The cellphone paradox - where are all the accidents?

I wait until I'm not driving any more to respond IF I remember that I actually got a text msg while driving. Sometimes, I don't hear the DING when I get the msg, too.

OMG! Mom and dad were what? ewwwwwwwwwwwwwwww!!

Reply to
Muggles
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You can take it out.

Reply to
Muggles

The problem is that MOST folks are in the second category!

It's easy to walk and chew gum at the same time. But, nowadays, folks try to do things that have much higher degrees of cognitive loading; require more *thought* to perform correctly.

Baking is largely a mindless task. Except when it isn't! :> I almost always premeasure all of my ingredients so I don't have that sort of "problem" to sort out WHILE I am in the middle of mixing them (where there may be some time constraints in order to ensure everything comes out properly).

There are few opportunities to "do over" if you screw up. "Did I put 4 cups of flour in there or 5? Hmmm... how can I tell now that it's all mixed together??"

[You know that if you end up with one too many or few the results will make the effort worthless!]

Likewise, baking cookies is a pipelined operation: prepare one cookie sheet of cookies, place in oven (lower rack), set timer. In the ~4 minutes available, prepare *second* sheet of cookies so that it can go into the oven when the timer expires -- replacing the sheet on the lower rack which then moves up to the upper rack (for the second half of the bake cycle). Reset the timer and prepare third sheet.

When this second timer expires, remove first sheet from upper rack, move second sheet from lower to upper, insert third sheet onto lower and reset timer. Now, move the cookies off the first sheet onto cooling racks *and* prepare fourth sheet before timer expires.

Lather, rinse, repeat.

If you are slow getting the "next" sheet ready, you can't hit "pause". The previous sheet needs to finish its bake cycle (and the one before that needs to be withdrawn). If you put a partial sheet in the oven, then you end up extending your time in the kitchen by "another cycle". If you leave a sheet (or two) in the oven a bit too long (while you rush to finish up the "next" sheet), then you risk ruining the cookies.

All of these actions are incredibly "mindless". Yet, consume 100% of your attention while performing them!

Reply to
Don Y

Now I have yet another thing to fumble on the rare occasion that the phone rings. No thanks.

Reply to
krw

But, if they are actually happening in any meaningful way, then the accident rate would be going up.

That it's not, is the paradox.

Reply to
ceg

You're talking fatalities, which is even further removed from accidents than injuries.

Why do you persist in muddling what is so very simple.

You and I believe that cellphone use is distracting enough to cause accidents, yet, those accidents aren't happening.

What part of that is full of shit? (Do you have *better* accident statistics?)

If so, show them.

Reply to
ceg

You fundamentally don't understand zeros.

It's like the old joke of aiming nuclear weapons.

If the number of accidents were truly going up, no amount of estimation errors would hide that fact.

It's clear, that the accident rate did not track the cellphone ownership rate, and that is a fact that no amount of apologies on your part can erase.

I think you're looking to prove your point that the astoundingly huge skyrocketing rate that must be expected by your assumptions is, somehow, magically, hidden inside of "estimation" errors.

You're grasping at straws.

Reply to
ceg

That's the conundrum!

Reply to
ceg

Just to be clear, I've used the words "accident rate" many times, but, to be just as clear, I don't think it matters whether we use rate or number of accidents, because, as someone already said, if the accidents were really being caused by any appreciable percentage of cellphone owners, then the roads would be awash in blood.

That they're not, is the conundrum.

Reply to
ceg

You have a logic problem if you really believe that your entire premise is that the answer is hidden inside of "estimation error".

I thank you for looking for a solution out of the conundrum, but, you're not going to find it in accident rate estimation error.

You apparently have no concept of the powers of ten (hint: It's an extra zero or two or three on the numbers, which no estimation error in the world is going to hide).,

That your entire premise hinges on the estimation error being so large as to greatly sway the numbers means you're simply grasping at straws.

I too am looking for *where* the conundrum is solved, but, it's not going to be in the "estimation errors" of the US figures on year to year accident rates.

Reply to
ceg

Sure, you can easily text with voice to speech through bluetooth. It works both ways (voice readout, and voice recognition).

It's not even fancy nowadays. All smartphones do it, as far as I know.

