Why do people claim cellphone use increased the accident rate in the USA?
In a recent thread c.m.a/m.p.m.i on various carplay, androidauto, android automotive and screen mirroring (sonicboom) solutions, an offshoot tangent occurred when we theorized why factories don't just make automotive dash systems a phone mirror so that a familiar interface is always on the dash.
Like this:
<https://i.postimg.cc/k5gv0yw8/vysor34.jpg> Apple iOS & Android mirroring
Some brought up technical issues, but really, there are none, while others brought up safety issues, and for that, I'm sure there are legal issues.
But, are those legal issues valid?
Q: Why do people claim cellphone use increased the USA accident rate?
A: ?
Note we're restricting this to the USA only because accurate data has been compiled by the USA government on accident rates over the past 100 years.
Note 1: Accident propaganda from the following will be deeply analyzed:
a. Law firms
b. Insurance companies
c. Law enforcement claims & politician claims
Note 2: Accident *rate* is what matters, not any given number of accidents,
over the period where cellphone ownership went from 0% to ~100%
Note 3: Fatalities and injuries, while deeply emotional, do not count
(because they are a second-order effect *after* the accident).
Note 4: Nobody claims "distracted driving" doesn't cause a large number
of accidents but distractions existed prior to cell phones and
distractions exist after cell phone became predominate, and yet,
in all the accurate accident-rate statistics, the rate simply
slowly trended downward year after year, before, during & after.
Note 5: Paradoxically, cellphone hands-free laws were enacted in most
states but there is absolutely no correlation with accident rates
in those states, before, during or after the laws went into force.
There was no blip whatsoever, in USA accident rate (for which accurate statistics have been kept for over a century) which tells the true story.
Given that, the question becomes...
Q: Why do people claim cellphone use increased the USA accident rate?
A: ?
Why do people claim cellphone use increased the accident rate in the USA?
In a recent thread c.m.a/m.p.m.i on various carplay, androidauto, android automotive and screen mirroring (sonicboom) solutions, an offshoot tangent occurred when we theorized why factories don't just make automotive dash systems a phone mirror so that a familiar interface is always on the dash.
Like this:
<https://i.postimg.cc/k5gv0yw8/vysor34.jpg> Apple iOS & Android mirroring
Some brought up technical issues, but really, there are none, while others brought up safety issues, and for that, I'm sure there are legal issues.
But, are those legal issues valid?
Q: Why do people claim cellphone use increased the USA accident rate?
A: ?
Note we're restricting this to the USA only because accurate data has been compiled by the USA government on accident rates over the past 100 years.
Note 1: Accident propaganda from the following will be deeply analyzed:
a. Law firms
b. Insurance companies
c. Law enforcement claims & politician claims
Note 2: Accident *rate* is what matters, not any given number of accidents,
over the period where cellphone ownership went from 0% to ~100%
Note 3: Fatalities and injuries, while deeply emotional, do not count
(because they are a second-order effect *after* the accident).
Note 4: Nobody claims "distracted driving" doesn't cause a large number
of accidents but distractions existed prior to cell phones and
distractions exist after cell phone became predominate, and yet,
in all the accurate accident-rate statistics, the rate simply
slowly trended downward year after year, before, during & after.
Note 5: Paradoxically, cellphone hands-free laws were enacted in most
states but there is absolutely no correlation with accident rates
in those states, before, during or after the laws went into force.
There was no blip whatsoever, in USA accident rate (for which accurate statistics have been kept for over a century) which tells the true story.
Given that, the question becomes...
Q: Why do people claim cellphone use increased the USA accident rate?
A: ?
Why do people claim cellphone use increased the accident rate in the USA?
In a recent thread c.m.a/m.p.m.i on various carplay, androidauto, android automotive and screen mirroring (sonicboom) solutions, an offshoot tangent occurred when we theorized why factories don't just make automotive dash systems a phone mirror so that a familiar interface is always on the dash.
Like this:
<https://i.postimg.cc/k5gv0yw8/vysor34.jpg> Apple iOS & Android mirroring
Some brought up technical issues, but really, there are none, while others brought up safety issues, and for that, I'm sure there are legal issues.
But, are those legal issues valid?
Q: Why do people claim cellphone use increased the USA accident rate?
A: ?
Note we're restricting this to the USA only because accurate data has been compiled by the USA government on accident rates over the past 100 years.
Note 1: Accident propaganda from the following will be deeply analyzed:
a. Law firms
b. Insurance companies
c. Law enforcement claims & politician claims
Note 2: Accident *rate* is what matters, not any given number of accidents,
over the period where cellphone ownership went from 0% to ~100%
Note 3: Fatalities and injuries, while deeply emotional, do not count
(because they are a second-order effect *after* the accident).
Note 4: Nobody claims "distracted driving" doesn't cause a large number
of accidents but distractions existed prior to cell phones and
distractions exist after cell phone became predominate, and yet,
in all the accurate accident-rate statistics, the rate simply
slowly trended downward year after year, before, during & after.
Note 5: Paradoxically, cellphone hands-free laws were enacted in most
states but there is absolutely no correlation with accident rates
in those states, before, during or after the laws went into force.
There was no blip whatsoever, in USA accident rate (for which accurate statistics have been kept for over a century) which tells the true story.
Given that, the question becomes...
Q: Why do people claim cellphone use increased the USA accident rate?
A: ?
Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> wrote:
Why do people claim cellphone use increased the accident rate in the USA?
In a recent thread c.m.a/m.p.m.i on various carplay, androidauto, android
automotive and screen mirroring (sonicboom) solutions, an offshoot tangent >> occurred when we theorized why factories don't just make automotive dash
systems a phone mirror so that a familiar interface is always on the dash. >>
Like this:
<https://i.postimg.cc/k5gv0yw8/vysor34.jpg> Apple iOS & Android mirroring >>
Some brought up technical issues, but really, there are none, while others >> brought up safety issues, and for that, I'm sure there are legal issues.
But, are those legal issues valid?
Q: Why do people claim cellphone use increased the USA accident rate?
A: ?
Note we're restricting this to the USA only because accurate data has been >> compiled by the USA government on accident rates over the past 100 years.
Note 1: Accident propaganda from the following will be deeply analyzed:
a. Law firms
b. Insurance companies
c. Law enforcement claims & politician claims
Note 2: Accident *rate* is what matters, not any given number of accidents, >> over the period where cellphone ownership went from 0% to ~100%
Note 3: Fatalities and injuries, while deeply emotional, do not count
(because they are a second-order effect *after* the accident).
Note 4: Nobody claims "distracted driving" doesn't cause a large number
of accidents but distractions existed prior to cell phones and
distractions exist after cell phone became predominate, and yet,
in all the accurate accident-rate statistics, the rate simply
slowly trended downward year after year, before, during & after.
Note 5: Paradoxically, cellphone hands-free laws were enacted in most
states but there is absolutely no correlation with accident rates
in those states, before, during or after the laws went into force.
There was no blip whatsoever, in USA accident rate (for which accurate
statistics have been kept for over a century) which tells the true story.
Given that, the question becomes...
Q: Why do people claim cellphone use increased the USA accident rate?
A: ?
YourCOve brought this topic up before.
As someone who works in the science field, I can assure you statistics donrCOt always tell the truth. The criteria are often cherry picked, the data can easily be skewed if not collected in a controlled environment, and the biases of the researchers often provide conclusions not necessarily consistent with the raw data.
I think itrCOs pretty obvious if you look at drivers around you that distracted driving is out of control and in turn it leads to erratic
driving. I trust personal anecdotes more than statistics in this case.
You ve brought this topic up before.
As someone who works in the science field, I can assure you statistics
don t always tell the truth. The criteria are often cherry picked, the data can easily be skewed if not collected in a controlled environment, and the biases of the researchers often provide conclusions not necessarily consistent with the raw data.
I think it s pretty obvious if you look at drivers around you that
distracted driving is out of control and in turn it leads to erratic
driving. I trust personal anecdotes more than statistics in this case.
Why do people claim cellphone use increased the accident rate in the USA?
Why do people claim cellphone use increased the accident rate in the USA?
Before anyone responds you need to address three key flaws in your OP.
1. You present no data nor evidence. As a "trained scientist" - lol! - you should do better than that. A vague link is not enough. Be explicit
regarding what data there is, the source and what you think it supports and how.
2. Remember absence of proof is not proof of absence. A complex environment can mask one affect with another, competing, one.
3. An argument to say that we're always distracted and we shouldn't bother
to target a solvable distraction isn't valid. All avoidable accidents and deaths on the road should be targeted and reduced.
If you do not address all three points. There's no reason to engage with
this topic with you.
Why do people claim cellphone use increased the accident rate in the USA?
In a recent thread c.m.a/m.p.m.i on various carplay, androidauto, android automotive and screen mirroring (sonicboom) solutions, an offshoot tangent occurred when we theorized why factories don't just make automotive dash systems a phone mirror so that a familiar interface is always on the dash.
On Sep 17, 2026 at 8:43:37rC>PM EDT, "badgolferman" <REMOVETHISbadgolferman@gmail.com> wrote:[...]
YourCOve brought this topic up before.
As someone who works in the science field, I can assure you statistics
donrCOt always tell the truth. The criteria are often cherry picked, the data
can easily be skewed if not collected in a controlled environment, and the >> biases of the researchers often provide conclusions not necessarily
consistent with the raw data.
I think itrCOs pretty obvious if you look at drivers around you that
distracted driving is out of control and in turn it leads to erratic
driving. I trust personal anecdotes more than statistics in this case.
Cell phones are absolutely causing more accidents every day. But that does not
necessarily mean "more total accidents than before".
OTOH, the possibility that Arlen is wrong/full of shit/lying cannot be ignored. Perhaps the accident rate HAS risen. After all, he is wrong/full of shit/lying about EVERY FUCKING TOPIC he raises here.
badgolferman wrote:
YouN++ve brought this topic up before.
As someone who works in the science field, I can assure you statistics
donN++t always tell the truth. The criteria are often cherry picked, the data
can easily be skewed if not collected in a controlled environment, and the >> biases of the researchers often provide conclusions not necessarily
consistent with the raw data.
I think itN++s pretty obvious if you look at drivers around you that
distracted driving is out of control and in turn it leads to erratic
driving. I trust personal anecdotes more than statistics in this case.
Hi badgolferman,
You are well aware that I'm trained as a scientist and as an engineer.
The first thing we learn in science is to be driven empirically by data.
Unfortunately, most people are not data driven.
They're driven by religion or emotion.
They make all their "scientific" decisions based on scary anecdotes.
The news writes about the one sensationalist accident.
Not the 100 boring accidents that occurred that very same day.
But most people believe only that sensationalistic accidents occur.
Not boring accidents.
Yet, "The plural of anecdote is not data" is an expression in science.
You are aware that for the past 60 years of driving, when I pull up to
the Costco pump, I ask the guy across from me what the difference is
between the premium and the regular. I got the right answer twice.
If that's once a month, for 60 years, I have 718 wrong answers out of
720 queries, or about 99.72% of the people I asked simply were wrong.
Why?
They're convinced their Honda Civic runs "better" and "with more power"
on premium, or that using premium "once a month" cleans out the engine.
Why do they think something that absurd?
Because it "sounds plausible" to them.
Same with car accidents, which are NOT cherry picked when we look at
the statistics since the 1920s compiled by the US for every state.
I get it that everyone reads the news, where "dog bites car" gets
more hits than "car hits dog", but anecdotal evidence is not science.
Anecdotal evidence is emotional.
Just like "religious evidence" is emotional.
But it's not science.
The Catholic Church has more than 1,000 formally canonized saints, and
the canonization process has officially recognized hundreds of alleged miracles associated with them. Hundreds of individual miracle claims
do not become scientific evidence merely because there are hundreds
of them.
I get it people think emotionally.
Not scientifically.
To them, if the current propaganda is cell phones cause accidents,
every accident they can find that has a cell phone is validation.
The same is true of thousands of people saying they saw a distracted
driver with a cell phone in their hand (where, I guess the corollary,
I suppose, is that these same people must never have seen a distracted
driver before cell phones existed, i.e., for about a hundred years.
Weak minds will parrot propaganda every time.
I don't even need to prove that, I hope.
But propaganda is not science.
This article discusses why people can give disproportionate weight
to personal experiences and anecdotes even when larger, systematically collected datasets point in another direction.
*How Anecdotal Evidence Can Undermine Scientific Results*
<https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-anecdotal-evidence-can-undermine-scientific-results/>
"thinking anecdotally comes naturally, whereas thinking scientifically does not"
The question being asked here is about science. Facts. Good data.
Real data. And, to my knowledge, only the USA has compiled that data.
Accident rate = number of motor-vehicle accidents N++ vehicle miles driven Usually expressed as accidents per 1 million vehicle-miles traveled
or equivalently per 100 million VMT (vehicle miles traveled).
Given that's the ONLY metric that matters in any first-order discussion, luckily the federal government explicitly recognizes number of accidents
per 100 million VMT as a highway safety performance measure.
Unfortunately, our first data-collection issue is Census has historical motor-vehicle accident counts, while FHWA has the historical VMT series.
Since this is getting long, let's take that up separately, since we
are not asking for anecdotal data, nor cherry-picked data, but for
the accidents divided by miles driven, either of or both of which
are accurate federal statistics which have been kept since the 1920s.
Why do people claim cellphone use increased the accident rate in the USA?
In a recent thread c.m.a/m.p.m.i on various carplay, androidauto, android
automotive and screen mirroring (sonicboom) solutions, an offshoot tangent >> occurred when we theorized why factories don't just make automotive dash
systems a phone mirror so that a familiar interface is always on the dash. >>
Familiar to what interface? Apple? Stock Android? Samsung? Nothing Phone?
Woozy Song wrote:
Why do people claim cellphone use increased the accident rate in the USA? >>>
In a recent thread c.m.a/m.p.m.i on various carplay, androidauto, android >>> automotive and screen mirroring (sonicboom) solutions, an offshoot tangent >>> occurred when we theorized why factories don't just make automotive dash >>> systems a phone mirror so that a familiar interface is always on the dash. >>>
Familiar to what interface? Apple? Stock Android? Samsung? Nothing Phone?
Hi Woozy Song,
Thanks for asking about that thread on beat sonic device screen mirroring.
While that thread talked about all the cellphone-to-dashboard automotive methods, mirroring of the exact phone on the dash should be familiar to the phone owner, since it's his/her phone that is being mirrored exactly.
<https://www.beatsonicusa.com/collections/smartphone-mirroring-system>
<https://www.podofo.com/>
<https://www.atotodirect.com/>
<https://carlinkitcarplay.com/>
<https://naviks.com/?>
<https://gromaudio.com/>
etc.
Like this mirroring I do every day, all day, to operate my iOS and Android devices using the PC keyboard, mouse, monitor, speakers & clipboard.
<https://i.postimg.cc/k5gv0yw8/vysor34.jpg> Apple iOS & Android mirroring
It's familiar because it's literally the driver's exact phone on the dash.
Just as it's my exact phone about two feet tall on my monitor in this shot. <https://i.postimg.cc/tgvzsMRm/scrcpy25.jpg> Connect over Wi-Fi sans USB
But this thread is designed to make people think about why there is no
change in the accident rate in USA records which have been dutifully collected every year for every state for just a bit over a century.
For anyone to claim those well-respected records are "cherry picked",
without providing any corollary records, is just a religious gripe.
What they're really saying is they hate the facts because those facts don't line up with their religious beliefs about cellphone use while driving.
The goal in this thread will be clear, where it is obvious I'm the only one who is actually providing facts (with cites, links, assessments & data).
