Inflatable helmet, really

Chalo wrote:
Tom Sherman wrote:

!Jones wrote:
[...]
Helmets work; that's simply a proven fact.[...]

Utter nonsense.

For sure. When I started riding seriously, helmets were quite rare.
Now they're everywhere, often being worn by the kinds of clueless
riders who have always been most likely to get themselves into
trouble. And yet more or less the same fraction of us get hurt just
as badly and killed just as dead as ever. The data confirm my
impressions in this regard.

What that tells me is that helmets can pass tests, and can even
prevent or reduce injury in an individual incident, but on the whole
something about them must effectively offset their entire measurable
benefit. To me, the simplest explanation is that they make riders
feel safer than they are, and make motorists think cycling is more
dangerous than it is. Both these things could result in higher risk
levels for cyclists.

I can recognize some validity to the claims of increased rotational
brain injury from helmets, but that alone seems like it wouldn't
entirely nullify the protective effect of helmets across the
population.

That's a little backwards. They're not saying, "just as many are dying."
They're saying, "just as FEW are dying." This has a slightly different
meaning, and leads to different conclusions. Rather than look for things
like rotational brain injuries as explanations, you're looking for reasons
why the death rate of helmet wearers remains proportionally low, despite the
relative increase in their population. 3% of all bicycle fatalities were
wearing helmets, in an 8 year study in NYC, despite a presumed increase in
helmet use during that time. You can thank the AHZ smoke blowers for
obscuring the issue and wasting your time.

Kevan Smith wrote:
On 9/9/10 12:57 AM, Chalo wrote:
I can recognize some validity to the claims of increased rotational
brain injury from helmets, but that alone seems like it wouldn't
entirely nullify the protective effect of helmets across the
population.

My opinion is that if a bicyclist wore a motorcycle helmet, that would
be the best protection and finally, _really_ have a scientifically
verifiable effect. But, screw doing that.

Bicycle helmets are tested to essentially the same impact loads and
survivability thresholds as motorcycle helmets. Specifically, a 12 pound
sledge falling 6 feet onto the helmeted heads of two cyclists, one wearing a
bicycle helmet and the other wearing a motorcycle helmet, will leave both
equally injured but both equally alive. Bicycle helmet ineffectiveness is a
myth, a big misguided smoke screen puffed up by anti-helmet zealots. See my
related note to Chalo for why I think they do this.

On 9/9/10 2:07 AM, MikeWhy wrote:
Bicycle helmets are tested to essentially the same impact loads and
survivability thresholds as motorcycle helmets.

BS. Quote the standards.

On Wed, 8 Sep 2010 13:38:49 -0700 (PDT), in rec.bicycles.tech Andre
Jute wrote:

Hey, Jonesy, I do hope you're not suggesting we ingest Krygowski raw.
He's such an unappetizing lumpenproletariat of gristly obstructionism
that even slow-braised he'd still be nasty. I'd rather turn veggie. --
AJ

PS Please start a separate thread to tell us how your Irish visit
turned out.

Well, we saw the Emerald Island... for three weeks, anyway. It was
nice to get out of the tropics in July! ... like stepping into winter
here; however, our winters are quite pleasant. We had a little
hippy-van rented that had a bed and a gas burner in the tail gate;
that was home on the road.

I must say, while Ireland is quite beautiful, you can jolly well keep
the cuisine! ... at least the "traditional Irish breakfast" part of
it! I cannot face a plate full of bangers in the morning! Oh, well,
that's why they make porridge, I suppose. And the raspberries were
in, so we had fresh berries every day.

Didn't do any cycling; the spousal module is handicapped, so we have
to ride tandem and none of the rental sites had any. I posted a few
pix if anyone is interested in typical tourist stuff... nothing
special... you know the drill: old castles and churches.

http://picasaweb.google.com/ra15932556/IrelandTrip#

Jones

"Kevan Smith" wrote in message
...
On 9/9/10 2:07 AM, MikeWhy wrote:
Bicycle helmets are tested to essentially the same impact loads and
survivability thresholds as motorcycle helmets.

