human error.
Total deaths is not a useful statistic. The deaths that could have been prevented by L4 autonomous cars but could have not been prevented by L1-L3 or more conventional safety practices is what you should be presenting.
Give as little surface area as possible to people who would use it to push back.
> Road fatalities are already the number 1 killer of some age groups
You're hiding a weakness in your argument by not specifying the age groups. You're hiding a weakness in your argument by restricting to cross-sections of the population that support your argument. You're misleading your listener by hiding the fact that this statement isn't because traffic accidents are unusually high, but that other causes of death are unusually low.
> Around 40,000 in the US last year.
Careful using absolute numbers, using 40,000 which is a very small number compared to other kinds of deaths like hard disease (800,000 deaths last year) can be misleading because 40,000 sounds like a big number.
> its estimated that over a million people worldwide die on the roads every year
You're hiding the fact that the US has 4% of the world's automobile deaths but 20% of the world's cars. You're using aggregate data to smooth over deaths that are caused by dangerous driving environments, roads, or ineffective traffic laws and misleading your listener into assuming that they're caused by human error.
Total deaths is not a useful statistic. The deaths that could have been prevented by L4 autonomous cars but could have not been prevented by L1-L3 or more conventional safety practices is what you should be presenting.
Give as little surface area as possible to people who would use it to push back.