The rest are clinging to their religious beliefs, which they feel, because they're religious, they can't be proven wrong when they claim all facts
about cellphone use while driving must only come from biased propaganda.
I prefer the government data that has been collected for over a century.
The number of accidents divided by the number of miles = accident rate
If cellphone use had *any* effect whatsoever, our hypothesis would be that there should be a spike or jump in the accident rate during those years.
1. Pre-cellular baseline 1937-1982 No commercial US cellular service
2. Cellular introduced 1983 First commercial cellular service began
3. Early adoption 1984-1989 Cell phones existed but were still rare
4. Rapid adoption 1990-1999 Cellular subscriptions exploded
5. Mass adoption 2000-2004 >100 million U.S. wireless connections
6. Essentially ubiquitous 2005-2010 ~208M -> 296M wireless connections
7. Smartphone era 2011-present Smartphones become dominant
The data is convincing. But religious zealots won't be swayed by facts. Propaganda is a well-known ferociously fierce competition to science.
Without regard to the larger questions you address, people
driving while engaging in audio conversation, telephone or
radio, seem not to be the actual problem.
Blasting that guy you have never met in a texting battle,
playing video games, watching porn or movies and the like
are of an entirely different risk level for distraction.
Legislatures, who regularly specify large hammers for
disposing of an ant, conflate the two.
On 9/17/2026 9:52 PM, Maria Sophia wrote:[...]
badgolferman wrote:
Since this is getting long, let's take that up separately, since we
are not asking for anecdotal data, nor cherry-picked data, but for
the accidents divided by miles driven, either of or both of which
are accurate federal statistics which have been kept since the 1920s.
Without regard to the larger questions you address, people driving
while engaging in audio conversation, telephone or radio, seem not to
be the actual problem.
Blasting that guy you have never met in a texting battle, playing
video games, watching porn or movies and the like are of an entirely different risk level for distraction.
Legislatures, who regularly specify large hammers for disposing of an
ant, conflate the two.
Please explain the improvement in driver awareness, reaction
time and overall safety on the public roads when changing
from playing a video game on a telephone to playing a video
game on the dash console.
Please explain the improvement in driver awareness, reaction
time and overall safety on the public roads when changing
from playing a video game on a telephone to playing a video
game on the dash console.
People are experts at multitasking. They have no problem having one hand
on the wheel, one hand holding their sandwich, and one hand on their beer. It's all perfectly safe. So how could anyone possibly be at risk just because
they are paying attention to the person on Facebook whose political beliefs are clearly wrong instead of to the road? The road can take care of itself. And turn signals? Those other people have no business knowing where you're going. They should keep to themselves.
Why do people claim cellphone use increased the accident rate in the USA?
On 17/09/2026 22:28, Maria Sophia wrote:
Why do people claim cellphone use increased the accident rate in the USA?
Well if it's like it is here, because it's intuitively obvious that it
must increase the accident rate. We still regularly see people driving
while holding and using their phones and obviously there would be less accidents if they did not do so.
Scott Dorsey wrote:
Please explain the improvement in driver awareness, reaction
time and overall safety on the public roads when changing
from playing a video game on a telephone to playing a video
game on the dash console.
People are experts at multitasking. They have no problem having one hand
on the wheel, one hand holding their sandwich, and one hand on their beer. >> It's all perfectly safe. So how could anyone possibly be at risk just because
they are paying attention to the person on Facebook whose political beliefs >> are clearly wrong instead of to the road? The road can take care of itself. >> And turn signals? Those other people have no business knowing where you're >> going. They should keep to themselves.
Hi Scott,
I wonder if you even realize how absurd your argument is, to a scientist? You're attempting to ridicule your absurd distortion of the argument.
That's called beating a strawman.
And claiming victory.
Stop it.
Be scientific please.
a. You claim cellphones are a distraction (and they are)
b. Out of, oh, there are about a hundred the government listed
c. And then you claim, unilaterally, it's NUMBER ONE in that hundred????
d. When, clearly, it's not???? WTF?
e. Worse, you seem to claim distractions are the ONLY cause of accidents!
WTF? Not speed? Not drunken driving? WTF?
Who makes such absurd arguments by ridiculing the facts?
No scientist would say what you just said, Scott. None.
Cellphones are not the major cause of accidents.
They're not even the major distraction in accidents, in fact.
It's not even in the top ten for God's sake.
People have been handling distractions while driving since driving started. What's different now?
What is the claim that people are making here given nobody is claiming
there aren't a zillion distractions while driving that everyone feels.
We covered, years ago, all the major distractions (there were about 100).
Cellphones barely made the top ten, and then it depended, as others have said, on what the driver was doing with the cell phone at any given
time.
If cellphone use had *any* effect whatsoever, our hypothesis would be that there should be a spike or jump in the accident rate during those years.
1. Pre-cellular baseline 1937-1982 No commercial US cellular service
2. Cellular introduced 1983 First commercial cellular service began
3. Early adoption 1984-1989 Cell phones existed but were still rare
4. Rapid adoption 1990-1999 Cellular subscriptions exploded
5. Mass adoption 2000-2004 >100 million U.S. wireless connections
6. Essentially ubiquitous 2005-2010 ~208M -> 296M wireless connections
7. Smartphone era 2011-present Smartphones become dominant
Nobody ever said cell phones aren't one of the hundreds of distractions.--
What is your claim about the accident rate changes during that period?
The accident rate is the number of accidents divided by miles driven.
a. FHWA gives annual USA vehicle-mile-traveled from 1900 through 2024.
b. That's our denominator.
c. NHTSA's General Estimates System (GES) began in 1988 and was
specifically designed to estimate the number of USA police-reported
motor-vehicle crashes that had any damage or injury.
d. That's our numerator.
This is good data.
It's not cherry picked.
What do YOU think it tells us about crashes during the cellphone period?
Well if it's like it is here, because it's intuitively obvious that it
must increase the accident rate. We still regularly see people driving
while holding and using their phones and obviously there would be less
accidents if they did not do so.
In New Zealand it has been illegal to use your cellphone while driving (unless using a hands-free option) ... but the fine / penalty is so
pathetic and chances of getting caught that many people still do it.
It isn't helped by almost all car manufacturers now having silly
touchscreen systems in their cars, which means there's little
difference between using that and a cellphone, other than the cellphone being a smaller screen size. :-(
On 9/17/2026 4:28 PM, Maria Sophia wrote:
Why do people claim cellphone use increased the accident rate in the USA?
In a recent thread c.m.a/m.p.m.i on various carplay, androidauto, android
automotive and screen mirroring (sonicboom) solutions, an offshoot tangent >> occurred when we theorized why factories don't just make automotive dash
systems a phone mirror so that a familiar interface is always on the dash. >>
Like this:
<https://i.postimg.cc/k5gv0yw8/vysor34.jpg> Apple iOS & Android mirroring >>
Some brought up technical issues, but really, there are none, while others >> brought up safety issues, and for that, I'm sure there are legal issues.
But, are those legal issues valid?
Q: Why do people claim cellphone use increased the USA accident rate?
A: ?
Note we're restricting this to the USA only because accurate data has been >> compiled by the USA government on accident rates over the past 100 years.
Note 1: Accident propaganda from the following will be deeply analyzed:
a. Law firms
b. Insurance companies
c. Law enforcement claims & politician claims
Note 2: Accident *rate* is what matters, not any given number of accidents, >> over the period where cellphone ownership went from 0% to ~100%
Note 3: Fatalities and injuries, while deeply emotional, do not count
(because they are a second-order effect *after* the accident).
Note 4: Nobody claims "distracted driving" doesn't cause a large number
of accidents but distractions existed prior to cell phones and
distractions exist after cell phone became predominate, and yet,
in all the accurate accident-rate statistics, the rate simply
slowly trended downward year after year, before, during & after.
Note 5: Paradoxically, cellphone hands-free laws were enacted in most
states but there is absolutely no correlation with accident rates
in those states, before, during or after the laws went into force. >>
There was no blip whatsoever, in USA accident rate (for which accurate
statistics have been kept for over a century) which tells the true story.
Given that, the question becomes...
Q: Why do people claim cellphone use increased the USA accident rate?
A: ?
There are many post-crash reports of semi and auto drivers
watching movies or porn or texting furiously as they
massacre innocents.
I agree that if people merely used the audio (as police and
truckers do with radios) there would not be a problem.
https://www.lifeasatrucker.com/trucker-caught-watching-porn-before-crash-that-killed-father-a-tragic-lesson-on-distraction.html
https://discover.swns.com/2025/09/shocking-dashcam-captures-woman-texting-at-wheel-before-crash/
As someone who works in the science field, I can assure you statistics
donot always tell the truth. The criteria are often cherry picked, the data >> can easily be skewed if not collected in a controlled environment, and the >> biases of the researchers often provide conclusions not necessarily
consistent with the raw data.
I think itos pretty obvious if you look at drivers around you that
distracted driving is out of control and in turn it leads to erratic
driving. I trust personal anecdotes more than statistics in this case.
Cell phones are absolutely causing more accidents every day. But that does not
necessarily mean "more total accidents than before".
In the past, "distracted driving" was people changing radio stations and/or tapes in the tape deck, etc. Those days are long gone. Not to mention women putting on makeup and looking at themselves in mirrors.
Today, "distracted driving" is texting/talking on the phone/changing your Spotify list/changing your iTunes list/watching TV/etc. Not to mention women are now looking at themselves in their phone front camera while putting on makeup.
So phones/iPads/whatever are definitely causing many/most/take your pick accidents today. But the overall accident totals could be the same, or statiscally not different.
So the statement "phones are causing more accidents every day" is perfectly valid. Extrapolating that into "Phones have increased the accident rate" is not valid or logical. Could be the same number of "distracted driving" accidents. Just a different cause for the distraction.
Why do people claim cellphone use increased the accident rate in the USA?
In a recent thread c.m.a/m.p.m.i on various carplay, androidauto, android automotive and screen mirroring (sonicboom) solutions, an offshoot tangent occurred when we theorized why factories don't just make automotive dash systems a phone mirror so that a familiar interface is always on the dash.
Assuming no other factor was involved to cancel the arguments that people
are claiming, if their hypothesis is cell phones cause accidents, then
the accident rate should have skyrocketed at some point during the introduction of cellphones, right?
Assuming no other factor was involved to cancel the arguments that people
are claiming, if their hypothesis is cell phones cause accidents, then
the accident rate should have skyrocketed at some point during the
introduction of cellphones, right?
But you can't just assume no other factor.
Why would you think you could??
How can you possibly say that as mobile phones gradually became more
popular other factors weren't, at the same time, reducing the accident rate?
Why do people claim cellphone use increased the accident rate in the USA?
I don't know what the stats are but can state that some time ago I
was rear-ended at a stop light by a young idiot who was texting.
I have also seen young imbeciles run through red lights and
stop signs while looking down at their phones. It's pretty
common.
Given that most if not all states have seen fit to pass laws against hand-held phone use while driving it is likely that cell phone use
has indeed increased the accident rate.
In a recent thread c.m.a/m.p.m.i on various carplay, androidauto, android
automotive and screen mirroring (sonicboom) solutions, an offshoot tangent >> occurred when we theorized why factories don't just make automotive dash
systems a phone mirror so that a familiar interface is always on the dash.
Why in the world would anyone want their dashboard to look like
a smart phone? That's one of the worst automotive ideas I've heard
in while. Also a smart phone interface is not something that is
familiar to everyone. I wouldn't know what to do with an Android
or iPhone if one were shoved in my face. (I know people who have
no cell phone at all. I've been tempted to go that way myself.)
Last time I checked the average age of cars on the road in the U.S.
was about 12 years. Some (like mine) are much older. Fewer people
are buying new cars these days due to their cost and complexity.
Making the dashboard look like a phone might well push even more
people away.
My own rule is that my cell phone is OFF while driving. (And mine
is truly dead to the world when it is turned off, though I could
remove the battery to be really certain.) Excepting possibly a
medical emergency there is nothing that can't wait.
HINT: The spike in accident rates you claim, simply never existed.
You made it up.
Chris wrote:
Why do people claim cellphone use increased the accident rate in the USA? >>Before anyone responds you need to address three key flaws in your OP.
1. You present no data nor evidence. As a "trained scientist" - lol! - you >> should do better than that. A vague link is not enough. Be explicit
regarding what data there is, the source and what you think it supports and >> how.
2. Remember absence of proof is not proof of absence. A complex environment >> can mask one affect with another, competing, one.
3. An argument to say that we're always distracted and we shouldn't bother >> to target a solvable distraction isn't valid. All avoidable accidents and
deaths on the road should be targeted and reduced.
If you do not address all three points. There's no reason to engage with
this topic with you.
Hi Chris,
It's a perfectly valid question, especially since most people own purely religious belief systems which are not based on solid USA government facts.
Let's approach this problem, which, since most people only believe in the propaganda, clearly needs to be revisited, and with all the new valid data.
Let's look at the assessment by enumerating two sets of accurate facts.
A. Census gives us the accident numerator since at least way back to 1937.
B. FHWA has annual USA vehicle-miles-traveled all the way back to 1900.
C. The accidents divided by the miles driven gives us the accident rate.
While the overall trends matter, for the first-order assessment, we only need to look at the statistics during the time period of the cell phone.
2. Pre-cellular baseline 1937-1982 No commercial US cellular service
2. Cellular introduced 1983 First commercial cellular service began
3. Early adoption 1984-1989 Cell phones existed but were still rare
4. Rapid adoption 1990-1999 Cellular subscriptions exploded
5. Mass adoption 2000-2004 >100 million U.S. wireless connections
6. Essentially ubiquitous 2005-2010 ~208M -> 296M wireless connections
7. Smartphone era 2011-present Smartphones become dominant
Hence, I posit it's reasonable for us to look the accident rate from
January 1, 1983 (which we can reasonably define as the cellular era).
Here is more granular detail on the total USA wireless subscribers.
<https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/2001/compendia/statab/120ed/tables/sec18.pdf>
<https://www.ntia.gov/sites/default/files/mgallagher_isd2005_wireless_0.pdf>
<https://api.ctia.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Background_on_CTIA_Wireless_Industry_Survey_2020.pdf>
Roughly...
1990: 5.283 million wireless subscriber connections
1993: 16.009 million wireless subscriber connections
1994: 24.134 million wireless subscriber connections
1995: 33.786 million wireless subscriber connections
1996: 44.043 million wireless subscriber connections
1997: 55.312 million wireless subscriber connections
1998: 69.209 million wireless subscriber connections
1999: 86.047 million wireless subscriber connections
2000: ~109.5 million wireless subscriber connections
2001: ~128.4 million wireless subscriber connections
2002: ~140.8 million wireless subscriber connections
2003: ~158.7 million wireless subscriber connections
2004: ~182.1 million wireless subscriber connections
2005: ~207.9 million wireless subscriber connections
By 2005, that's roughly 70% of the U.S. population in subscriber connections.
By 2010 there were about 296 million wireless subscriber connections.
Questions we might ask ourselves BEFORE making any assessments, are
Q1: What was happening to the accident rate before cellular phones existed?
Q2: What happened to the accident rate during the 1983-2000 adoption curve?
Q3: What happened to the accident rate after cellular phones became commonplace?
1983 = existence.
1990s = adoption.
~2005-2010 = mass adoption.
2010s-2020s = smartphone era.
Since we're being scientific, what's our hypothesis if we BELIEVE that the cell phone caused accidents that wouldn't have happened prior to cell phones.