BS. Quote the standards.

Snell Foundation and US DOT, for motorcycle helmets. US Consumer Product
Safety Commission for bicycle helmets. Snell specifies the impact energy as
105 joules, about the same as the other standards of 5 kg impact mass
dropped from 2 meters. Survivability thresholds are all about the same, at
300 G measured in the head mass.

On Sep 8, 10:37*pm, !Jones wrote:

There are lots of sports wherein participants wear helmets, Frank.
Everyone from skaters to equestrian sports to motorcycle racers all
tend to wear helmets. *Soldiers have historically worn helmets; riot
cops wear helmets; wild bull riders wear helmets (some of them,
anyway... never wanted to try it, myself); BASE jumpers wear helmets.
Heck, we had a publicity stunt where someone bungee jumped from a high
bridge and he wore a helmet; however, I haven't a clue what good it
would have done from that height!

Right - or, mostly right, anyway.

But when "Safety!!!" missionaries say that one should never ride a
bike without a helmet, they are putting ordinary bicycling into the
same category as soldiers, riot cops, bull riders, BASE jumpers and
bungee jumpers. All those are activities that most people will shun.
The implication that cycling is similarly dangerous cannot possibly be
good for cycling, and it adds evidence to the claims that "He knew the
risks!" when some motorist negligently harms a cyclist.

A few years ago, I had an "OH ****!" moment with a major component
failure. *I had about half a second between the metallic "Pop!" and
impact. *No, this isn't a "The helmet saved my life" story because my
head didn't hit... but, I guarantee that the thoughts flashing through
my mind in that half second were not: "I wish I wasn't wearing this
darned helmet!"

.... and that's what it's come to. Any fall off a bike immediately
generates helmet stories - either "My helmet touched the ground, and
that proves I'd have died without it!" Or "He died. He should have
been wearing a helmet." Or "He died, even though he was wearing a
helmet." Or "He died. We'd better not mention that he was wearing a
helmet."

There was a time when almost all falls off bikes were just falls off
bikes. You got up. You rode on. Exceptions were as rare then as
they are now. But now every one is described as a near-death
experience.

Helmets work; that's simply a proven fact.

Oh?
http://www.cyclehelmets.org/1041.html

For those who find clicking a link to be burdensome, that page
contains data on US head injuries for cyclists:
67,000 head injuries in 1991, when 18% of cyclists wore helmets.
74,000 head injuries in 2000, when 50% of cyclists wore helmets.
And in that time, cycling had fallen by 21%.

Can you explain how this proves that helmets work?

- Frank Krygowski

On Sep 9, 2:51*am, "MikeWhy" wrote:
Rather than look for things
like rotational brain injuries as explanations, you're looking for reasons
why the death rate of helmet wearers remains proportionally low, despite the
relative increase in their population. 3% of all bicycle fatalities were
wearing helmets, in an 8 year study in NYC, despite a presumed increase in
helmet use during that time. You can thank the AHZ smoke blowers for
obscuring the issue and wasting your time.

So what percentage of the much-more-common pedestrian fatality victims
had been wearing helmets? Wasn't it 0%? Despite their per-mile risk
being at least triple that of cyclists?

How's that campaign for pedestrian helmets coming along? After all,
it's usually considered silly to attack a relatively small problem,
while ignoring a much larger one.

- Frank Krygowski

!Jones wrote:
Andre Jute wrote:

PS Please start a separate thread to tell us how your Irish visit
turned *out.

Well, we saw the Emerald Island... for three weeks, anyway. *It was
nice to get out of the tropics in July! ... like stepping into winter
here; however, our winters are quite pleasant. *We had a little
hippy-van rented that had a bed and a gas burner in the tail gate;
that was home on the road.

