Trikki Beltran's bad concussion and his helmet

"Bill Sornson" wrote in message
...
David Damerell wrote:
Quoting :
David Damerell wrote:
Your reading comprehension is too limited to explain this. I did
not say that the negative and positive effects were equal. Please
reread it until you understand what I am saying; then perhaps we
can discuss it.
You wrote:
the supposed negative and positive effects being discussed are
equally "once an accident has happened".
I'm guessing you meant "equal".

Well, you're wrong. I wrote "equally" because I meant "equally", of
course. Why don't you try reading what I wrote, not what you think I
wrote?

"the supposed negative and positive effects being discussed are equally
'once an accident has happened'" makes no sense.

Do you suppose that's what he meant when he said that he meant to write
"equally"? I'm thinking that what he's saying is that he meant to write
nonsense.

Steven Bornfeld wrote:

Context is everything. Anti-helmet folks using risk compensation seem
to say that any perceived protective measure is useless for its intended
function--that safety measures in short do not promote safety--that they
promote risky behavior.

That phrase "seem to say" is as accurate as a third grader saying "The
teacher seems to say three times four is fourteen." IOW, you must not
have been paying attention.

What we're saying - well expressed by Dave - is that whether a "safety"
measure is useful or not depends at least partly on whether the user
has a realistic sense of its protective effect.

Risk compensation is real, and denying it is vacuous. It's far too
easy to demonstrate. But that doesn't disprove the benefit of _any_
safety item. To attach hypothetical numbers (for explanation only), if
the person behaves 30% riskier and the protection is 40% greater, the
person still comes out ahead. If the person behaves 50% riskier with
that same protection, the person comes out behind.

What affects the person's behavior? In part, his estimate of
protection. As I've said before, side impact beams in car doors are
largely unknown to consumers. They're not visible, and people don't
think about their presence. They probably cause negligible risk
compensation. Therefore, if they have _any_ protective effect, it's
probably a net positive situation.

OTOH, helmets are constantly obvious on one's head. Worse, the public
has been convinced that they prevent 85% of truly serious head
injuries. Many people probably believe they prevent 85% of fatalities.
Given those facts, helmets probably generate extreme risk
compensation.

I really do believe that if people knew and understood the incredibly
low level of impact in the certification tests, helmet-induced risk
compensation would largely vanish. Unfortunately, the helmet promotion
hasn't started with "Helmets are 85% effective." It's started with
"Cycling is incredibly dangerous." At this point, I think our phobic
public would stop cycling entirely.

There is no acknowledgement that there is any
benefit to safety devices or behaviors.

I don't need to come in here and praise safety devices. We have an
entire industry, plus dozens of government agencies, doing that all the
time. It's reached ludicrous proportions.

Regarding "safety behaviors," I can discuss those readily. Those are
where the emphasis _should_ be. But it's not, not at all. "Bicycle
safety" has become equated with "bicycle helmet."

Maybe it's a natural effect of an instant gratification consumer
society - but
when people want to be safer, they don't try to _learn_ anything; they
try to _buy_ something. And hey, if that "something" fixes 85% of the
problem, why bother with learning?

No time in this very lengthy
debate (to my knowledge) is spent on speculating how safety devices can
be improved; only whether they have a right to exist at all

We can talk about how to improve helmets, if that's what you want.
It's simple. Make them much thicker. Do away with most of the
ventilation holes. Bring back the hard shells. Oh, and redesign the
ridiculously ineffective straps with something that will keep its shape
and adjustment - maybe solid plastic.

One more thing: If you take the recommendation of the Thompson &
Rivara team (originators of the "85%" crap), you should build rigid
chin bars into all bike helmets. You know - full face helmets for
ordinary riding. They actually have called for such things.

Do all those things, and you can probably increase a bike helmet's
protective range from the current 14 mph impact of a decapitated head,
to perhaps an 18 mph impact of a decapitated head.


the use of the term "risk
compensation" in this thread has become as slippery as Frank wants it to be.

