[*BCM*] The movement that divides us

[turtle]

So Adam, what do you believe CAUSES crashes?

Boston Critical Mass <list at bostoncriticalmass.org> wrote:
> 
> On Mon, Jun 05, 2006 at 03:53:27PM -0700, turtle wrote:
> > > Another valid conclusion is that half of all bicyclists don't follow the
> > > rules; and that not following the rules doesn't make you any less safe.
> > Well, except that I would argue that half of cyclists don't violate the
> > laws ALL of the time.  Most of the time, they are probably following
> > the laws, and most of the time they don't get into crashes.
> 
> Well, yes, that's right. We'd have to know how much of the time people
> are violating the laws to make any sense of Paul's statistic. I don't
> think any of us know the answer to that questions.
> 
> > > Your conclusion requires the unstated premise that bicyclists who don't
> > > follow the rules are a minority of bicyclists, and thus they are
> > > disproportionately represented in crashes. 
> > I don't see that conclusion from Paul's statement.  Why do the violators
> > need to be a minority?  They can be a majority and still be
> > disproportionally represented.
> 
> My unstated premise should have been that bicyclists are following the
> rules most of the time... I'm also not sure that's true, or how exactly
> you'd measure it.
> 
> For example, if the statistic were that 52% of heart attack victims are
> women, that would tell us nothing about sex and heart attacks. (As it
> turns out, most heart attack victims are men...)
> _______________________________________________
> Boston Critical Mass mailing list
> list at bostoncriticalmass.org
> http://bostoncriticalmass.org/list
> To unsubscribe email list-unsubscribe at bostoncriticalmass.org
> 

----------------------------------
"One day we must come to see that peace is not merely a distant goal we
seek, but that it is a means by which we arrive at that goal.  We must
pursue peaceful ends through peaceful means." - Martin Luther King Jr.