The stronger test is:
Q: Did the accident rate after cellular adoption depart from the
trajectory that was already occurring before cellular adoption?
On 2026-09-18, Maria Sophia wrote:
Scott Dorsey wrote:
Please explain the improvement in driver awareness, reaction
time and overall safety on the public roads when changing
from playing a video game on a telephone to playing a video
game on the dash console.
People are experts at multitasking. They have no problem having one hand >>> on the wheel, one hand holding their sandwich, and one hand on their beer. >>> It's all perfectly safe. So how could anyone possibly be at risk just because
they are paying attention to the person on Facebook whose political beliefs >>> are clearly wrong instead of to the road? The road can take care of itself.
And turn signals? Those other people have no business knowing where you're >>> going. They should keep to themselves.
Hi Scott,
I wonder if you even realize how absurd your argument is, to a scientist?
You're attempting to ridicule your absurd distortion of the argument.
That's called beating a strawman.
And claiming victory.
If anything, I believe it's called reductio ad absurdum.
<https://i.ytimg.com/vi/SPmxsRDSmTc/maxresdefault.jpg> and <https://enwp.org/WP:SARC> may also apply.
Stop it.
Be scientific please.
a. You claim cellphones are a distraction (and they are)
b. Out of, oh, there are about a hundred the government listed
c. And then you claim, unilaterally, it's NUMBER ONE in that hundred????
d. When, clearly, it's not???? WTF?
e. Worse, you seem to claim distractions are the ONLY cause of accidents!
WTF? Not speed? Not drunken driving? WTF?
Who makes such absurd arguments by ridiculing the facts?
No scientist would say what you just said, Scott. None.
Yeah, because no scientist would use sarcasm, ever.
Brian Gregory wrote:
Assuming no other factor was involved to cancel the arguments that people >>> are claiming, if their hypothesis is cell phones cause accidents, then
the accident rate should have skyrocketed at some point during the
introduction of cellphones, right?
But you can't just assume no other factor.
Why would you think you could??
How can you possibly say that as mobile phones gradually became more
popular other factors weren't, at the same time, reducing the accident rate?
I agree.
Your God works in mysterious ways that even you, can't explain.
But you still believe very deeply in your staid religious views, don't you.
But, where's your data?
Let's look at it.
What are you claiming happens to all your missing accidents?
Maybe aliens took them?
HINT: The spike in accident rates you claim, simply never existed.
You made it up.
On 9/18/2026 11:02 PM, Maria Sophia wrote:
Brian Gregory wrote:
Assuming no other factor was involved to cancel the arguments that people >>>> are claiming, if their hypothesis is cell phones cause accidents, then >>>> the accident rate should have skyrocketed at some point during the
introduction of cellphones, right?
But you can't just assume no other factor.
Why would you think you could??
How can you possibly say that as mobile phones gradually became more
popular other factors weren't, at the same time, reducing the accident rate?
I agree.
Your God works in mysterious ways that even you, can't explain.
But you still believe very deeply in your staid religious views, don't you. >> But, where's your data?
Let's look at it.
What are you claiming happens to all your missing accidents?
Maybe aliens took them?
HINT: The spike in accident rates you claim, simply never existed.
You made it up.
Frequent logical gap to an unsupported conclusion.
USA has world-high rates of autism in children. USA also had
very high rates of childhood vaccination. Some people infer
a link but such may or may not actually be causal. This is
as yet unknown; maybe, but maybe not.
Logic. Not religion.
It's simply anecdotal evidence.
It's why I brought up the classic propaganda that "premium gasoline" will make your Honda Civic run like a race car, more efficiently & even cleaner.
If the cell phone had *any* effect on the number of accidents, then it
would have shown up when the cell phone ownership percentage skyrocketed.
It didn't.
I think people want to use the power of their smart phone for their driving and entertainment and communication purposes, which, of course, they can do with a bluetooth speakerphone, but they want the visuals of driving too.
I am on record for owning cars from the 1990's, with over 300K miles on
them, where I do my own maintenance not limited to timing belts, clutches, cooling system overhauls & I even mount and balance my own tires at home.
My vehicles are easy to maintain for a few reasons, not the least of which
is cars are more reliable now than they were in the 1960's when I started working on them (e.g., my dwellmeter is gathering dust along with my spark plug gapping tool and my timing light forgotten like the brave little toaster).
Why do people claim cellphone use increased the accident rate in the USA?
AMuzi <am@yellowjersey.org> wrote:
On 9/18/2026 11:02 PM, Maria Sophia wrote:
Brian Gregory wrote:
Assuming no other factor was involved to cancel the arguments that people >>>>> are claiming, if their hypothesis is cell phones cause accidents, then >>>>> the accident rate should have skyrocketed at some point during the
introduction of cellphones, right?
But you can't just assume no other factor.
Why would you think you could??
How can you possibly say that as mobile phones gradually became more
popular other factors weren't, at the same time, reducing the accident rate?
I agree.
Your God works in mysterious ways that even you, can't explain.
But you still believe very deeply in your staid religious views, don't you. >>> But, where's your data?
Let's look at it.
What are you claiming happens to all your missing accidents?
Maybe aliens took them?
HINT: The spike in accident rates you claim, simply never existed.
You made it up.
Frequent logical gap to an unsupported conclusion.
USA has world-high rates of autism in children. USA also had
very high rates of childhood vaccination. Some people infer
a link but such may or may not actually be causal. This is
as yet unknown; maybe, but maybe not.
It absolutely is known. It has been tested and retested many times. There
is no evidence that any vaccine causes autism in children.
Why do people claim cellphone use increased the accident rate in the USA?
In a recent thread c.m.a/m.p.m.i on various carplay, androidauto, android automotive and screen mirroring (sonicboom) solutions, an offshoot tangent occurred when we theorized why factories don't just make automotive dash systems a phone mirror so that a familiar interface is always on the dash.
Like this:
<https://i.postimg.cc/k5gv0yw8/vysor34.jpg> Apple iOS & Android mirroring
Some brought up technical issues, but really, there are none, while others brought up safety issues, and for that, I'm sure there are legal issues.
But, are those legal issues valid?
Q: Why do people claim cellphone use increased the USA accident rate?
A: ?
Note we're restricting this to the USA only because accurate data has been compiled by the USA government on accident rates over the past 100 years.--- Synchronet 3.22a-Linux NewsLink 1.2
Note 1: Accident propaganda from the following will be deeply analyzed:
a. Law firms
b. Insurance companies
c. Law enforcement claims & politician claims
Note 2: Accident *rate* is what matters, not any given number of accidents,
over the period where cellphone ownership went from 0% to ~100%
Note 3: Fatalities and injuries, while deeply emotional, do not count
(because they are a second-order effect *after* the accident).
Note 4: Nobody claims "distracted driving" doesn't cause a large number
of accidents but distractions existed prior to cell phones and
distractions exist after cell phone became predominate, and yet,
in all the accurate accident-rate statistics, the rate simply
slowly trended downward year after year, before, during & after.
Note 5: Paradoxically, cellphone hands-free laws were enacted in most
states but there is absolutely no correlation with accident rates
in those states, before, during or after the laws went into force.
There was no blip whatsoever, in USA accident rate (for which accurate statistics have been kept for over a century) which tells the true story.
Given that, the question becomes...
Q: Why do people claim cellphone use increased the USA accident rate?
A: ?
I've had my car rear ended at 60mph where highway 880 funnels into highway
17 by a driver with not only a cellphone, but no insurance, license or >registration, but that doesn't have any effect on the USA accident rate.
It's simply anecdotal evidence.
If the cell phone has had any effect on the accident rate in the United >States, the only affect it could have had is lowering it year by year.
Which, it didn't do, since the accident rate in the USA was already
lowering year by year, so the cell phone simply had no effect at all.
What I'm trying to impart to people on these ngs is that they fell for the >propaganda, which turned out to be religious lies wrapped in anecdotes.
I agree.
Your God works in mysterious ways that even you, can't explain.
But you still believe very deeply in your staid religious views, don't you.
But, where's your data?
Let's look at it.
What are you claiming happens to all your missing accidents?
Maybe aliens took them?
HINT: The spike in accident rates you claim, simply never existed.
You made it up.
On Fri, 18 Sep 2026 00:28:28 +0300, Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> wrote:
Why do people claim cellphone use increased the accident rate in the USA?
So, you've been cited for phoning while driving? And you're angry about it?
On 9/19/2026 9:12 AM, Chris wrote:
AMuzi <am@yellowjersey.org> wrote:
On 9/18/2026 11:02 PM, Maria Sophia wrote:
Brian Gregory wrote:
Assuming no other factor was involved to cancel the arguments that people
are claiming, if their hypothesis is cell phones cause accidents, then >>>>>> the accident rate should have skyrocketed at some point during the >>>>>> introduction of cellphones, right?
But you can't just assume no other factor.
Why would you think you could??
How can you possibly say that as mobile phones gradually became more >>>>> popular other factors weren't, at the same time, reducing the accident rate?
I agree.
Your God works in mysterious ways that even you, can't explain.
But you still believe very deeply in your staid religious views, don't you.
But, where's your data?
Let's look at it.
What are you claiming happens to all your missing accidents?
Maybe aliens took them?
HINT: The spike in accident rates you claim, simply never existed.
You made it up.
Frequent logical gap to an unsupported conclusion.
USA has world-high rates of autism in children. USA also had
very high rates of childhood vaccination. Some people infer
a link but such may or may not actually be causal. This is
as yet unknown; maybe, but maybe not.
It absolutely is known. It has been tested and retested many times. There
is no evidence that any vaccine causes autism in children.
I happen to agree with you on that, but just as the
telephones-in-autos example, absence of evidence is not
evidence of absence.
Why do people claim cellphone use increased the accident rate in the USA?
In a recent thread c.m.a/m.p.m.i on various carplay, androidauto, android automotive and screen mirroring (sonicboom) solutions, an offshoot tangent occurred when we theorized why factories don't just make automotive dash systems a phone mirror so that a familiar interface is always on the dash.
AMuzi <am@yellowjersey.org> wrote:
On 9/19/2026 9:12 AM, Chris wrote:
AMuzi <am@yellowjersey.org> wrote:
On 9/18/2026 11:02 PM, Maria Sophia wrote:
Brian Gregory wrote:
Assuming no other factor was involved to cancel the arguments that people
are claiming, if their hypothesis is cell phones cause accidents, then >>>>>>> the accident rate should have skyrocketed at some point during the >>>>>>> introduction of cellphones, right?
But you can't just assume no other factor.
Why would you think you could??
How can you possibly say that as mobile phones gradually became more >>>>>> popular other factors weren't, at the same time, reducing the accident rate?
I agree.
Your God works in mysterious ways that even you, can't explain.
But you still believe very deeply in your staid religious views, don't you.
But, where's your data?
Let's look at it.
What are you claiming happens to all your missing accidents?
Maybe aliens took them?
HINT: The spike in accident rates you claim, simply never existed.
You made it up.
Frequent logical gap to an unsupported conclusion.
USA has world-high rates of autism in children. USA also had
very high rates of childhood vaccination. Some people infer
a link but such may or may not actually be causal. This is
as yet unknown; maybe, but maybe not.
It absolutely is known. It has been tested and retested many times. There >>> is no evidence that any vaccine causes autism in children.
I happen to agree with you on that, but just as the
telephones-in-autos example, absence of evidence is not
evidence of absence.
Except with vaccines there isn't any absence of evidence.
Carlos, this may be the beginning of all-AI arguments on
usenet. Probably not a good thing :-(
YourCOve brought this topic up before.
As someone who works in the science field, I can assure you statistics donrCOt always tell the truth. The criteria are often cherry picked, the data can easily be skewed if not collected in a controlled environment, and the biases of the researchers often provide conclusions not necessarily consistent with the raw data.
I think itrCOs pretty obvious if you look at drivers around you that distracted driving is out of control and in turn it leads to erraticMy view exactly. One of them got to within inches of killing me; the
driving. I trust personal anecdotes more than statistics in this case.
Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> wrote:
HINT: The spike in accident rates you claim, simply never existed.
You made it up.
HINT: that's *your* strawman argument. You still haven't fully evidenced
your actual argument in a single post. As per usual you scattergun your information across multiple making it very difficult to follow your thought process.
Chris wrote:
Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> wrote:
HINT: The spike in accident rates you claim, simply never existed.
You made it up.
HINT: that's *your* strawman argument. You still haven't fully evidenced
your actual argument in a single post. As per usual you scattergun your
information across multiple making it very difficult to follow your thought >> process.
Hi Chris,
I certainly know the answer to the question that I posed in this thread.
I knew it a decade ago.
Why?
Because I can think. I can do research. I can look up the data.
So I knew cellphones had zero measurable effect on accident rate.
So why did I make the thread, again, after ten more years of data?
I am making a very clear point that nobody who responded knows it.
The hypothesis of most people is premium gasoline gives their Honda Civic more power, just because of the propaganda they parrot that they're fed.
Likewise, people parrot the incorrect information that astronauts are 'weightless' in space, right, or, that gravity is a force, right?
Why?
I know why.
People don't think.
If it "sounds" plausible, they believe it.
Most people got C's or maybe B's in school because they couldn't think.
Most people simply do not own the mental capacity to think things through.
So most people believe all the bullshit that a politician or marketing
spiel tells them to believe - and they don't even *think* to question it.
That's one reason I love the Mythbusters TV series, as they tested them.
Who knew, for example, that a lit cigarette doesn't light a puddle of gas.
That's the problem here.
Most people are claiming that, by Golly, since cellphone use rocketed up during only a handful of years, accidents *must* have followed the trend.
And yet, they didn't.
HINT: I'll bring this up, again, a decade from now, and guess what...
Nobody will have learned a damn thing. That's rather sad.
I've had my car rear ended at 60mph where highway 880 funnels into highway >>17 by a driver with not only a cellphone, but no insurance, license or >>registration, but that doesn't have any effect on the USA accident rate.
Sure it does. It increments the USA accident rate by 1.
It's simply anecdotal evidence.
Yes. You put evidence of individual events together and you have statistics and then when you analyze statistics you have data.
What you should be looking at is this: of the number of people charged in accidents, what has been the progression of the rate of distracted driving charges related to phones.
If the cell phone has had any effect on the accident rate in the United >>States, the only affect it could have had is lowering it year by year.
Which, it didn't do, since the accident rate in the USA was already >>lowering year by year, so the cell phone simply had no effect at all.
Perhaps it would have lowered faster were it not for people using
their cellphones while driving.
What I'm trying to impart to people on these ngs is that they fell for the >>propaganda, which turned out to be religious lies wrapped in anecdotes.
And whatever happened to the campaigns against smoking in bed? Used to
be we had a lot of deaths from people smoking in bed.
On 2026-09-19, Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> wrote:
Logic. Not religion.
Logic tells me that if the young twit coming up behind me had
not been texting the accident I mentioned would likely have
never happened.
It's simply anecdotal evidence.
I have no doubt that many other people have such "anecdotes" where
a collision was caused by some moron using their phone instead
of paying attention to the road.
It's why I brought up the classic propaganda that "premium gasoline" will >> make your Honda Civic run like a race car, more efficiently & even cleaner.
Depending on the car and the brand of fuel, premium gasoline may be of
some benefit. For example, Shell oil company conducted tests showing
that Super Shell with Platformate delivered more miles per gallon.
Premium gasolines may also have more and better detergents and,
depending on the engine and its control system, you may also have
more power. (I worked for over a decade in the R&D department of a
major oil company.)
If the cell phone had *any* effect on the number of accidents, then it
would have shown up when the cell phone ownership percentage skyrocketed.
It didn't.
