I am not here to debate the dangers of drunk driving, however, an interesting thought came to mind while conversing in a recently started pit thread about my driving misbehaviors (I already contended that my behavior was dangerous to others , so this isn’t about that).
We have a lot of studies (sorry, I don’t have cites, but I’ve seen videos) showing driving drunk impairs a lot of function and makes you dangerous - controlled studies where impaired drivers drive a closed course. We also have a lot of statistics about nighttime accidents and the percetange of drivers involved being drunk (If I remember correctly, 25% was a number I heard, any cites?).
Now, the latter kind of study seems utterly dubious to me. In fact, the number seems completely meaningless unless you have some sort of information about how many people drove drunk and didn’t crash. Have there ever been studies on this?
It just seems that it would be reasonable that drivers who are a little impaired but not too much will drive significantly more carefully than even the unimpaired drivers, thereby I would expect that on average, impaired drivers would be less likely to get into an accident than sober drivers. With the graph having exponentially higher risk at high levels of impairment and somewhat lower risk at lower levels of impairment, and I would expect the majority of impaired drivers to be at a lower level of impairment. Any stats on that?
I don’t really have any personal experience in the matter other than I’ve been a passenger with a drunk driver dozens of times, so I don’t really know what the reality is.
Well, if they didn’t get into a crash and weren’t pulled over, there is going to be no record of them driving drunk. It’s like trying to estimate the actual number of rapes that occur - you can’t measure something that is unreported.
I highly disagree with your assertion that drunk drivers are more careful. They may spend more energy concentrating on the act of driving, but that is because they are impaired. That doesn’t make them more careful, and indeed, cannot, since by definition they are physically impaired, and have a slower reaction time regardless of how hard they are concentrating. You can’t sober up by concetrating.
Well, I see where you’re coming from, but my point is that even know your reaction time and motor skills are a little impaired, does not necessarily mean you are more likely to be in an accident. Distraction is a major factor as well, and I don’t know if there have been studies done on effects of mild alcohol consumption on attention.
If you’re sober and not watching where you’re going, no reaction time or motor skills are going to save you because by the time you realize you’re about to crash it might be too late.
I am asking if there have been studies that show that mildly impaired drivers realize their condition and the increased risk and perhaps OVERCOMPENSATE their attention and control, making them safer drivers than their sober counterparts.
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Well, I see where you’re coming from, but my point is that even know your reaction time and motor skills are a little impaired, does not necessarily mean you are more likely to be in an accident.
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And if I look down the barrel of a loaded gun, it doesn’t necessarily mean I am going to get shot in the face, but it sure improves the odds.
Much the same way, if you’re reaction time is impaired, it significantly improves the odds of you getting in an accident.
If you’ve ever drank, I assume you are well aware that you have to work harder to concentrate on things when your thinking is impaired.
Irrelevant, because earlier you explicity stated a hypothesis that drunk drivers were less likely to be in an accident because they pay closer attention.
Sure are none that I know of. No matter how close attention they are paying, it will NOT correct for impaired judgement and slower reaction times.
Umm, yes it will. If you keep further away from the cars around you, and become more aware of your surroundings and the potential for danger, that could definitely compensate for slower reaction time. Say the car in front of me slams on its brakes. If I’m sober and driving 2 seconds behind it and not paying any more attention than I usually do, I could easily not see it right away and rear-end the car. But if I’m five seconds away and paying insanely close attention to everything because I’ve had a few beers and have a BAC of 0.08, I’m going to see that car brake as soon as it happens, and (while it might take me an extra second or two due to physical impairment) I’m going to be way less likely to hit that car than Sober Average Driving Me.
Alcohol is not some magic bullet that immediately voids any and all ability to drive you once had. A small degree of physical impairment can be compensated for with more careful and attentive driving. I have heard before (no cite, just a vague recollection) that the vast majority of drunk driving problems come from those who are super-drunk. These are the people too impaired to even realize they’re fucking up, the people whose BAC is two or three times higher than the legal limit.
DISCLAIMER: I do not encourage drunk driving, or any other illegal activities (especially downloading music!) but being hysterical about the dangers is not something I encourage either. Just because driving at 0.08 is illegal and dangerous does not mean we can’t have a rational discussion about it.
Driving itself is an inherently dangerous activity. Consumption of alcohol beforehand makes it more dangerous. The more you drink, the worse off you are. There’s lots of other things you can do to increase or decrease your risks while driving, and paying acute attention to the road is right at the top of that list.
OK, I am going to nominate this as the 2nd stupidest idea put forth in this thread so far.
At a BAC of 0.08 you are impared to the point of thing that Al Unser is no match for you. You are in the bulletproof phase of drunkeness. That is if you are paying attention at all.
Several years back Car and Driver did a series of tests to find out if 0.10 or 0.08 (just coming into vogue at the time IIRC) was too low a limit. So they took some cars, some breathalyzers and headed out to a track. Test were runs sober (baseline) and after drinking. Each drink was allowed to be absorbed into the blood stream before each turn behind the wheel, and each BAC measurement. By 0.04 most testers felt that they were way out of control. They were knocking down cones (Lining the track), and their lap times sucked. By the time they got to 0.08 most of them could not hit the floor with their hats. The cones were in mortal danger.
At the end of the test all of the participants felt that 0.08 was way too high to safely drive a car.
I dont have a link (I got this info from work) but closed course the only drug tested that didnt increase the chances of crashing (they tested drunk drivers and stoned (pot) and at least one other that I am blanking on) was pot, the stoned driver did just fine on the course other than the fact that he was driving about 15mph slower than the base test done while sober.
heres the thing about driving drunk. your reaction time is slowed to the point where the following can happen.
sober driver: sees cross traffic car and hits brakes stopping in time to avoid crash.
