h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Didn't know that. Can't have been easy. Wonder if that's where the notion that women are bad drivers came from?

TR, you might be interested in a conversation thread called "I'm gonna raise a mass theological debate here: God; fact, or fiction".

If so, you can access it via my space.

Bod.

Disclaimer: whilst it is true that the average man has better spatial awareness than the average woman (biological fact), I think that the average woman is a better driver than the average man, the main reason being that extra caution arising from the average woman being less aggressive than the average man (that whole pesky testosterone thing) outweighs the spatial awareness thing.

I try to avoid discussions of whether God exists or not.
For my particular mental health, I need to assume that there is a guiding or, at least, a pervasive force in the universe.
That gives me a base line to compare events and philosophies against.
The version of deity that is presented in the Bible is the particular philosophy that I deal with on a daily basis because I think that a culture that purports to believe in something, such as a book, should actually be reading that book and have some small knowledge of where it comes from.

Women drivers are also a discussion I choose to avoid, because in my experience, there are many people who shouldn't be driving, regardless of sex, myself foremost among them.

There oughta be a law against people like me driving.
I am easily distracted.
I am startled by bright lights and rapidly moving objects.
I hate speed and heights.
I have no directional sense.
And any place I have to go, I'm probably better off not going there, cause I probably do not know what I am doing when I get there.

Actually, I agree with both of you. There are some people who should not be driving, and men and women, generally speaking, have those characteristics. I've seen the research findings.

Interestingly, men tend to class themselves as more skillful than safe and women as more safe than skillful and so women tend to have fewer and less serious accidents. Men who are more likely to have accidents engage in 'deliberate law violations', such as speeding, jumping the lights, close and aggressive following, etc. Women are more likely to have accidents as a result of carelessness or misjudgements. However, as women have lighter bodyframes, they are more likely to be more seriously injured in the same type of accident (ie an accident of equal seriousness).

Various government bodies in the early days of automobiles considered them to be trackless railroad engines.
The regulatory tests and requirements were reflective of the attitude that the vehicle was a big smelly dangerous piece of machinery.

Apparently, over the past century, under pressure from the investors who needed to sell a lot of the things in order to make a profit, the regulations have been dumbed down to where all you have to do is pass a couple of tests, none of which require the 'driver' to learn about the motor, the tires, the complexity of the vehicle.

So, you have people who believe that is is their 'right' to drive and so they do, like they were racing, or plowing....

Considering that an automobile is, in many cases, more dangerous than a shotgun... It is sad that they are so taken for granted.

I am scared of them.