Certainly it works through my Motorola Roadster speakerphone and my android cellphone.

Reply to
ceg

Nobody can multitask, it's just sequential flipping back and forth. Women may just need to do more flipping than guys do.

When I needed shoes for my daughter's wedding I ended up trying up everything that might vaguely go with my dress in the quest for something that didn't hurt. I took the winners off as soon as I could sit down at the reception. Some men's tennies are OK, but they suck for formal wear.

Our only REAL hardware store closed several months ago. One of the things of which I'm most proud is that Mrs. Berg offered me a job there

45 years ago when I was buying a lot of weird stuff to build a tape recorder. Couldn't take it, but it made me really feel good. Still does.

Damn Harbor Freight stopped giving them out even if you didn't buy anything. Those are nifty little flashlights.

Yard sales. People buy way too many clothes, so I might as well buy used t-shirts for a quarter and levi's for $2. This means that *I* buy way too many clothes.

T-shirt, shorts/pants. I'm good.

Reply to
The Real Bev

If this is true, then why aren't accident rates going up?

Reply to
ceg

Let's stick with accidents, since injuries and deaths have a whole host of additional factors that actually have nothing to do with cellphone ownership (and some that do), but none of which are relevant to the original accident.

You're just clouding what is a simple issue that is a paradox.

Unless you're saying that cellphone use causes these fatalities and injuries WITHOUT causing an accident first?

Reply to
ceg

You have supplied a possible fifth solution to the conundrum!

I have noted already that a car with a cellphone might actually be a *safer* car than one without, simply because of the lack of need for reading road signs in the rain, or for making u-turns in unfamiliar territory, or for avoiding traffic backups, etc.

Certainly a cellphone equipped car is much safer *after* the accident, because help can be on its way even before you step out of the vehicle.

So, maybe the conundrum is solved by the assumption that cellphones both cause and prevent accidents in *exactly equal numbers*.

That would be a fifth solution to the conundrum.

Reply to
ceg

I used to make fudge for Xmas. I could keep 3 pots going until I ran out of ingredients and god help anybody who got in my way while I was doing it. I had one dry measuring cup, one wet one, a knife for the butter and a tablespoon for the cocoa. You use the cap to measure vanilla, everybody knows that!

Reply to
The Real Bev

I saw it. I trust them. I think they take too much pride in their actual considerable skills and are having too much fun to fudge their projects.

Perhaps the smarter non-users are getting better at avoiding the assholes on the phone -- a survival characteristic.

I've used my phone twice while driving. Both times I could actually FEEL my peripheral vision as well as my attention to driving shutting down. Both times my response was "I'm on my way, see you in a few minutes." I don't use my phone for anything but messages like that and really don't understand how people can be constantly chattering.

Reply to
The Real Bev

I bake often: biscotti every 2 weeks, 12 cheesecakes/year (one tonight),

3 or 4 coffee cakes; and ~15 doz cookies every 3 months. The holidays see a dramatic increase: several hundred dozens of cookies, homemade ice cream, etc.

On each "occasion", my attention is effectively 100% tied up until the job is over. E.g., tonight's cheesecake will be 2 hours at the stove; followed by another 3 hours to finish up, tomorrow. A small screwup and all that time invested is for naught...

Reply to
Don Y

You'll make an excellent wife, but I'd rather have one who was good at cleaning :-) I used to cook regularly, but now I just assemble food. Exceptions, of course:

Grate 1 potato. Press down into pan and fry in butter for 10 minutes or less. Flip and fry on other side for 5 minutes. Salt and eat. Adjust time depending on whatever it depends on.

Boil corned beef and cabbage for 5 hours. (Live-in consultant likes

5-hour cabbage.)

Jalapeno jelly. It hasn't jelled so far, so I use cornstarch and make jalapeno pudding. Next batch will be perfect.

Reply to
The Real Bev

No let's not, since you don't have good data on accidents.

No more so than accidents.

Deaths may have factors like that but injuries don't. And your objection doesn't apply to deaths either, because the same people lying dead on the highway or dead at the hospital within a day or two, 99% of the time would still be alive were it not for the accident.

You're just clouding an issue to make it seem like there's a paradox.

Deaths and injuries are directly though not necessarilly linearly proportional to accidents.

Reply to
micky

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