You know, I teach for a living. And I've learned that not all students
will get the subject material, no matter what I do or say.

Some just can't comprehend, and some just don't want to comprehend.

Whatever the reason, Steven, I'd recommend you drop this class. If you
truly don't understand what risk compensation is by now, you're just
not keeping up.

- Frank Krygowski

In article 3w4Ne.2836$wb.2818@trndny09,
Mark & Steven Bornfeld
wrote:

David Damerell wrote:

Quoting Mark & Steven Bornfeld :

wrote:

An interesting test for someone who thinks they _don't_ risk compensate
is this: Get into a car and drive in heavy traffic with no seatbelt
and no airbag.

Oh, and considering that the lack of seatbelts as a safety device will
stop me driving (or that I will not cycle if I've forgotten my helmet on
a ride)


Then you pretty clearly risk compensate. Lacking a seatbelt, you reduce
the chance of being in a motor accident to zero; given a seatbelt, you
increase it to some higher figure.

Only as a driver or passenger. But most of you anti-helmet crowd

There is no "anti-helmet crowd." It is all in your head.

[...]

--
Michael Press

In article ,
Steven Bornfeld
wrote:

Context is everything. Anti-helmet folks using risk compensation seem

There are no "anti-helmet folks." It is all in your mind.

--
Michael Press

Michael Press wrote:
In article ,
Steven Bornfeld
wrote:

Context is everything. Anti-helmet folks using risk compensation
seem

There are no "anti-helmet folks." It is all in your mind.

That's funny, I could have sworn it's been on my computer screen!

Bob the Cow wrote:

That, and they have jobs which feature virtually limitless and unsupervised
access to computers.

Virtually or morally?

--
IT Management. Tel: +64 3 479 5478
Web and database hosting, Co-location. Web: http://www.wic.co.nz
Software development. Email:

I submit that on or about Thu, 18 Aug 2005 09:38:19 -0400, the person
known to the court as The Wogster made a
statement in Your
Honour's bundle) to the following effect:

I doubt it would take much to feed the output of a hub generator into a
trickle type charger that charges a small battery, then have the battery
power the lamps, giving you the best of both worlds.

No need: modern dynamo lights are available with built-in standlights.
Guy
--
May contain traces of irony. Contents liable to settle after posting.
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk

85% of helmet statistics are made up, 69% of them at CHS, Puget Sound

I submit that on or about Thu, 18 Aug 2005 16:42:54 GMT, the person
known to the court as SMS made a statement
in Your Honour's bundle) to
the following effect:

Oh dear, you accidentally forgot to provide the evidence to back your
assertions, as requested in the bit you snipped.
So let's be clear, he you assert with great confidence that dynamo
lighting is unsafe.

You're looking more and more like Frank, trying to create strawmen. I
have never stated that dynamo lighting is unsafe.

So you say. And of course in ScharfWorld, denouncing them as
"woefully inadequate" is of course completely different...

http://groups.google.co.uk/group/rec...e=source&hl=en

But once again you "forgot" to post any evidence! So, where is your
externally verifiable evidence that these systems are "woefully
inadequate"? Per-mile collision data for dynamo versus battery users
would prove your point nicely.

You also say "The only good dynamo system remains the very expensive
Dymotec S12 with its 12 volt/5W headlight." This conflicts with the
opinions of a very large number of dynamo users: the SON 6V hub is
widely reckoned to be the best dynamo on the market.

You also instruct people not to rely on the generator lighting systems
on the commuter bikes you discuss on your pages. I guess that since
you read on a web page somewhere that you are "one of Earth's leading
experts on bicycle lighting" that must make your judgment superior to
that of the manufacturers of those bikes, to say nothing of the many
cyclists who have bought them and mysteriously failed to die as a
result of their "woefully inadequate" lighting. Mind you, a 0.2W LED
is enough to stop side-impacts, it's only 3W headlights which are
inadequate...

Again, if you want to discuss the relative merits of each type of
lighting system, please start a thread on that subject. This thread has
digressed enough as it is.