So it is your claim that people using cell phones while driving
have not caused accidents which otherwise would not have occurred. "Anecdotal" evidence at the very least suggests that is not the case.
I think people want to use the power of their smart phone for their driving >> and entertainment and communication purposes, which, of course, they can do >> with a bluetooth speakerphone, but they want the visuals of driving too.
I don't claim to know what other people want. I have no interest in
smart phones or their so-called "apps", and have no plans to ever
own one. In fact my much simpler phone is off most of the time unless
there is a need to use it. I'm not on board with the modern idea of
being reachable 24/7 under virtually all circumstances. Call, leave
a message, I'll get back to you when I can.
As far as entertainment, my cars have AM/FM radio and tape decks.
No bluetooth. No wifi. No connectivity. That works for me.
I am on record for owning cars from the 1990's, with over 300K miles on
them, where I do my own maintenance not limited to timing belts, clutches, >> cooling system overhauls & I even mount and balance my own tires at home.
That's what I do other than mounting/balancing tires. I have yet to
own a car made in the 21st century.
My vehicles are easy to maintain for a few reasons, not the least of which >> is cars are more reliable now than they were in the 1960's when I started
working on them (e.g., my dwellmeter is gathering dust along with my spark >> plug gapping tool and my timing light forgotten like the brave little
toaster).
I still have cars from the 1960s and early 1970s, though not for daily
use. They are used little enough that a set of points and plugs lasts
for quite a few years so I've resisted the temptation to convert to electronic ignition. I do still keep my dwell meter, plug gapper,
and timing light handy.
Because a cellphone (at least the smart variety) has a predominantly visual interface. They cannot be operated by touch alone. They are a distraction much worse than customarily allowed (radios, or conversation in the cab,
for example).
Eyes cannot be kept on the road when a smartphone is in use.
Thus, they cannot plausibly reduce crash risk. It must be
admitted, however, that they do speed up first responder's
arrival.
Roger Blake wrote:
On 2026-09-19, Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> wrote:
Logic. Not religion.
Logic tells me that if the young twit coming up behind me had
not been texting the accident I mentioned would likely have
never happened.
It's simply anecdotal evidence.
I have no doubt that many other people have such "anecdotes" where
a collision was caused by some moron using their phone instead
of paying attention to the road.
It's why I brought up the classic propaganda that "premium gasoline" will >>> make your Honda Civic run like a race car, more efficiently & even cleaner. >>Depending on the car and the brand of fuel, premium gasoline may be of
some benefit. For example, Shell oil company conducted tests showing
that Super Shell with Platformate delivered more miles per gallon.
Premium gasolines may also have more and better detergents and,
depending on the engine and its control system, you may also have
more power. (I worked for over a decade in the R&D department of a
major oil company.)
If the cell phone had *any* effect on the number of accidents, then it
would have shown up when the cell phone ownership percentage skyrocketed. >>>
It didn't.
So it is your claim that people using cell phones while driving
have not caused accidents which otherwise would not have occurred.
"Anecdotal" evidence at the very least suggests that is not the case.
I think people want to use the power of their smart phone for their driving >>> and entertainment and communication purposes, which, of course, they can do >>> with a bluetooth speakerphone, but they want the visuals of driving too.
I don't claim to know what other people want. I have no interest in
smart phones or their so-called "apps", and have no plans to ever
own one. In fact my much simpler phone is off most of the time unless
there is a need to use it. I'm not on board with the modern idea of
being reachable 24/7 under virtually all circumstances. Call, leave
a message, I'll get back to you when I can.
As far as entertainment, my cars have AM/FM radio and tape decks.
No bluetooth. No wifi. No connectivity. That works for me.
I am on record for owning cars from the 1990's, with over 300K miles onThat's what I do other than mounting/balancing tires. I have yet to
them, where I do my own maintenance not limited to timing belts, clutches, >>> cooling system overhauls & I even mount and balance my own tires at home. >>
own a car made in the 21st century.
My vehicles are easy to maintain for a few reasons, not the least of which >>> is cars are more reliable now than they were in the 1960's when I started >>> working on them (e.g., my dwellmeter is gathering dust along with my spark >>> plug gapping tool and my timing light forgotten like the brave little
toaster).
I still have cars from the 1960s and early 1970s, though not for daily
use. They are used little enough that a set of points and plugs lasts
for quite a few years so I've resisted the temptation to convert to
electronic ignition. I do still keep my dwell meter, plug gapper,
and timing light handy.
Hi Roger,
What I'm trying to impart to people on these ngs is that they fell for the propaganda, which turned out to be bullshit lies wrapped in anecdotes.
Just as people believe gravity is a force, we've known since 1916 it's not.
It took a while for Einstein to prove it, which is kind of what's happening here because people can't believe the data that there is no measurable
change in accident rate in the USA before, during or after cellphones were introduc3ed, let alone some kind of mysterious skyrocketing that's "hidden" (by whom? Aliens?) in exact timing and skyrocketing introduction rates.
Yet, people always fall on their anecdotes, such as "A friend of my
mother's sister saw this accident", and form their entire belief system
based on that one anecdote (simply because it "sounded plausible" to them).
Using the example of Scott about cigarettes in bed, I can claim equally as well that I knew a guy smoking cigarettes and his wife never divorced him.
Therefore, using the same anecdotal evidence you & Scott are attempting to apply, this proves (in your minds) that smoking in bed lowers the divorce rate. Maybe it does. Maybe it doesn't. But where's the data I will ask.
Regarding home maintenance, I'm sure a lot (if not most?) of the folks on some of the automotive newsgroups do all their own work, which, I must add, saves them a ton of money, although, I'm in my 80's now, and it's getting harder and harder to be on the ground (I bring along cushions & knee pads).
As for none of my current cars are older than 1996, so all of them have
the 'new fangled' pointless ignition, which,
Given dwell angle was something we set because it directly affected coil saturation & ignition timing, "electronic ignition", wiped out my need for testing it. As I recall, my Sears Craftsman chromed timing light lasted longer but I don't even know if my late 1990s vehicles have timing notches
on the harmonic balancer, but worse, there's no distributor to twist.
Times changed in the past 86 years, that's fer' sure!
this may be the beginning of all-AI arguments on usenet.
Carlos, this may be the beginning of all-AI arguments on usenet.
Probably not a good thing :-(
Physics rests on the four forces: gravity, electromagnetism,
and the strong & weak atomic forces. Einstein's General
Theory (1916) affirms that, and the 1919 eclipse provided
dispositive proof.
As a scientist, you know this. So, whatever your point above
was, it makes no sense within the context of physics.
AMuzi wrote:
Physics rests on the four forces: gravity, electromagnetism,
and the strong & weak atomic forces. Einstein's General
Theory (1916) affirms that, and the 1919 eclipse provided
dispositive proof.
As a scientist, you know this. So, whatever your point above
was, it makes no sense within the context of physics.
Hi Andrew,
Look up "gravity is not a force".
Tell us what you found.
You're conflating two different frameworks.
In Newtonian mechanics, gravity is indeed modeled as a force.
But in General Relativity, gravity is not a force in that sense since
freely falling objects follow geodesics in curved spacetime, and what we
call "gravitational acceleration" is the result of spacetime geometry
rather than a force acting on the object.
Also, physics does not have "four forces" in the same theoretical sense.
The Standard Model describes three fundamental interactions
a. electromagnetism,
b. the strong interaction,
c. and the weak interaction
While General Relativity describes gravity geometrically rather than as a quantum force within the Standard Model.
And the 1919 eclipse observations were an important early test of GR's prediction for the deflection of starlight by the Sun, but calling them "dispositive proof" is much too strong by modern standards. They provided early evidence consistent with GR and hundreds of thousands of subsequent observations and experiments have subjected the theory to vastly more stringent tests.
So my point that "gravity is not a force" was specifically in the General Relativistic sense, not a denial that gravity is conventionally called a force by people who only know of Newtonian physics of centuries ago.
However.... this isn't a physics lesson, because people who claim that
aliens must have EXACTLY manipulated the accident rate to cancel out an astronomical spike they predicted in both timing & magnitude, have not
shown that they have reached the level of understanding general relativity.
My main point was that people own a religious belief system that, when you try to explain to them the facts, using statistics, such as the accident
rate which has been calculated in the USA rather accurately for decades,
that they come up with a pithy excuse that "they feel" negates all facts.
Since I also took statistics when I took science & engineering courses, I know all the aphorisms that people use to negate facts that THEY NEVER EVEN LOOKED AT EVEN ONCE! (Note that this is what ALWAYS happens!).
a. People have a religious belief system which is NOT based on facts
b. When provided statistics which challenge that belief system...
c. They use one of the pithy aphorisms below to make the facts "go away".
And yet, they *never* even *L@@KED* at the facts before claiming...
a. "Correlation isn't causation."
True, but often used as though it means correlation tells us nothing.
b. "Statistics can prove anything."
Usually a way of avoiding asking which statistics, from what data,
using what method?
c. "Numbers don't lie; liars use numbers."
A rhetorical escape hatch rather than an analysis of the numbers.
d. "You can make statistics say whatever you want."
Sometimes true of bad analysis but it's not an argument against
a particular analysis.
e. "That's just a statistic."
As though aggregation somehow makes measurements cease to be evidence.
f. "I don't need statistics as I have common sense."
Particularly useful when the question is precisely whether
intuition matches reality.
g. "My experience says otherwise."
An anecdote promoted to the status of a representative sample.
h. "I've never seen that happen."
A one-person observation treated as evidence about a population.
i. "There are lies, damn lies, and statistics."
A wonderfully reusable way of declining to investigate what
the statistics actually show.
j. "You can't reduce everything to numbers."
Often correct, but irrelevant when the question is specifically
quantitative.
k. "Statistics don't tell the whole story."
They generally don't but the interesting question is what part
of the story they do tell.
l. "That's just an average."
As if distributions, confidence intervals, sample sizes, etc. don't exist.
m. "The sample size is only X."
Sometimes an excellent objectionx but sometimes merely a number
repeated without considering whether X is actually inadequate
for the effect being measured.
n. "Who funded the study?"
A legitimate question about conflicts of interest that can also
be deployed as a conversation-ending genetic fallacy.
o. "Scientists have been wrong before."
Technically irrefutable and almost completely nonresponsive.
p. "There are studies on both sides."
Treating the mere existence of opposing studies as evidence
that the evidence is evenly balanced.
q. "Show me a study that proves it."
Often sneaks an impossible standard of absolute proof
into an empirical question.
r. "That's not statistically significant, therefore there's no effect."
A particularly technical version of the same mistake.
s. "It could just be chance."
A possibility is not a probability estimate.
t. "That's an outlier."
Sometimes correct but sometimes an attempt to throw away an
inconvenient observation without a principled criterion.
u. "Statistics are manipulated by whoever collects them."
Possible, but again doesn't establish that these particular
data were manipulated.
v. "People aren't statistics."
True and entirely compatible with statistics being about populations.
w. "The data are cherry-picked."
Sometimes an important criticism, but it needs to identify what
relevant data were omitted and why their inclusion would change
the conclusion.
x. "That's not what the numbers really mean."
A wonderfully convenient assertion when one doesn't want to say
what the numbers actually mean instead.
y. "You can find a study to support anything."
The existence of a bad or contrary study doesn't establish
that the available evidence is evenly divided.
z. "Well, that's just your interpretation of the data."
Sometimes legitimate, but often used without offering an alternative
analysis of the data or explaining why the original interpretation
is wrong.
On 9/17/26 8:43 PM, badgolferman wrote:
YourCOve brought this topic up before.
As someone who works in the science field, I can assure you statistics
donrCOt always tell the truth. The criteria are often cherry picked, the data
can easily be skewed if not collected in a controlled environment, and the >> biases of the researchers often provide conclusions not necessarily
consistent with the raw data.
My only ever stats prof opened the semester with
"statistics is the science that allows us to prove anything, or its opposite".
I think itrCOs pretty obvious if you look at drivers around you that
distracted driving is out of control and in turn it leads to erratic
driving. I trust personal anecdotes more than statistics in this case.
My view exactly. One of them got to within inches of killing me; the
only answer is to pull their license for 5 years, on the retry give
them a 1000 question quiz on defensive driving... miss one and you fail
for another 5 years.
... all-AI ... not a good thing
On 9/19/2026 5:18 PM, Chris wrote:
AMuzi <am@yellowjersey.org> wrote:
On 9/19/2026 9:12 AM, Chris wrote:
AMuzi <am@yellowjersey.org> wrote:
On 9/18/2026 11:02 PM, Maria Sophia wrote:
Brian Gregory wrote:
Assuming no other factor was involved to cancel the arguments that >>>>>>>> people are claiming, if their hypothesis is cell phones cause >>>>>>>> accidents, then the accident rate should have skyrocketed at some point
during the introduction of cellphones, right?
But you can't just assume no other factor.
Why would you think you could??
How can you possibly say that as mobile phones gradually became more >>>>>>> popular other factors weren't, at the same time, reducing the accident rate?
I agree.
Your God works in mysterious ways that even you, can't explain.
But you still believe very deeply in your staid religious views, don't >>>>>> you. But, where's your data?
Let's look at it.
What are you claiming happens to all your missing accidents?
Maybe aliens took them?
HINT: The spike in accident rates you claim, simply never existed. >>>>>> You made it up.
Frequent logical gap to an unsupported conclusion.
USA has world-high rates of autism in children. USA also had
very high rates of childhood vaccination. Some people infer
a link but such may or may not actually be causal. This is
as yet unknown; maybe, but maybe not.
It absolutely is known. It has been tested and retested many times. There >>>> is no evidence that any vaccine causes autism in children.
I happen to agree with you on that, but just as the telephones-in-autos >>> example, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
Except with vaccines there isn't any absence of evidence.
As with police radio and truckers on CB for decades, audio seems to be benign as compared to a video or text device. Yet legislatures make no distinction and aggregated data (as referenced by OP) lumps all those together. Some large proportion of people believe both that there is a childhood vaccine and autism link ( I am not one) and that telephones
are a crash risk while ignoring console and telephone video and text as unique interfaces disparate from audio.
Existing evidence has failed to sway a great many people in both areas.
My only ever stats prof opened the semester with
"statistics is the science that allows us to prove anything, or its opposite".
Yep. Surveys, polls, studies, etc. only ever prove what the person
paying for it wants them to prove. They are also usually run with ridiculously small sample sizes and (purposely) lots of restrictions on
who can answer them. Then any answewrs they don't like or other
possible options are simply ignored. :-\
Plus, after heavy manipulation, results are usually released in a
percentage format to purposely con the general public.
That's why one week you'll get a study that says "product XYZ is good
for you" and the next week another silly study that says "product XYZ
is bad for you".
The really dangerous ones are the medical studies, such as the "you
have to drink eight glasses of water a day" nonsense. Stupid people believing such idiocy can seriously harm or kill themselves.
On 2026-09-20 16:11:42 +0000, AMuzi said:
A quick Google search seems to indicate that using a CB radio or similar while driving is also illegal in some US states (exemptions of emergency services, etc.), but not in others.
Current syllabus for MIT Physics: https://web.mit.edu/sahughes/www/8.022/lec01.pdf
It is also illegal to wear headphones while driving
On 9/17/26 8:43 PM, badgolferman wrote:
YourCOve brought this topic up before.
As someone who works in the science field, I can assure you statistics
donrCOt always tell the truth. The criteria are often cherry picked, the data
can easily be skewed if not collected in a controlled environment, and the >> biases of the researchers often provide conclusions not necessarily
consistent with the raw data.