Drunk driver: sees crosstraffic car and hits brakes only to witnesses what really happens is Drunk crashes into crosstraffic car then his brake lights come on. he doesnt even know hes been in a crash til seconds AFTER its already happened.
seriously how many times do you have to hear about a dumbfuck drunk who kills a child or a familly or anyone to realise that alcohol and driving is a bad combination, if you cant react properly to the unexpected you shouldnt be behind the wheel.
an ex GF of mine was in a crash with her mom, dad, and little Brother where a drunk ran a light and t-boned them. dad died at the scene, mom suffered some brain damage that basically left her partally senile the GF had some spinal injuries that she was still dealing with years later, dont know about the little bro.
iirc the guy was just over leagaly drunk.
I belive that you are exaggerating slightly. 0.08 is not illegal in many places, and the BAC is, sensibly, set a little lower than the point where an individual is obviously intoxicated.
IIRC the feds leaned on all of the states to lower their DUI limit from 0.10 to 0.08 a while back. The threat of the withdrawl of federal highway funds was the stick they used. So IIRC here in the US 0.08 is the rule. I do know that if you go to Sweden the limit is 0.02.
As far as your assertion that 0.08 is not obviously intoicated all I can say is cite please.
I don’t know how to cite something about “obviously intoxicated” or not, but here’s the California BAC chart (it’s only a rough guideline, but still): here
According to that if you are a 210 lbs male and you have 4 drinks quickly and then measure your BAC it’s going to blow 0.08. I don’t know about you, but a person who’s had 4 drinks is usually not obviously intoxicated to me, maybe because I hang out with too many alcoholics.
They don’t have to be drooling on themselves in order to be too drunk to drive. When you are flying down a freeway at 80mph talking into your cell phone, reaction time is vital. That guy is the guy thinks he’s totally ok to drive, and winds up with his car sticking out of the broadside of a schoolbus.
No, I know that, I’m just picking at the “obviously intoxicated” bit. I’ve aced midterms in college before in a condition where I would definitely not be able to drive. I was still able to walk straight and appear sober though.
I agree. Body weight, food consumption, experience driving, driving in daytime or nightime, raining or clear, and probably many other things, should be taken into consideration when considering impairment. I’ve known people who were ticketed unjustly for four or five beers after work. Big burly costruction workers who stuffed themselves with food while drinking. I dunno, the laws just need to be looked at closer.
People think that getting having five beers after work and getting ticketed for it is unjust? No wonder drunk driving is still such a big problem. The usual rule of thumb is to wait an hour per drink. OK, so that’s only a rule of thumb, so maybe big construction workers would be fine after half an hour or 45 minutes. Maybe. But even so, I doubt these guys are waiting 3 hours for the drinks to wear off.
The problem with the “slightly drunk drivers drive more carefully” argument is that they don’t. One of the major dangerous effects of alcohol is that it impairs your judgement. That is to say, it makes you more likely to do foolish things. It does not make you more likely to do sensible things.
I wasn’t saying they weren’t intoxicated, merely that they weren’t obviously so. The most important factor in a DWI arrest is the policeman’s detrmination, through observation, that you are intoxicated. If you refuse the breathalizer you can still be convicted of DWI (in addition to losing your license for refusing the breathalizer).
MADD has a page devoted to drinking and driving statistics and laws: http://www.madd.com/stats
According to their data, approximately 40% of traffic fatalities are drunk-driving related. I think the idea that someone can have 4 drinks in an hour or two and not be impaired is stupid. After a single drink you are already impaired. That doesn’t mean that you are a stumbling mess but absolutely your driving will be affected. And the #1 concern is reaction times and observation. I don’t care if you think you’re driving even better than usual because you’re paranoid; it doesn’t matter because you can be driving your very best and have totally missed the fact that you went the wrong way down a one way street, or are about to miss your exit, or that someone just pulled along next to you. That’s the way it works - the drunk driver often doesn’t even know how or what happened.
As for the comment about hanging out with people who drink four drinks and seem fine - try being totally sober and observing the same group. You will notice a difference, believe me.
MADD is not an unbiased source. They are a neo-prohibitionist radical movement, similar in their ability to engage in rational thinking to PETA, ELF/ALF, KKK and Fred Phelps. I’m not disputing the validity of the cite, but I would not rely upon it. If you doubt this, try researching the PETA vs. MADD beer vs. milk conflict that arose a few years ago.
I have many times. I’m taking medication that prevents me from drinking and have had plenty of opportunity to do just that recently.
Bingo! And as already stated, it slows your reaction time as well as reduces your attention span so even if you are being “careful” you really can’t be as careful as a sober person who is being careful. Just because someone isn’t visibly intoxicated (presumably you mean stubling around and punching people in the face) does not mean their reaction time isn’t off.
And believe me, I know what I am talking about. My friends and I used to drive drunk quite a bit when we were younger. Not smashed really, but enough so that we shouldn’t have. Typically the “designated driver” would drink his beer at a casually pace and then stop an hour or so before closing. Obviously this is a little dangerous as it’s easy to lose track.
Yes, we managed to make it home without incident, but it’s more a matter of luck and the fact that there’s not a lot of traffic at 3:00 am.
The reality is that a lot of people do drive drunk, especially at night. Most drivers on the road after midnight probably either a) have been drinking or b) are coming from a bar or party other alchohol related activity.
IOW you’re better off just sucking it up and either taking a cab or limiting yourself to 0-1 drink every hour and no more than a handful of drinks.