Once again you miss the point. This is not really about lighting,
it's about the way you make dogmatic assertions, falsely portray as
extremists those who would allow cyclists to make choices other than
the one you make, as if it is your dogmatic view which is balanced:
you do not permit of the possibility that you may be wrong, but when
challenged for hard evidence you are mysteriously silent.

I guess to a zealot like you every agnostic looks like an atheist :-)
Guy
--
May contain traces of irony. Contents liable to settle after posting.
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk

85% of helmet statistics are made up, 69% of them at CHS, Puget Sound

Just zis Guy, you know? wrote:
I submit that on or about Thu, 18 Aug 2005 09:38:19 -0400, the person
known to the court as The Wogster made a
statement in Your
Honour's bundle) to the following effect:


I doubt it would take much to feed the output of a hub generator into a
trickle type charger that charges a small battery, then have the battery
power the lamps, giving you the best of both worlds.


No need: modern dynamo lights are available with built-in standlights.
Guy

But think about it for a second, the argument against dynamo lights is
their low power (no matter how you look at it, 3Watts at 3V is pretty
dim). The problem with battery systems is that the batteries, go flat.

So, how about combining the two, a hub generator outputs power at all
times, so it would be charging the battery, ride all day, and your
battery is fully charged, then you can ride all night, without being
concerned with a battery that is going to go flat.

W

In article ,
Steven Bornfeld wrote:


Context is everything. Anti-helmet folks using risk compensation seem
to say that any perceived protective measure is useless for its intended
function--that safety measures in short do not promote safety--that they
promote risky behavior.

The only reason they seem to be saying that is because you're not reading
for comprehension. It usually goes something like this:

Helmet Zealot: Everybody should wear a helmet.
FK: Why? What benefit do they provide?
HZ: They prevent head injuries.
FK: What kind of head injuries?
HZ: All of 'em.
FK: Really? Cite?
HZ: You're claiming they don't? Cite?
FK: Here you go.
HZ2: But helmets prevent most serious injuries, so everybody should
wear one.
FK: No, they don't, and if you ride as if they will you're exposing
yourself to more risk.
HZ2: But cycling is dangerous, and people need the helmet to protect
them.

....and this is where risk compensation gets introduced. If the protective
measure is completely inadequate for its intended function, then it *is*
useless, risk compensation or not - and if it's assumed to be effective,
it's worse than useless, because of the risk compensation that that
assumption leads to.

Of course, Frank isn't always as clear as he could be on the subject,
but I think that's an unavoidable consequence of the amount of time he
spends arguing with idiots about it. When the best response you can
hope for, no matter how well you present something, is a blank stare
(or the usenet equivalent), there's no way to tell whether you need to
improve your presentation, and not much of an incentive to do so either.

Which is why it's nice to have people who don't spend enough time arguing
with idiots to run into that, but aren't sick enough of it that they
don't occasionally stick their heads in to address some particularly
egregious reasoning errors. I like to think I'm one of those.




Dave Vandervies wrote:

Once you've read *and* *understood* that last paragraph, and thought
through the consequences of what it says, go back and read this again:


wrote:

IOW, you perceive there is protection from the helmet. Therefore,
because of that perceived protection, you engage in an activity you
would otherwise avoid, at least sometimes. Briefly, you are giving
personal testimony about your risk compensation.


and tell us whether it makes sense, and whether your response to it
makes sense.

It makes sense, as does my response--because the use of the term "risk
compensation" in this thread has become as slippery as Frank wants it to be.

Slipperier than it should be, perhaps, but you're as much to blame as
him for that (if not more).

And it appears you still haven't read and understood what I wrote.
Are you going to, or are you just going to tell us why you should be
allowed to remain stupid because you can't be bothered to understand
what we're trying to tell you?


dave

--
Dave Vandervies
(In the interest of full disclosure, I do, however, have a friend
who is a rocket scientist.)
--Ben Pfaff in comp.lang.c