My only ever stats prof opened the semester with
"statistics is the science that allows us to prove anything, or its opposite".
I think itrCOs pretty obvious if you look at drivers around you thatMy view exactly. One of them got to within inches of killing me; the
distracted driving is out of control and in turn it leads to erratic
driving. I trust personal anecdotes more than statistics in this case.
only answer is to pull their license for 5 years, on the retry give them
a 1000 question quiz on defensive driving... miss one and you fail for another 5 years.
Chris wrote:
Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> wrote:
HINT: The spike in accident rates you claim, simply never existed.
You made it up.
HINT: that's *your* strawman argument. You still haven't fully evidenced
your actual argument in a single post. As per usual you scattergun your
information across multiple making it very difficult to follow your thought >> process.
Hi Chris,
I certainly know the answer to the question that I posed in this thread.
I knew it a decade ago.
Why?
Because I can think. I can do research. I can look up the data.
On 2026-09-17 23:28, Maria Sophia wrote:
Why do people claim cellphone use increased the accident rate in the USA?
In a recent thread c.m.a/m.p.m.i on various carplay, androidauto, android
automotive and screen mirroring (sonicboom) solutions, an offshoot tangent >> occurred when we theorized why factories don't just make automotive dash
systems a phone mirror so that a familiar interface is always on the dash.
I'm tired, not interested in arguing this again. So I asked ChatGPT to
argue it for me. If you do not agree with what he says, take it with him :-P
I certainly know the answer to the question that I posed in this thread.
I knew it a decade ago.
If you know it so well it would be very easy for you to evidence it irrefutably. Which you've yet to do this time and also every other time you bring this up.
Why? Because it doesn't exist.
Why?
Because I can think. I can do research. I can look up the data.
Your attempts to make yourself sound like an authority just come across as the boasts of a weak man.
I invite you to respond to my experimental design questions and also
Carlos's very pertinent ChatGPT clear answers to your intentionally false claims.
Gravity is a indeed a force:
https://www.thoughtco.com/what-are-fundamental-forces-of-physics-2699070
Gravity
Electromagnetism
Weak Interaction (or Weak Nuclear Force)
Strong Interaction (or Strong Nuclear Force)
I'm tired, not interested in arguing this again. So I asked ChatGPT to
argue it for me. If you do not agree with what he says, take it with him :-P
Nice one!
In a recent thread c.m.a/m.p.m.i on various carplay, androidauto, android
automotive and screen mirroring (sonicboom) solutions, an offshoot tangent >> occurred when we theorized why factories don't just make automotive dash
systems a phone mirror so that a familiar interface is always on the dash.
I'm tired, not interested in arguing this again.
I think itos pretty obvious if you look at drivers around you thatMy view exactly. One of them got to within inches of killing me; the
distracted driving is out of control and in turn it leads to erratic
driving. I trust personal anecdotes more than statistics in this case.
only answer is to pull their license for 5 years, on the retry give them
a 1000 question quiz on defensive driving... miss one and you fail for
another 5 years.
Can I recommend "How to Lie with Statistics" by Darrell Huff? Published back in 1954.
Carlos E.R. wrote:
If cellphone use "caused" accidents, why are there no consistent
increase in accidents in the USA (where the data is good) during the
years that cellphone ownership skyrocketed from 0% to nearly 100% while >>> > driving?
Data in Europe contradicts you, and it is forbidden to touch the phone
while driving. Even touching the GPS device is prohibited, with serious >>> sanctions. All backed by hard data.
Hi Carlos,
If you have the data, I'll take a look, but I don't need you to look
because I searched extensively years ago, and that data didn't change.
We went through all the data at the time, where I do agree that, in the UK, >> surprisingly, supposedly the "evidence" showed an uptick in accident rates. >>
However, in the USA there was decidedly no uptick in accident rates, which >> is the point, since the USA has kept excellent data since the 1920s.
You're looking at it from the wrong direction.
It's very difficult to ascribe a change in rates of anything like this
where there are multiple causes. You would have to remove all the confounding factors. It's pretty much impossible in the case of road accidents.
What is very clear, though, is that significant numbers of accidents
are caused by drivers who are distracted by their mobile phones. There
have been so many in the UK alone. I find it distressing to read about
them in the news, and even more distressing to see in-vehicle video
leading up to the point just before what would have been a horrific
accident.
You can count me as a firm supporter of the laws against use of mobile
phones while driving.
Carlos E.R. wrote:
In a recent thread c.m.a/m.p.m.i on various carplay, androidauto, android >>> automotive and screen mirroring (sonicboom) solutions, an offshoot tangent >>> occurred when we theorized why factories don't just make automotive dash >>> systems a phone mirror so that a familiar interface is always on the dash. >>
I'm tired, not interested in arguing this again.
Hi Carlos,
Cut it with the childish stupidity.
Just cut it.
Typical reaction to a pertinent post. Attacking the messenger rather than deal with the facts.
Picking just the first example from NHTSA. Where do you disagree with the facts? https://www.nhtsa.gov/book/countermeasures-that-work/distracted-driving/understanding-problem
There's a 12x increased risk of an accident when dialling a phone number
and 6.6x increased risk when texting.
These are results from scientific studies done with the appropriate data,
not random police statistics.
Picking just the first example from NHTSA. Where do you disagree with the facts? https://www.nhtsa.gov/book/countermeasures-that-work/distracted-driving/understanding-problem
There's a 12x increased risk of an accident when dialling a phone number
and 6.6x increased risk when texting.
These are results from scientific studies done with the appropriate data,
not random police statistics.
Chris wrote:
Typical reaction to a pertinent post. Attacking the messenger rather than
deal with the facts.
Picking just the first example from NHTSA. Where do you disagree with the
facts?
https://www.nhtsa.gov/book/countermeasures-that-work/distracted-driving/understanding-problem
There's a 12x increased risk of an accident when dialling a phone number
and 6.6x increased risk when texting.
These are results from scientific studies done with the appropriate data,
not random police statistics.
Hi Chris,
Let's give up.
Nobody on this newsgroup owns enough intelligence to understand the issue. Except me.
Skimmed over your post a bit, it is foolish, not worth it to answer.
Chris wrote:
I certainly know the answer to the question that I posed in this thread. >>> I knew it a decade ago.
If you know it so well it would be very easy for you to evidence it
irrefutably. Which you've yet to do this time and also every other time you >> bring this up.
Why? Because it doesn't exist.
Jesus Christ, Chris. Seriously. Have you no decency? I gave you the facts!
I get it you're from the iOS group so you think denying all facts makes
them go away, but I posted the evidence in this group, Read the thread.
Yes. It's boring. Not a single emoji. No 'bold new colors' either.
But I provided the statistics and the links to where they came from.
1. Cellphone ownership rates
2. Miles driven
3. Accidents
Accidents divided by miles driven over the period of cellphone
skyrocketing, and there are no changes whatsoever in the rate.
I explained my hypothesis and the data supports it.
You invented accident rates which don't exist. Now support that.
Don't support it by NOT looking at the data and saying it doesn't exist. That's what Apple posters do all the time on the Apple newsgroups, Chris.
Why?
Because I can think. I can do research. I can look up the data.
Your attempts to make yourself sound like an authority just come across as >> the boasts of a weak man.
I invite you to respond to my experimental design questions and also
Carlos's very pertinent ChatGPT clear answers to your intentionally false
claims.
Oh my God, Chris. I get it you are from an iOS group
Q: Here is the statistics posted to Usenet. Are they correct?
Chris wrote:
Typical reaction to a pertinent post. Attacking the messenger rather than
deal with the facts.
Picking just the first example from NHTSA. Where do you disagree with the
facts?
https://www.nhtsa.gov/book/countermeasures-that-work/distracted-driving/understanding-problem
There's a 12x increased risk of an accident when dialling a phone number
and 6.6x increased risk when texting.
These are results from scientific studies done with the appropriate data,
not random police statistics.
Hi Chris,
Let's give up.
The only person giving up is you.
Do you know the major cause of accidents?
I do.
HINT: It's not distractions.
State explicitly what the question at hand is.
HINT: It's not distractions.
The major cause of accidents is high speed chases between police and untrained drivers behind the wheel of stolen schoolbusses full of weed.
It happens every day.
It's simply anecdotal evidence.
Maria Sophia wrote:
It's simply anecdotal evidence.
And that's why we know texting and driving causes NO ACCIDENTS.
Because there's only anecdotal evidence.
That goes for watching porn, or drinking and driving. There is no
evidence they cause accidents.
AI Overview:
The use of cell phones has been shown to have NO EFFECT on the
probability of car accidents. Period. The End.
On 2026-09-22 05:13:23 +0000, multistrada said:
Maria Sophia wrote:
It's simply anecdotal evidence.
And that's why we know texting and driving causes NO ACCIDENTS.
Utter bollocks.
Because there's only anecdotal evidence.
That goes for watching porn, or drinking and driving. There is no
evidence they cause accidents.
Utter bollocks.
AI Overview:
The use of cell phones has been shown to have NO EFFECT on the
probability of car accidents. Period. The End.
Idiotic AI is completely useless for anything, and like silly "studies"
can 'prove' whatever you want it to 'prove' ...
AI Overview:
Yes, using a cell phone while driving significantly increases
the risk of a car accident. Research shows that talking on a
phone multiplies the risk of a crash by roughly four times,
while texting or reading messages can increase the chance of
crashing by up to 20 times or more.
On 2026-09-22 06:18:03 +0000, Your Name said:
On 2026-09-22 05:13:23 +0000, multistrada said:
Maria Sophia wrote:
It's simply anecdotal evidence.
And that's why we know texting and driving causes NO ACCIDENTS.
Utter bollocks.
Because there's only anecdotal evidence.
That goes for watching porn, or drinking and driving. There is no
evidence they cause accidents.
Utter bollocks.
AI Overview:
The use of cell phones has been shown to have NO EFFECT on the
probability of car accidents. Period. The End.
Idiotic AI is completely useless for anything, and like silly "studies" can 'prove' whatever you want it to 'prove' ...
AI Overview:
Yes, using a cell phone while driving significantly increases
the risk of a car accident. Research shows that talking on a
phone multiplies the risk of a crash by roughly four times,
while texting or reading messages can increase the chance of
crashing by up to 20 times or more.
Here's another example of the uselessness of the idiotic AI gimmick ...
ask Mr Google "does using a cellphone cause people to sneeze", and you
get:
AI Overview:
Yes, using a cell phone can indirectly cause you to sneeze.
Cell phones collect common household allergens like pet dander,
mold fragments, and dust on their surfaces. Holding the phone
close to your face transfers these particles near your nose and
triggers allergic reactions.
Your Name <YourName@YourISP.com> wrote:
On 2026-09-22 06:18:03 +0000, Your Name said:
On 2026-09-22 05:13:23 +0000, multistrada said:
Maria Sophia wrote:
It's simply anecdotal evidence.
And that's why we know texting and driving causes NO ACCIDENTS.
Utter bollocks.
Because there's only anecdotal evidence.
That goes for watching porn, or drinking and driving. There is no
evidence they cause accidents.
Utter bollocks.
AI Overview:
The use of cell phones has been shown to have NO EFFECT on the
probability of car accidents. Period. The End.
Idiotic AI is completely useless for anything, and like silly "studies"
can 'prove' whatever you want it to 'prove' ...
AI Overview:
Yes, using a cell phone while driving significantly increases
the risk of a car accident. Research shows that talking on a
phone multiplies the risk of a crash by roughly four times,
while texting or reading messages can increase the chance of
crashing by up to 20 times or more.
Here's another example of the uselessness of the idiotic AI gimmick ...
ask Mr Google "does using a cellphone cause people to sneeze", and you
get:
AI Overview:
Yes, using a cell phone can indirectly cause you to sneeze.
Cell phones collect common household allergens like pet dander,
mold fragments, and dust on their surfaces. Holding the phone
close to your face transfers these particles near your nose and
triggers allergic reactions.
Buddy boi, you have chosen the exact wrong path down which to
wander. You have accepted the mandatory cancer clot shot
which turned your sheeple brain into oatmeal and made you
into another autistic athiezoid. Me and the Lord don't take
kindly to your ilk.
AI Overview:
Clot shots cause cancer, expecially in the vicinity of
windmills. They promote athiesm by the constant humdrum of
the propellers going around and around all day and night,
interrupting prayers flowing upward and blessings dropping
from above.
Stupid slothy sightwalkers.
Chris wrote:
State explicitly what the question at hand is.
The question is WHY do people claim cellphones increased the accident rate.
Chris wrote:
The only person giving up is you.
Hi Chris,
The only person who supplied any data, is me.
The only person who supplied any data, is me.
And you haven't explained why it is useful and relevant. For some reason
you think correlating mobile phone ownership with a survey of police
accident reports is indicative of something. Explain. You may think it's obvious, but it isn't and won't become clear until you understand the parameters of your datasets and the limitations of correlations.
State explicitly what the question at hand is.
The question is WHY do people claim cellphones increased the accident rate.
No-one has said that. You've put that up as a strawman argument.
I just claimed that there would be NO spike.
Chris wrote:
No-one has said that. You've put that up as a strawman argument.State explicitly what the question at hand is.
The question is WHY do people claim cellphones increased the accident rate. >>
Hi Chris,
First off, you claimed the question is unknown
when it's in the SUBJECT
line for God's sake, so you can't possibly have been serious in asking.
But even so, people claimed the data was bad,
when it's in the SUBJECT
line for God's sake, so you can't possibly have been serious in asking.
As I said elsewhere you're making multiple claims. If you were actually wanting an answer you'd be specific. I know that's a big "if".
bp@www.zefox.net wrote:
Because a cellphone (at least the smart variety) has a predominantly visual >> interface. They cannot be operated by touch alone. They are a distraction
much worse than customarily allowed (radios, or conversation in the cab,
for example).
Eyes cannot be kept on the road when a smartphone is in use.
Thus, they cannot plausibly reduce crash risk. It must be
admitted, however, that they do speed up first responder's
arrival.
Hi Bob,
You're on to something IMPORTANT with that astute observation.
But first we have to start with the facts, and not the religion.
Take Einstein informing the world in 1916 that time is not invariant.
It took a long time for people to believe in Minkowski 4D spacetime, right?
It sounds plausible, to people that time must be the same for everyone.
And yet, it's not.
It sounds plausible, to people, that light is either a wave or a particle. And yet, it's both.
Any scientist knows that what sounds plausible to others, may not be fact.
So, sure, it sounds plausible that cellphones are an *added* distraction. BTW, I don't disagree with that and I don't think anyone disagrees with it.
So then why didn't the accident rate skyrocket between the time the
cellphone didn't exist, to the time that it became ubiquitous in vehicles?
HINT: I know the answer, but I can't explain it to you until you start to think about what could be the reason there was no increase in accident
rate, when, clearly, cellphones are an added distraction by all counts.
Chris wrote:
The only person who supplied any data, is me.
And you haven't explained why it is useful and relevant. For some reason
you think correlating mobile phone ownership with a survey of police
accident reports is indicative of something. Explain. You may think it's
obvious, but it isn't and won't become clear until you understand the
parameters of your datasets and the limitations of correlations.
Hi Chris,
1. We know EXACTLY when cell phones came into being, Chris.
2. We know EXACTLY what the accident rate is before, during & after.
The fact the accident rate shows NO CHANGE from the downward trend
HINT: I know the answer, but I can't explain it to you until you start to
think about what could be the reason there was no increase in accident
rate, when, clearly, cellphones are an added distraction by all counts.
Ok, please try.