I must say, while Ireland is quite beautiful, you can jolly well keep
the cuisine! ... at least the "traditional Irish breakfast" part of
it!

A "full Irish breakfast" is a delete-option multiple choice. You tell
the landlady, "Leave off the bangers and the black and white puddings,
poach the eggs and crisp the bacon," and then you get a breakfast that
is palatable, looks good on the plate with the mushroom and grilled
tomato, and leaves space for lunch. The "pudding", which I have only
tasted in guest houses, actually tastes good if cooked right. We eat
cereal or toast for breakfast at home, or rarely barley oats porridge
and kippers, so I don't know how to prepare black pudding right, but
suspect it is fried in lethal amounts of fat; not for people our age,
if you won't think me impertinent.

*I cannot face a plate full of bangers in the morning! *Oh, well,
that's why they make porridge, I suppose. *And the raspberries were
in, so we had fresh berries every day.

There's a couple of weeks every year where you can make a meal in
blackberries off the hedgerows.

Didn't do any cycling; the spousal module is handicapped, so we have
to ride tandem and none of the rental sites had any. *

In truth, though sometimes on the road I speak to experienced foreign
tourers who do it, I wouldn't tour on a bike in Ireland, or even take
local rides without expert local advice, though that is readily
available at the guesthouses and hotels. At one hotel where we stayed
in Bantry, just down the road here, the most popular leaflet on the
rack in reception was a map of local safe bicycle rides and the
address of a rental place.

I posted a few
pix if anyone is interested in typical tourist stuff... nothing
special... you know the drill: old castles and churches.

http://picasaweb.google.com/ra15932556/IrelandTrip#

Jones

I like your pics -- you've found some places down the road from me
that I didn't even know existed -- but I'm surprised you didn't see
more sunshine. August, which is about as far back as I remember, was
so hot, I had to take my rides before dawn for a couple of weeks. No
doubt you noticed how small the Emerald Isle is, so that wherever you
go you're never far from water.

I hope you stopped off to kiss the Blarney Stone.
http://members.multimania.co.uk/fiul...rney_stone.jpg

Andre Jute
in the green and beloved (with gold coachlines!)

On Sep 9, 12:57*am, Chalo wrote:

For sure. *When I started riding seriously, helmets were quite rare.
Now they're everywhere, often being worn by the kinds of clueless
riders who have always been most likely to get themselves into
trouble. *And yet more or less the same fraction of us get hurt just
as badly and killed just as dead as ever. *The data confirm my
impressions in this regard.

What that tells me is that helmets can pass tests, and can even
prevent or reduce injury in an individual incident, but on the whole
something about them must effectively offset their entire measurable
benefit. *To me, the simplest explanation is that they make riders
feel safer than they are, and make motorists think cycling is more
dangerous than it is. *Both these things could result in higher risk
levels for cyclists.

I can recognize some validity to the claims of increased rotational
brain injury from helmets, but that alone seems like it wouldn't
entirely nullify the protective effect of helmets across the
population.

Chalo

If one examines only the HIV and teen pregnancy rates, then one must
conclude that condoms are ineffective. "It said, 'Place on organ to
prevent infection,' but we don't have an organ, so I put it on the
piano, instead." We passed out condoms to the kids like candy in the
late '80s and '90s; they had no effect whatsoever.

So... I plan to head out to some sleazy bar tonight, pick up some ****-
faced drunk person, and have sex with him or her. Without passing
judgment on my hypothetical evening plans, would you suggest that
including a condom might be a good idea? But, wait a minute! I
thought we had established that they were ineffective. I suggest that
it's simply impossible for protein to pass through latex... it cannot
happen!

Similarly, opponents of the death penalty argue that such Draconian
behavior does not prevent violent criminal behavior; they point out
that there is no detectible difference in the rate of violent crime
before and after passage of capital punishment statutes. Please tell
me how a person recidivates after receiving the death penalty.

