I read an article long ago about incorporating optical illusions into traffic calming. Things like the shape of ditches and the placement of trees on highways and parkways to make the shoulders look narrower than they really are.

Making the road appear more dangerous than it really is makes people slow down and pay attention, without the uptick in danger of an actual hazard.

"Let's train people to ignore danger"

what we need is red camera* at every light and speed trap at every road, only the fear of enforcement keep people honest

*minus the whole shorten yellows for profit, of course

Surely we could more or less eliminate all kind of law violations by total control. But I don't think this is what we want as a society.

I'm not arguing about every single law, only those that have impact on the leading cause of death beyond health issues in the civilized world

but ok, nice slippery slope, I guess.

Let my rephrase it in a better way I hope.

I'm not trying to say that once we introduce methods to fully detect some types of law infractions it will inevitably lead to a totalitarian regime.

But I believe some leeway is necessary for people to feel comfortable and somewhat free. I don't want to be punished every time I make a mistake. I think you can find some sweet spot between zero and total detection. And yeah, probably leaning towards the latter, in correlation with seriousness of a violation (optimal discoverability reaching zero rather means the law should be revoked, like jaywalking being penalized in my country imho).

Also, how would you even know some law is optimal when no one violates it? I mean, we could put radars on every road and set the limit on 30 kph. The studies discussed in the article wouldn't be possible then.

> I'm not arguing about every single law, only those that have impact on the leading cause of death beyond health issues in the civilized world

Definitely speed is the factor. But what about other variables at play like road quality, intersections planning, lights, other traffic regulations? And if tweaking them actually lowered casualties equally well with better economical outcome?

> only the fear of enforcement keep people honest

As for a slippery slope. You vastly generalized your statement yourself tbh.