On 20 Sep 2026 at 20:08:03 BST, "bad sector" <forgetski@_INVALID.net> wrote:
On 9/17/26 8:43 PM, badgolferman wrote:
YourCOve brought this topic up before.
As someone who works in the science field, I can assure you statistics
donrCOt always tell the truth. The criteria are often cherry picked, the data
can easily be skewed if not collected in a controlled environment, and the >>> biases of the researchers often provide conclusions not necessarily
consistent with the raw data.
My only ever stats prof opened the semester with
"statistics is the science that allows us to prove anything, or its
opposite".
I think itrCOs pretty obvious if you look at drivers around you thatMy view exactly. One of them got to within inches of killing me; the
distracted driving is out of control and in turn it leads to erratic
driving. I trust personal anecdotes more than statistics in this case.
only answer is to pull their license for 5 years, on the retry give them
a 1000 question quiz on defensive driving... miss one and you fail for
another 5 years.
Can I recommend "How to Lie with Statistics" by Darrell Huff? Published back in 1954.
1. We know EXACTLY when cell phones came into being, Chris.
2. We know EXACTLY what the accident rate is before, during & after.
Why does a correlation of those numbers have any meaning? You're assuming that the before, during and after are directly comparable. Are they? Has nothing else changed in that period?
The fact the accident rate shows NO CHANGE from the downward trend
You've only shown three numbers. That's nowhere near enough to make any categorical statements. Either one way or the other.
In the old days you could reach for the dash, find the heater controls
and id the one you want just by touching to set up exactly what you want without EVER taking yor eyes off the road. When people do their smartass
bit with me I just say "well over a million miles in 70 years of driving
and not a single accident, argue with THAT".
This is not a joke, years ago I once answered a polling call and
expressed without reservation my then ultra-conservative opinions (in
the middle of an election campaign). I got another two or three calls
within a couple of weeks presumably because some pollster already knew
how I would answer :-)
https://imgur.com/screenshot-SdrsEbs
Nowadays I just ask them to confirm if the call is about 'consultation', because I do that too for only $200/minute and want to know who to send
the bill to.
bp@www.zefox.net wrote:
HINT: I know the answer, but I can't explain it to you until you start to >>> think about what could be the reason there was no increase in accident
rate, when, clearly, cellphones are an added distraction by all counts.
Ok, please try.
Hi Bob Prohaska,
Many years ago, I too read all the emotionally charged propaganda about cellphones causing horrific accidents, so I simply did what adults do.
I looked it up.
Whoa?
What?
No way....
They lied?
Almost everything online about cellphones causing horrific accidents is clickbait, where the articles *never* reference what really matters.
Almost all the clickbait is from four extremely biased clickbait entities:
1. News media (man bites dog being more interesting than dog bites man)
2. Insurance
3. Politicians (and police)
4. Lawyers
Almost *everything* online about cellphone related accidents is from them. Nobody else (for the most part).
Just them.
Just try to find something (anything!) about this subject for the USA accident rate caused by cellphones (not injuries as that's 2nd order).
You certainly can't have injuries without the 1st order accident first.
They make it sound like distractions are the major cause of accidents.
But the data is easy to check, and it simply did not support the claims.
a. The number of accidents has been recorded for over a century
b. As has the number of miles driven (although methods have changed)
c. We take the number of accidents divided by miles to get the rate
And, of course, we look at three periods, which are extremely well known:
i. Before cellphones existed
ii. During the meteoric rise of cellphone ownership
iii. After the cellphone ownership plateau
There's no doubt that distractions cause a minor number of accidents.
I don't think anyone doubts that, but what's the major cause of accidents?
a. Speeding
b. Intoxication
c. Failure to yield
They make it sound like distractions are the major cause of accidents.References?
But the data is easy to check, and it simply did not support the claims.
a. The number of accidents has been recorded for over a century
b. As has the number of miles driven (although methods have changed)
c. We take the number of accidents divided by miles to get the rate
And, of course, we look at three periods, which are extremely well known:
i. Before cellphones existed
ii. During the meteoric rise of cellphone ownership
iii. After the cellphone ownership plateau
Thanks for writing,
Well if it's like it is here, because it's intuitively obvious that it
must increase the accident rate. We still regularly see people driving
while holding and using their phones and obviously there would be less
accidents if they did not do so.
In New Zealand it has been illegal to use your cellphone while driving (unless using a hands-free option) ... but the fine / penalty is so
pathetic and chances of getting caught that many people still do it.
It isn't helped by almost all car manufacturers now having silly
touchscreen systems in their cars, which means there's little
difference between using that and a cellphone, other than the cellphone being a smaller screen size. :-(
On 9/17/2026 4:28 PM, Maria Sophia wrote:
Why do people claim cellphone use increased the accident rate in the USA?
In a recent thread c.m.a/m.p.m.i on various carplay, androidauto, android
automotive and screen mirroring (sonicboom) solutions, an offshoot tangent >> occurred when we theorized why factories don't just make automotive dash
systems a phone mirror so that a familiar interface is always on the dash. >>
Like this:
<https://i.postimg.cc/k5gv0yw8/vysor34.jpg> Apple iOS & Android mirroring >>
Some brought up technical issues, but really, there are none, while others >> brought up safety issues, and for that, I'm sure there are legal issues.
But, are those legal issues valid?
Q: Why do people claim cellphone use increased the USA accident rate?
A: ?
Note we're restricting this to the USA only because accurate data has been >> compiled by the USA government on accident rates over the past 100 years.
Note 1: Accident propaganda from the following will be deeply analyzed:
a. Law firms
b. Insurance companies
c. Law enforcement claims & politician claims
Note 2: Accident *rate* is what matters, not any given number of accidents, >> over the period where cellphone ownership went from 0% to ~100%
Note 3: Fatalities and injuries, while deeply emotional, do not count
(because they are a second-order effect *after* the accident).
Note 4: Nobody claims "distracted driving" doesn't cause a large number
of accidents but distractions existed prior to cell phones and
distractions exist after cell phone became predominate, and yet,
in all the accurate accident-rate statistics, the rate simply
slowly trended downward year after year, before, during & after.
Note 5: Paradoxically, cellphone hands-free laws were enacted in most
states but there is absolutely no correlation with accident rates
in those states, before, during or after the laws went into force. >>
There was no blip whatsoever, in USA accident rate (for which accurate
statistics have been kept for over a century) which tells the true story.
Given that, the question becomes...
Q: Why do people claim cellphone use increased the USA accident rate?
A: ?
There are many post-crash reports of semi and auto drivers
watching movies or porn or texting furiously as they
massacre innocents.
I agree that if people merely used the audio (as police and
truckers do with radios) there would not be a problem.
https://www.lifeasatrucker.com/trucker-caught-watching-porn-before-crash-that-killed-father-a-tragic-lesson-on-distraction.html
https://discover.swns.com/2025/09/shocking-dashcam-captures-woman-texting-at-wheel-before-crash/
As someone who works in the science field, I can assure you statistics
donot always tell the truth. The criteria are often cherry picked, the data >> can easily be skewed if not collected in a controlled environment, and the >> biases of the researchers often provide conclusions not necessarily
consistent with the raw data.
I think itos pretty obvious if you look at drivers around you that
distracted driving is out of control and in turn it leads to erratic
driving. I trust personal anecdotes more than statistics in this case.
Cell phones are absolutely causing more accidents every day. But that does not
necessarily mean "more total accidents than before".
In the past, "distracted driving" was people changing radio stations and/or tapes in the tape deck, etc. Those days are long gone. Not to mention women putting on makeup and looking at themselves in mirrors.
Today, "distracted driving" is texting/talking on the phone/changing your Spotify list/changing your iTunes list/watching TV/etc. Not to mention women are now looking at themselves in their phone front camera while putting on makeup.
So phones/iPads/whatever are definitely causing many/most/take your pick accidents today. But the overall accident totals could be the same, or statiscally not different.
So the statement "phones are causing more accidents every day" is perfectly valid. Extrapolating that into "Phones have increased the accident rate" is not valid or logical. Could be the same number of "distracted driving" accidents. Just a different cause for the distraction.
Why do people claim cellphone use increased the accident rate in the USA?
Before anyone responds you need to address three key flaws in your OP.
1. You present no data nor evidence. As a "trained scientist" - lol! - you should do better than that. A vague link is not enough. Be explicit
regarding what data there is, the source and what you think it supports and how.
2. Remember absence of proof is not proof of absence. A complex environment can mask one affect with another, competing, one.
3. An argument to say that we're always distracted and we shouldn't bother
to target a solvable distraction isn't valid. All avoidable accidents and deaths on the road should be targeted and reduced.
If you do not address all three points. There's no reason to engage with
this topic with you.
On 9/23/26 17:45, Maria Sophia wrote:
There's no doubt that distractions cause a minor number of accidents.
I don't think anyone doubts that, but what's the major cause of accidents? >> a. Speeding
b. Intoxication
c. Failure to yield
People tend to parrot propaganda without ever looking at the data.
bp@www.zefox.net wrote:
They make it sound like distractions are the major cause of accidents.References?
But the data is easy to check, and it simply did not support the claims. >>> a. The number of accidents has been recorded for over a century
b. As has the number of miles driven (although methods have changed)
c. We take the number of accidents divided by miles to get the rate
And, of course, we look at three periods, which are extremely well known: >>> i. Before cellphones existed
ii. During the meteoric rise of cellphone ownership
iii. After the cellphone ownership plateau
Thanks for writing,
Hi Bob,
I've never made a statement that isn't backed up in facts, in decades
of posting to Usenet, so rest assured, everything I said has references.
The references are already in this thread, which I repeat below for
your convenience...
====< #1 cut here for the next reference post >====
Newsgroups: misc.phone.mobile.iphone,rec.autos.driving,comp.mobile.android,rec.autos.tech
Subject: Re: Why do people claim cellphone use increased the USA accident rate?
Date: Sat, 19 Sep 2026 02:35:00 +0300
Message-ID: <118khr3$1ekk$1@nnrp.usenet.blueworldhosting.com>
Your Name wrote:
Well if it's like it is here, because it's intuitively obvious that it
must increase the accident rate. We still regularly see people driving
while holding and using their phones and obviously there would be less
accidents if they did not do so.
In New Zealand it has been illegal to use your cellphone while driving
(unless using a hands-free option) ... but the fine / penalty is so
pathetic and chances of getting caught that many people still do it.
It isn't helped by almost all car manufacturers now having silly
touchscreen systems in their cars, which means there's little
difference between using that and a cellphone, other than the cellphone
being a smaller screen size. :-(
Hi YourName,
Assuming no other factor was involved to cancel the arguments that people
are claiming, if their hypothesis is cell phones cause accidents, then
the accident rate should have skyrocketed at some point during the introduction of cellphones, right?
What's intuitively obvious is most accidents are NOT caused by cell phones. Speed and drunken driving are, almost certainly, vastly great represented.
Even so, given we know exactly when cellphones were introduced into the
USA, those who argue cellphones meaningfully increased the USA accident
rate have merely to show us valid USA statistics which back up their claim.
U.S. cell phones, crashes, miles, and crash rate - 1988-2024
Crash rate = NHTSA estimated police-reported crashes ??WA VMT x 100 million.
Year Wireless connections* Police-reported crashes VMT (billion) Crashes / 100M VMT
1988 2.07 M 6,886,800 2,026 339.9
1989 3.51 M 6,652,815 2,096 317.4
1990 5.28 M 6,471,202 2,144 301.8
1991 7.56 M 6,117,359 2,172 281.6
1992 11.03 M 6,000,310 2,247 267.0
1993 16.01 M 6,105,915 2,296 265.9
1994 24.13 M 6,495,988 2,358 275.5
1995 33.79 M 6,699,415 2,423 276.5
1996 44.04 M 6,769,583 2,500 270.8
1997 55.31 M 6,624,149 2,568 257.9
1998 69.21 M 6,334,573 2,645 239.5
1999 86.05 M 6,279,036 2,707 232.0
2000 109.48 M 6,393,624 2,764 231.3
2001 128.37 M 6,322,963 2,813 224.8
2002 140.77 M 6,315,708 2,874 219.8
2003 158.72 M 6,327,955 2,909 217.5
2004 182.14 M 6,181,027 2,982 207.3
2005 207.90 M 6,159,350 3,009 204.7
2006 233.04 M 5,973,213 3,034 196.9
2007 255.40 M 6,024,008 3,049 197.6
2008 270.33 M 5,810,846 2,993 194.1
2009 285.65 M 5,505,180 2,976 185.0
2010 296.29 M 5,419,445 2,985 181.6
2011 315.96 M 5,337,829 2,965 180.0
2012 326.48 M 5,615,045 2,969 189.1
2013 335.65 M 5,686,891 2,988 190.3
2014 355.45 M 6,064,284 3,040 199.5
2015 377.92 M 6,296,134 3,110 202.4
2016 ~387 M 6,821,129 3,174 214.9
2017 ~392 M 6,452,598 3,225 200.1
2018 ~413 M 6,734,681 3,255 206.9
2019 ~435 M 6,756,084 3,276 206.2
2020 ~461 M 5,251,006 2,917 180.0
2021 ~491 M 6,103,213 3,154 193.5
2022 ~515 M 5,930,697 3,197 185.5
2023 ~558 M 6,138,474 3,247 189.0
2024 ~? 6,180,241 3,294 1 8
*Wireless figures are connections/subscriptions, not unique people.
CTIA's historical series gives the exact 1988-2015 numbers/
For example, 1990 was 5,283,055 and 2015 was 377,921,241. <https://api.ctia.org/docs/default-source/default-document-library/ctia_survey_ye_2015_graphics.pdf?
Later CTIA reporting uses slightly different reported connections.
The crash figures through 2020 come from NHTSA's national GES/CRSS series. NHTSA's historical table explicitly starts at 1988 and gives 6,886,800
total crashes for that year.
<https://crashstats.nhtsa.dot.gov/Api/Public/ViewPublication/813375>
The 2023 and 2024 numbers are from NHTSA's latest national estimates.
<https://crashstats.nhtsa.dot.gov/Api/Public/ViewPublication/813720>
FHWA provides the national VMT series, including every year from 1988
through 2024.
<https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/policyinformation/pubs/our_nations_highways_2026/travel.cfm>
Note sample designs changed between 2015 & 1016 for NASS GES & CRSS estimates. That doesn't invalidate the table. But it does mean that
we should not interpret the jump from 202.4 in 2015 to 214.9 in 2016
as necessarily a real-world increase without looking closer at it. <https://studylib.net/doc/27913014/overview-of-motor-vehicle-traffic-crashes-in-2023--4->
Guess what?
Yup. You guessed it.
Just like everyone intuitively believes "premium gas" gives their Honda
Civic "more power", everyone believes the accident rate must have skyrocketed during the period that cell phones were introduced & after.
And yet... The numbers we can compare within the same GES system are valid:
Wireless connections:
1990 -> 5.3 million
2000 -> 109.5 million
2010 -> 296.3 million
Crash rate:
1990 -> 301.8 / 100M VMT
2000 -> 231.3 / 100M VMT
2010 -> 181.6 / 100M VMT
So while wireless connections increased roughly 56-fold from 1990 to 2010, the national police-reported-crash rate went down, not up.
Think about that fact...
====< #2 cut here for the next reference post >====
Newsgroups: alt.home.repair,comp.mobile.android,misc.phone.mobile.iphone,rec.autos.tech,rec.autos.driving
Subject: Re: Why do people claim cellphone use increased the USA accident rate?