One sees exactly the same argument raised by auto drivers about
seatbelts, gun owners about locking devices on guns, and kayakers
about flotation devices. I wear my seatbelt in a car, keep my gun
locked, and wear a PFD when kayaking... and I'm not really going to
the bar for sex, but, if I did, I'd take a package of condoms with
me. Helmets, regardless what the motorcyclists and bicyclists think
of them, work for the same reason (but not in the same way) condoms
work; they work because they cannot *not* work.

When a study seems to violate common sense, I tend to look carefully
at the operational definitions (i.e. "reported use") and the data
collection methodology; therein, I usually find the issue. SPSS
usually doesn't make mistakes; however, there *is* the famous
statistical proof that the world is flat (p=0.05).

Jones

On 09/09/2010 20:19, !Jones wrote:
On Sep 9, 12:57 am, wrote:

For sure. When I started riding seriously, helmets were quite rare.
Now they're everywhere, often being worn by the kinds of clueless
riders who have always been most likely to get themselves into
trouble. And yet more or less the same fraction of us get hurt just
as badly and killed just as dead as ever. The data confirm my
impressions in this regard.

What that tells me is that helmets can pass tests, and can even
prevent or reduce injury in an individual incident, but on the whole
something about them must effectively offset their entire measurable
benefit. To me, the simplest explanation is that they make riders
feel safer than they are, and make motorists think cycling is more
dangerous than it is. Both these things could result in higher risk
levels for cyclists.

I can recognize some validity to the claims of increased rotational
brain injury from helmets, but that alone seems like it wouldn't
entirely nullify the protective effect of helmets across the
population.

Chalo

If one examines only the HIV and teen pregnancy rates, then one must
conclude that condoms are ineffective. "It said, 'Place on organ to
prevent infection,' but we don't have an organ, so I put it on the
piano, instead." We passed out condoms to the kids like candy in the
late '80s and '90s; they had no effect whatsoever.

No, one would conclude that the passing out of condoms like candy didn't
prevent all teenage pregnancy and HIV. It's not that they don't work,
it's that they're not being used. The analogy to helmet wearing doesn't
hold, because the method of failure differs.

So... I plan to head out to some sleazy bar tonight, pick up some ****-
faced drunk person, and have sex with him or her. Without passing
judgment on my hypothetical evening plans, would you suggest that
including a condom might be a good idea? But, wait a minute! I
thought we had established that they were ineffective. I suggest that
it's simply impossible for protein to pass through latex... it cannot
happen!

Since your original premise is wrong, this paragraph is simple nonsense.

Similarly, opponents of the death penalty argue that such Draconian
behavior does not prevent violent criminal behavior; they point out
that there is no detectible difference in the rate of violent crime
before and after passage of capital punishment statutes. Please tell
me how a person recidivates after receiving the death penalty.

You're comparing things which aren't related again. Prison prevents
reoffending in the same way as death, thus one can see that the death
penalty isn't having the deterrent effect its proponents hope for. The
deterrent effect is far more important than the punishment of
individuals for the numbers you're looking at.

One sees exactly the same argument raised by auto drivers about
seatbelts, gun owners about locking devices on guns, and kayakers
about flotation devices. I wear my seatbelt in a car, keep my gun
locked, and wear a PFD when kayaking... and I'm not really going to
the bar for sex, but, if I did, I'd take a package of condoms with
me. Helmets, regardless what the motorcyclists and bicyclists think
of them, work for the same reason (but not in the same way) condoms
work; they work because they cannot *not* work.

That's not actually true. You're starting with your conclusion and
working back - that's bad science.

When a study seems to violate common sense, I tend to look carefully
at the operational definitions (i.e. "reported use") and the data
collection methodology; therein, I usually find the issue. SPSS
usually doesn't make mistakes; however, there *is* the famous
statistical proof that the world is flat (p=0.05).

The issue ain't what you think it is.