Date: Sat, 19 Sep 2026 02:41:15 +0300
Message-ID: <118ki6q$1lni$1@nnrp.usenet.blueworldhosting.com>
AMuzi wrote:
On 9/17/2026 4:28 PM, Maria Sophia wrote:
Why do people claim cellphone use increased the accident rate in the USA? >>>
In a recent thread c.m.a/m.p.m.i on various carplay, androidauto, android >>> automotive and screen mirroring (sonicboom) solutions, an offshoot tangent >>> occurred when we theorized why factories don't just make automotive dash >>> systems a phone mirror so that a familiar interface is always on the dash. >>>
Like this:
<https://i.postimg.cc/k5gv0yw8/vysor34.jpg> Apple iOS & Android mirroring >>>
Some brought up technical issues, but really, there are none, while others >>> brought up safety issues, and for that, I'm sure there are legal issues. >>>
But, are those legal issues valid?
Q: Why do people claim cellphone use increased the USA accident rate?
A: ?
Note we're restricting this to the USA only because accurate data has been >>> compiled by the USA government on accident rates over the past 100 years. >>>
Note 1: Accident propaganda from the following will be deeply analyzed:
a. Law firms
b. Insurance companies
c. Law enforcement claims & politician claims
Note 2: Accident *rate* is what matters, not any given number of accidents, >>> over the period where cellphone ownership went from 0% to ~100%
Note 3: Fatalities and injuries, while deeply emotional, do not count
(because they are a second-order effect *after* the accident).
Note 4: Nobody claims "distracted driving" doesn't cause a large number
of accidents but distractions existed prior to cell phones and
distractions exist after cell phone became predominate, and yet, >>> in all the accurate accident-rate statistics, the rate simply
slowly trended downward year after year, before, during & after. >>>
Note 5: Paradoxically, cellphone hands-free laws were enacted in most
states but there is absolutely no correlation with accident rates >>> in those states, before, during or after the laws went into force. >>>
There was no blip whatsoever, in USA accident rate (for which accurate
statistics have been kept for over a century) which tells the true story. >>>
Given that, the question becomes...
Q: Why do people claim cellphone use increased the USA accident rate?
A: ?
There are many post-crash reports of semi and auto drivers
watching movies or porn or texting furiously as they
massacre innocents.
I agree that if people merely used the audio (as police and
truckers do with radios) there would not be a problem.
https://www.lifeasatrucker.com/trucker-caught-watching-porn-before-crash-that-killed-father-a-tragic-lesson-on-distraction.html
https://discover.swns.com/2025/09/shocking-dashcam-captures-woman-texting-at-wheel-before-crash/
Assuming no other factor was involved to cancel the arguments that people
are making, if their hypothesis is "cell phones cause accidents," then
the accident rate should have increased substantially at some point
during the introduction and widespread adoption of cell phones, right?
What's intuitively obvious is that most accidents are NOT caused by
cell phones. Speed, alcohol, weather, road conditions, vehicle
conditions, driver experience, etc. are all potential causes.
Even so, given that we know approximately when cell phones were
introduced into the USA, those who argue that cell phones meaningfully increased the USA accident rate have merely to show us valid USA
statistics which support that claim.
Here are the national numbers.
U.S. CELL PHONES, CRASHES, MILES & CRASH RATE
1988-2024
Crash rate = NHTSA estimated police-reported crashes / FHWA VMT
x 100 million.
Year Wireless Police-reported VMT Crashes/
connections* crashes billion 100M VMT ----------------------------------------------------------------
1988 2.07 M 6,886,800 2,026 339.9
1989 3.51 M 6,652,815 2,096 317.4
1990 5.28 M 6,471,202 2,144 301.8
1991 7.56 M 6,117,359 2,172 281.6
1992 11.03 M 6,000,310 2,247 267.0
1993 16.01 M 6,105,915 2,296 265.9
1994 24.13 M 6,495,988 2,358 275.5
1995 33.79 M 6,699,415 2,423 276.5
1996 44.04 M 6,769,583 2,500 270.8
1997 55.31 M 6,624,149 2,568 257.9
1998 69.21 M 6,334,573 2,645 239.5
1999 86.05 M 6,279,036 2,707 232.0
2000 109.48 M 6,393,624 2,764 231.3
2001 128.37 M 6,322,963 2,813 224.8
2002 140.77 M 6,315,708 2,874 219.8
2003 158.72 M 6,327,955 2,909 217.5
2004 182.14 M 6,181,027 2,982 207.3
2005 207.90 M 6,159,350 3,009 204.7
2006 233.04 M 5,973,213 3,034 196.9
2007 255.40 M 6,024,008 3,049 197.6
2008 270.33 M 5,810,846 2,993 194.1
2009 285.65 M 5,505,180 2,976 185.0
2010 296.29 M 5,419,445 2,985 181.6
2011 315.96 M 5,337,829 2,965 180.0
2012 326.48 M 5,615,045 2,969 189.1
2013 335.65 M 5,686,891 2,988 190.3
2014 355.45 M 6,064,284 3,040 199.5
2015 377.92 M 6,296,134 3,110 202.4
2016 ~387 M 6,821,129 3,174 214.9
2017 ~392 M 6,452,598 3,225 200.1
2018 ~413 M 6,734,681 3,255 206.9
2019 ~435 M 6,756,084 3,276 206.2
2020 ~461 M 5,251,006 2,917 180.0
2021 ~491 M 6,103,213 3,154 193.5
2022 ~515 M 5,930,697 3,197 185.5
2023 ~558 M 6,138,474 3,247 189.0
2024 -- 6,180,241 3,294 187.6
* Wireless figures are connections/subscriptions, NOT unique people.
A person can have multiple connections, so these numbers should not
be interpreted as "percentage of Americans who own a phone."
The historical CTIA series gives the exact annual wireless connection
numbers for the earlier period. For example:
1990 = 5,283,055
2000 =109,476,000 (approximately)
2010 =296,293,000 (approximately)
2015 =377,921,241
CTIA: <https://api.ctia.org/docs/default-source/default-document-library/ctia_survey_ye_2015_graphics.pdf>
NHTSA's national crash series begins in 1988. It is based on the
National Automotive Sampling System's General Estimates System (GES),
which estimated the number of police-reported crashes in the USA.
NHTSA:
<https://crashstats.nhtsa.dot.gov/Api/Public/ViewPublication/813375>
For the later years, NHTSA uses the Crash Report Sampling System
(CRSS).
NHTSA:
<https://crashstats.nhtsa.dot.gov/Api/Public/ViewPublication/813720>
FHWA provides the national vehicle-miles-traveled series.
FHWA: <https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/policyinformation/pubs/our_nations_highways_2026/travel.cfm>
There is a methodological break between GES and CRSS in 2016. NHTSA
states that the estimates from the two systems are not directly
comparable because their sampling designs differ.
Therefore, don't interpret the change from 2015 to 2016 as necessarily representing a real-world change in crashes.
The much cleaner comparison is entirely within the GES period:
WIRELESS CONNECTIONS
1990 5.3 million
2000 109.5 million
2010 296.3 million
CRASHES / 100M VMT
1990 301.8
2000 231.3
2010 181.6
So from 1990 to 2010, wireless connections increased approximately
56-fold.
During that same period, the national police-reported crash rate
declined from approximately 302 crashes per 100 million vehicle-miles
to approximately 182.
That's a decline of about 40%.
This does NOT prove that cell phones never cause individual accidents. Obviously, a driver can be distracted by a cell phone and crash.
It does, however, create a very simple empirical question for anyone
claiming that cell phones caused a substantial increase in the overall
U.S. accident rate:
Where is the corresponding increase in the NATIONAL ACCIDENT RATE?
The phones went from essentially nothing to hundreds of millions of connections.
The miles driven went up.
And the national crash rate, during the clean 1990-2010 GES period,
went DOWN substantially.
Think about that fact.
====< #3 cut here for the next reference post >====
Newsgroups: comp.mobile.android,misc.phone.mobile.iphone,rec.autos.tech,rec.autos.driving,alt.home.repair
Subject: Re: Why do people claim cellphone use increased the USA accident rate?
Date: Sat, 19 Sep 2026 02:56:33 +0300
Message-ID: <118kj3g$1k8h$1@nnrp.usenet.blueworldhosting.com>
Nick Charles wrote:
As someone who works in the science field, I can assure you statistics
don?t always tell the truth. The criteria are often cherry picked, the data >>> can easily be skewed if not collected in a controlled environment, and the >>> biases of the researchers often provide conclusions not necessarily
consistent with the raw data.
I think it?s pretty obvious if you look at drivers around you that
distracted driving is out of control and in turn it leads to erratic
driving. I trust personal anecdotes more than statistics in this case.
Cell phones are absolutely causing more accidents every day. But that does not
necessarily mean "more total accidents than before".
In the past, "distracted driving" was people changing radio stations and/or >> tapes in the tape deck, etc. Those days are long gone. Not to mention women
putting on makeup and looking at themselves in mirrors.
Today, "distracted driving" is texting/talking on the phone/changing your
Spotify list/changing your iTunes list/watching TV/etc. Not to mention women
are now looking at themselves in their phone front camera while putting on >> makeup.
So phones/iPads/whatever are definitely causing many/most/take your pick
accidents today. But the overall accident totals could be the same, or
statiscally not different.
So the statement "phones are causing more accidents every day" is perfectly >> valid. Extrapolating that into "Phones have increased the accident rate" is >> not valid or logical. Could be the same number of "distracted driving"
accidents. Just a different cause for the distraction.
Hi Nick,
If phones are causing a great number of accidents, we would expect it
to show up in the USA statistics on the number of accidents per mile
during the period just before, during & after the cellphone skyrocketing.
1. Pre-cellular baseline 1937-1982 No commercial US cellular service
2. Cellular introduced 1983 First commercial cellular service began
3. Early adoption 1984-1989 Cell phones existed but were still rare
4. Rapid adoption 1990-1999 Cellular subscriptions exploded
5. Mass adoption 2000-2004 >100 million U.S. wireless connections
6. Essentially ubiquitous 2005-2010 ~208M -> 296M wireless connections
7. Smartphone era 2011-present Smartphones become dominant
Yet, the accident rate went down, just as it had been trending for
decades, and still trends downward, which needs to be explained if
someone is claiming that skyrocketing cell phone ownership caused
concomitant skyrocketing cellphone related accidents which wouldn't have
been caused otherwise, right?
But we just showed the rates went down in the data for the United
States which has been compiled very accurately over decades in use.
Bear in mind there is one important limitation in that the NHTSA's
nationally estimated total-crash series begins in 1988.
For 1983-1987, we have federal national traffic data, but not the same
GES total-crash series, so, for sure, we need to understand the data.
What we can put together cleanly is this:
1983-2010: NATIONAL U.S. PICTURE
Period Year Wireless Crashes VMT Rate
connections billion /100M ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Cellular introduced 1983 ~0.2 M -- 1,653 --
Early adoption 1984 ~0.3 M -- 1,720 --
Early adoption 1985 0.34 M -- 1,775 --
Early adoption 1986 ~0.68 M -- 1,835 --
Early adoption 1987 ~1.2 M -- 1,921 --
Early adoption 1988 2.07 M 6,886,800 2,026 339.9
Early adoption 1989 3.51 M 6,652,815 2,096 317.4
Rapid adoption 1990 5.28 M 6,471,202 2,144 301.8
1991 7.56 M 6,117,359 2,172 281.6
1992 11.03 M 6,000,310 2,247 267.0
1993 16.01 M 6,105,915 2,296 265.9
1994 24.13 M 6,495,988 2,358 275.5
1995 33.79 M 6,699,415 2,423 276.5
1996 44.04 M 6,769,583 2,484 272.6
1997 55.31 M 6,624,149 2,578 257.0
1998 69.21 M 6,334,573 2,632 240.7
1999 86.05 M 6,279,036 2,691 233.3
Mass adoption 2000 109.5 M 6,393,624 2,767 231.0
2001 128.4 M 6,322,963 ~2,801 225.7
2002 140.8 M 6,315,708 ~2,874 219.8
2003 158.7 M 6,327,955 ~2,910 217.5
2004 182.1 M 6,181,027 ~2,982 207.3 Essentially ubiquitous 2005 207.9 M 6,159,350 ~3,009 204.7
2006 233.0 M 5,973,213 ~3,034 196.9
2007 255.4 M 6,024,008 ~3,049 197.6
2008 270.3 M 5,810,846 ~2,993 194.1
2009 285.7 M 5,505,180 ~2,976 185.0 Essentially ubiquitous 2010 296.3 M 5,419,445 ~2,985 181.6
The VMT figures for 1983-2000 are available directly from the--- Synchronet 3.22a-Linux NewsLink 1.2
Federal Highway Administration's historical series.
FHWA:
<https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/ohim/onh00/line9.htm>
The national crash estimates beginning in 1988 come from NHTSA's
GES series. The 1988 estimate is 6,886,800 crashes. The 2000
estimate is 6,393,624.
NHTSA: <https://www.nhtsa.gov/document/economic-impact-motor-vehicle-crashes-2000>
The wireless numbers for the early-adoption period and 1990s
come from the historical CTIA series.
Notice that this is the really important part when analyzing the dataset.
If we start the clean comparison at 1988, the progression is:
1988
2.1 million wireless connections
340 crashes / 100M VMT
1990
5.3 million
302 crashes / 100M VMT
2000
109.5 million
231 crashes / 100M VMT
2005
207.9 million
205 crashes / 100M VMT
2010
296.3 million
182 crashes / 100M VMT
So during the period when wireless connections went from roughly
2 million --> 296 million
the national police-reported crash rate went from approximately
340 --> 182 crashes per 100 million miles.
That's about a 46% decline in the crash rate.
And that's not using fatalities as a proxy. These are total
estimated police-reported crashes where you can't have a
From 1983-1987 is a bit harder because the dataset changed..
We have excellent national VMT:
1983: 1.653 trillion miles
1984: 1.720 trillion
1985: 1.775 trillion
1986: 1.835 trillion
1987: 1.921 trillion
FHWA:
<https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/ohim/onh00/line6.htm>
But for those years, it's harder to get comparative crash reports.
Luckily, 1988 is still extremely early in cellular adoption
where only about 2 million U.S. wireless connections existed, so
we can then follow the same national crash series through the
explosion to hundreds of millions of connections.
1. 1937-1982 -- Pre-cellular
Historical baseline/context.
2. 1983 -- Cellular introduced
First commercial U.S. cellular service.
3. 1984-1989 -- Early adoption
Still extremely few subscribers.
4. 1990-1999 -- Rapid adoption
~5M --> ~86M connections.
5. 2000-2004 -- Mass adoption
~109M --> ~182M connections.
6. 2005-2010 -- Essentially ubiquitous
~208M --> ~296M connections.
7. 2011-present -- Smartphone era.
For the actual crash-rate calculation, however, we have to
start around 1988, because that's where the nationally
estimated NHTSA total-crash series begins.
1988: 2.1M phones / 340 crashes per 100M miles
1990: 5.3M / 302 crashes per 100M miles
2000: 109.5M / 231 crashes per 100M miles
2010: 296.3M / 182 crashes per 100M miles
That is the cleanest first-order comparison of cellular adoption
versus total crash rate that the national data give us, where
the trend is clearly going down, not up.
So the hypothesis that cellphone ownership rates skyrocketing
caused accident rates to skyrocket, is busted, don't you think?
====< #4 cut here for the next reference post >====
Newsgroups: misc.phone.mobile.iphone,comp.mobile.android,rec.autos.tech,rec.autos.driving
Subject: Re: Why do people claim cellphone use increased the USA accident rate?
Date: Fri, 18 Sep 2026 10:58:17 +0300
Message-ID: <118iquo$kp0$1@nnrp.usenet.blueworldhosting.com>
Chris wrote:
Why do people claim cellphone use increased the accident rate in the USA? >>Before anyone responds you need to address three key flaws in your OP.
1. You present no data nor evidence. As a "trained scientist" - lol! - you >> should do better than that. A vague link is not enough. Be explicit
regarding what data there is, the source and what you think it supports and >> how.
2. Remember absence of proof is not proof of absence. A complex environment >> can mask one affect with another, competing, one.
3. An argument to say that we're always distracted and we shouldn't bother >> to target a solvable distraction isn't valid. All avoidable accidents and
deaths on the road should be targeted and reduced.
If you do not address all three points. There's no reason to engage with
this topic with you.
Hi Chris,
It's a perfectly valid question, especially since most people own purely religious belief systems which are not based on solid USA government facts.
Let's approach this problem, which, since most people only believe in the propaganda, clearly needs to be revisited, and with all the new valid data.
Let's look at the assessment by enumerating two sets of accurate facts.
A. Census gives us the accident numerator since at least way back to 1937.
B. FHWA has annual USA vehicle-miles-traveled all the way back to 1900.
C. The accidents divided by the miles driven gives us the accident rate.
While the overall trends matter, for the first-order assessment, we only need to look at the statistics during the time period of the cell phone.
2. Pre-cellular baseline 1937-1982 No commercial US cellular service
2. Cellular introduced 1983 First commercial cellular service began
3. Early adoption 1984-1989 Cell phones existed but were still rare
4. Rapid adoption 1990-1999 Cellular subscriptions exploded
5. Mass adoption 2000-2004 >100 million U.S. wireless connections
6. Essentially ubiquitous 2005-2010 ~208M -> 296M wireless connections
7. Smartphone era 2011-present Smartphones become dominant
Hence, I posit it's reasonable for us to look the accident rate from
January 1, 1983 (which we can reasonably define as the cellular era).
Here is more granular detail on the total USA wireless subscribers.
<https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/2001/compendia/statab/120ed/tables/sec18.pdf>
<https://www.ntia.gov/sites/default/files/mgallagher_isd2005_wireless_0.pdf>
<https://api.ctia.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Background_on_CTIA_Wireless_Industry_Survey_2020.pdf>
Roughly...
1990: 5.283 million wireless subscriber connections
1993: 16.009 million wireless subscriber connections
1994: 24.134 million wireless subscriber connections
1995: 33.786 million wireless subscriber connections
1996: 44.043 million wireless subscriber connections
1997: 55.312 million wireless subscriber connections
1998: 69.209 million wireless subscriber connections
1999: 86.047 million wireless subscriber connections
2000: ~109.5 million wireless subscriber connections
2001: ~128.4 million wireless subscriber connections
2002: ~140.8 million wireless subscriber connections
2003: ~158.7 million wireless subscriber connections
2004: ~182.1 million wireless subscriber connections
2005: ~207.9 million wireless subscriber connections
By 2005, that's roughly 70% of the U.S. population in subscriber connections.
By 2010 there were about 296 million wireless subscriber connections.
Questions we might ask ourselves BEFORE making any assessments, are
Q1: What was happening to the accident rate before cellular phones existed?
Q2: What happened to the accident rate during the 1983-2000 adoption curve?
Q3: What happened to the accident rate after cellular phones became commonplace?
1983 = existence.
1990s = adoption.
~2005-2010 = mass adoption.
2010s-2020s = smartphone era.
Since we're being scientific, what's our hypothesis if we BELIEVE that the cell phone caused accidents that wouldn't have happened prior to cell phones.
Is this the hypothesis we will strive to prove/disprove in our studies?
The introduction and increasing prevalence of cell phones caused
an increase in the rate of motor-vehicle accidents per vehicle-mile
traveled, above the rate that would otherwise have occurred.
That produces a very specific prediction, does it not:
If cell phones cause accidents that would not otherwise have occurred,
then, as cell-phone use spreads through the driving population,
the accident rate should increase relative to the pre-cellular baseline.
If, what almost everyone believes is true, is born out by facts, then
we should reasonably expect something like this in accident rate facts.
1937-1982 During this period we can perhaps establish the pre-cellular
accident-rate baseline and its natural variation/trend.
1983-1989 A change should begin to appear as cellular phones enter the
driving environment, although adoption is initially tiny.
1990-1999 As subscribers increase from ~5M to ~86M, accident rate should
show an upward departure from the pre-cellular trend if phones
are causing additional accidents.
2000-2004 With >100M connections, the upward effect should be more
apparent if the hypothesis is substantial.
2005-2010 With ~208M -> ~296M connections, the accident rate should
remain elevated or increase further if cell phones are
materially causing additional accidents.
2011-now With smartphones becoming dominant, any effect associated
with mobile-device distraction should at least persist.
The stronger test is:
Q: Did the accident rate after cellular adoption depart from the
trajectory that was already occurring before cellular adoption?
What do folks think about that being the starting point hypothesis?
If we proceed on that hypothesis, we should be able to assess the facts.
Your summaries are persuasive that crashes per vehicle mile have gone
down over the span of cellphone adoption. That does not suggest cellphone
use is benign while driving, rather that other innovations have been more influential. Adoption of ABS is one counterpoise to distracted and
unskilled driving.
On 9/23/26 17:45, Maria Sophia wrote:
There's no doubt that distractions cause a minor number of accidents.
I don't think anyone doubts that, but what's the major cause of
accidents?
-a a. Speeding
-a b. Intoxication
-a c. Failure to yield
d. spike protein
Turns out spike protein causes organ damage. The brain is an organ. You
do the math.
Culture has a lot to do with it too, another brain function.
"Between 2011 and 2021, U.S. traffic fatalities surged by roughly 33%,
while Canada experienced an 18% decline"
I've driven many times over 1000 clicks without hearing a single horn
and without seeing anyone block a badly planned merge just because the *monkey had the right of way*. U-tube is full of such Darwin laureates! Defensive driving is a science and an art, it means not being involved
in an accident even if someone wants to provoke one. Nor do you drive
like you were on a F1 circuit because all kinds of people use the roads; some with only one eye, some with bad legs, some just returning from the funeral of a loved one, some from the doctor's with the worst possible
news to digest.....
Why do people claim cellphone use increased the accident rate in the USA?
In misc.phone.mobile.iphone Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> wrote:
Questions we might ask ourselves BEFORE making any assessments, are
Q1: What was happening to the accident rate before cellular phones existed? >> Q2: What happened to the accident rate during the 1983-2000 adoption curve? >> Q3: What happened to the accident rate after cellular phones became commonplace?
1983 = existence.
1990s = adoption.
~2005-2010 = mass adoption.
2010s-2020s = smartphone era.
Since we're being scientific, what's our hypothesis if we BELIEVE that the >> cell phone caused accidents that wouldn't have happened prior to cell phones.
Is this the hypothesis we will strive to prove/disprove in our studies?
The introduction and increasing prevalence of cell phones caused
an increase in the rate of motor-vehicle accidents per vehicle-mile
traveled, above the rate that would otherwise have occurred.
That produces a very specific prediction, does it not:
If cell phones cause accidents that would not otherwise have occurred,
then, as cell-phone use spreads through the driving population,
the accident rate should increase relative to the pre-cellular baseline.
If, what almost everyone believes is true, is born out by facts, then
we should reasonably expect something like this in accident rate facts.
1937-1982 During this period we can perhaps establish the pre-cellular
accident-rate baseline and its natural variation/trend.
1983-1989 A change should begin to appear as cellular phones enter the
driving environment, although adoption is initially tiny.
1990-1999 As subscribers increase from ~5M to ~86M, accident rate should
show an upward departure from the pre-cellular trend if phones
are causing additional accidents.
2000-2004 With >100M connections, the upward effect should be more
apparent if the hypothesis is substantial.
2005-2010 With ~208M -> ~296M connections, the accident rate should
remain elevated or increase further if cell phones are
materially causing additional accidents.
2011-now With smartphones becoming dominant, any effect associated
with mobile-device distraction should at least persist.
The stronger test is:
Q: Did the accident rate after cellular adoption depart from the
trajectory that was already occurring before cellular adoption?
What do folks think about that being the starting point hypothesis?
If we proceed on that hypothesis, we should be able to assess the facts.
Main critical question is what else is going on within the automative industry or elsewhere that may affect accident rates.
Also how useful are the data being used to make conclusions? Just because data have been collected for a long time doesn't mean they are necessarily useful for the purpose at hand. The onus is on you to demonstrate that your data has any hope to reveal the outcomes you're looking for. For example,
can you prove with your data that the introduction of ABS reduced
accidents?
For example your very much lauded accident data is based on police surveys. Surveys are universally known to be biased and only a sample of the truth. Given that most "fender benders" don't involve the police, how does that affect your assertions.
Many posts back I gave you the exact data required to answer your question reliably. Did you ever bother to see if it exists?
1983 = existence.
1990s = adoption.
~2005-2010 = mass adoption.
2010s-2020s = smartphone era.
Since we're being scientific, what's our hypothesis if we BELIEVE that the >>> cell phone caused accidents that wouldn't have happened prior to cell phones.
That's not scientific. You're prejudging the results ahead of the
experiment.
Is this the hypothesis we will strive to prove/disprove in our studies?
The introduction and increasing prevalence of cell phones caused
an increase in the rate of motor-vehicle accidents per vehicle-mile
traveled, above the rate that would otherwise have occurred.
That produces a very specific prediction, does it not:
If cell phones cause accidents that would not otherwise have occurred,
then, as cell-phone use spreads through the driving population,
the accident rate should increase relative to the pre-cellular baseline.
Only if no other outside factors are compensating and that you're able to observe the change with the methods chosen.
If, what almost everyone believes is true, is born out by facts, then
we should reasonably expect something like this in accident rate facts.
1937-1982 During this period we can perhaps establish the pre-cellular
accident-rate baseline and its natural variation/trend.
1983-1989 A change should begin to appear as cellular phones enter the
driving environment, although adoption is initially tiny.
1990-1999 As subscribers increase from ~5M to ~86M, accident rate should >>> show an upward departure from the pre-cellular trend if phones
are causing additional accidents.
2000-2004 With >100M connections, the upward effect should be more
apparent if the hypothesis is substantial.
2005-2010 With ~208M -> ~296M connections, the accident rate should
remain elevated or increase further if cell phones are
materially causing additional accidents.
2011-now With smartphones becoming dominant, any effect associated
with mobile-device distraction should at least persist.
You're assuming a linear and direct relationship between mobile phone ownership and use while driving. There are other models available. Where's the evidence your assumption holds.
The stronger test is:
Q: Did the accident rate after cellular adoption depart from the
trajectory that was already occurring before cellular adoption?
What do folks think about that being the starting point hypothesis?
The above isn't a (testable) hypothesis. It's a simply a question.
If we proceed on that hypothesis, we should be able to assess the facts.
Experiments do not provide facts. They generate evidence.
The fact you're having to resort to the absurd to answer straightforward question tells us you're unwilling and/or incapable of having a rational discussion.
1. Police-reported motor-vehicle crashes (reported for over a century)
2. Divided by FHWA annual national vehicle-miles traveled statistics
3. Over 30-years of cellphone ownership skyrocketing (~1985 to ~2015)
The data is good data.
That's simply an opinion.
The accident rate was simply unaffected by the skyrocketing cellphone
ownership rates during those years...
You've not demonstrated that.
Chris wrote:
Main critical question is what else is going on within the automative
industry or elsewhere that may affect accident rates.
Also how useful are the data being used to make conclusions? Just because
data have been collected for a long time doesn't mean they are necessarily >> useful for the purpose at hand. The onus is on you to demonstrate that your >> data has any hope to reveal the outcomes you're looking for. For example,
can you prove with your data that the introduction of ABS reduced
accidents?
For example your very much lauded accident data is based on police surveys. >> Surveys are universally known to be biased and only a sample of the truth. >> Given that most "fender benders" don't involve the police, how does that
affect your assertions.
Many posts back I gave you the exact data required to answer your question >> reliably. Did you ever bother to see if it exists?
1983 = existence.
1990s = adoption.
~2005-2010 = mass adoption.
2010s-2020s = smartphone era.
Since we're being scientific, what's our hypothesis if we BELIEVE that the >>>> cell phone caused accidents that wouldn't have happened prior to cell phones.
That's not scientific. You're prejudging the results ahead of the
experiment.
Only if no other outside factors are compensating and that you're able toIs this the hypothesis we will strive to prove/disprove in our studies? >>>> The introduction and increasing prevalence of cell phones caused
an increase in the rate of motor-vehicle accidents per vehicle-mile
traveled, above the rate that would otherwise have occurred.
That produces a very specific prediction, does it not:
If cell phones cause accidents that would not otherwise have occurred, >>>> then, as cell-phone use spreads through the driving population,
the accident rate should increase relative to the pre-cellular baseline. >>
observe the change with the methods chosen.
If, what almost everyone believes is true, is born out by facts, then >>>> we should reasonably expect something like this in accident rate facts. >>>>
1937-1982 During this period we can perhaps establish the pre-cellular >>>> accident-rate baseline and its natural variation/trend.
1983-1989 A change should begin to appear as cellular phones enter the >>>> driving environment, although adoption is initially tiny.
1990-1999 As subscribers increase from ~5M to ~86M, accident rate should >>>> show an upward departure from the pre-cellular trend if phones
are causing additional accidents.
2000-2004 With >100M connections, the upward effect should be more
apparent if the hypothesis is substantial.
2005-2010 With ~208M -> ~296M connections, the accident rate should
remain elevated or increase further if cell phones are
materially causing additional accidents.
2011-now With smartphones becoming dominant, any effect associated
with mobile-device distraction should at least persist.
You're assuming a linear and direct relationship between mobile phone
ownership and use while driving. There are other models available. Where's >> the evidence your assumption holds.
The stronger test is:
Q: Did the accident rate after cellular adoption depart from the
trajectory that was already occurring before cellular adoption?
What do folks think about that being the starting point hypothesis?
The above isn't a (testable) hypothesis. It's a simply a question.
Experiments do not provide facts. They generate evidence.If we proceed on that hypothesis, we should be able to assess the facts. >>
The claim that aliens
exactly manipulated the rate for 30 years, and then
stopped, by exactly counterbalancing the accidents, is so absurd as to indicate desperation on the part of anyone who makes that ridiculous claim.
FACTS:
1. Police-reported motor-vehicle crashes (reported for over a century)
2. Divided by FHWA annual national vehicle-miles traveled statistics
3. Over 30-years of cellphone ownership skyrocketing (~1985 to ~2015)
The data is good data.
The accident rate was simply unaffected by the skyrocketing cellphone ownership rates during those years...
Chris wrote:
The fact you're having to resort to the absurd to answer straightforward
question tells us you're unwilling and/or incapable of having a rational
discussion.
You're the one claiming something absolutely fantastical changed the data. Not me.
You hate that there is no good data on the planet that backs up your point
of view, which means, obviously, your point of view isn't based on fact.
You're the one claiming something absolutely fantastical changed the data. >> Not me.
Remind me. Who keeps bringing up aliens?
If you can't cope with normal scientific inquiry then stop pretending this
is anything more than self-serving axe-grinding on your part.
You hate that there is no good data on the planet that backs up your point >> of view, which means, obviously, your point of view isn't based on fact.
Carlos highlighted several scientific studies which provided a lot of evidence of the harms of mobile phone use while driving.
Of course you ignored them. You're simply wilfully ignorant which is worse than being an idiot.
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