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this post was submitted on 21 Sep 2023
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Feel free to correct me, but I’m reading “Darwin applies here” as “the guy was too dumb to live longer”, which I think would be pretty insensitive. Regardless, I don’t think it’s fair at all to invoke Darwin here.
This article paints a better picture of the driver’s perspective. It was late at night and rainy, so vision was obscured and allegedly “pitch black”. Furthermore I’d argue the average driver doesn’t have a reason to believe that Google Maps would direct them over a collapsed bridge, much less one that’d collapsed 10 years ago, so it’d be easier to say “Can’t see a damn thing, I’ll trust Maps”.
I obviously don’t know the guy at all, and the details above were taken from the lawsuit afaik so they can make any claim they want, but with so little other information I think it’s fair to paint this more as a tragedy than as “natural selection”, even if you don’t want to hold Google or any of the bridge property managers responsible.
Plus, the guy had a wife and 2 kids, and was driving home late from cleaning up from his daughter’s birthday party; I think he deserves a bit more respect than that.
“Cant see, trust the map and keep driving” is like an even dumber birdbox challenge.
You know something. If vision is poor. You are legally required to slow to the point you can safly stop within your visual range.
If for example its late at night. And some little old lady crossing the road falls and knocks herself out.
As a qualified driver you are responsible if you crush her head. Not h poor old lady. Sorry I could not see her on the road is not an acceptable excuse. If you cannot see whas in front of ou. Your inconvenience in no way outweighs your responsibility as a driver.
The average driver dose not in any way shape or form have a legal right to abdicate their responsibility to google.
If he was driving towards the bridge without the ability to see it was out. He was driving in a way that means any pedestrian was t risk from his actions.
I’m not talking about the level of responsibility he has as the driver of the vehicle, I’m talking about the degree to which it’s okay to mock him (post-mortem, I might add).
It sounds like you’d argue that Google Maps and the bridge managers should win this lawsuit (assuming this even goes to court) under ACDA laws. Maybe you’re right. But there’s a large gap between just saying that, and then also saying “this is natural selection taking its course”.
Say that about the dude that sticks his dick in an electrical socket, or the guy that shoots himself because a magic 8-ball affirmed that he was bullet-proof. Don’t say it about a guy who probably just drove a little too fast, with visibility a little too low, a little too confident that a GPS system wouldn’t guide him over a literal cliff.
As far as I’m concerned, this was a preventable tragedy, yes preventable by more cautious driving, but also by better GPS, or by barricades, or by so much as a visible warning sign.
They will win this lawsuit. Its happe ed multiple times whe folks drove into lakes etc. Was a common issue in the early days of GPS navigation. And is proove n again and again that navigation systems are not responsible for your inability to look where you are driving.
As for bridge repair. Well apparently this was a privrate road. But if not. Whike there is grounds to sue the authority for failing to do thier job. Seems very unlikely they can be held accountable for the inability of the driver to stop within his visual range. I have been licenced (before losing my vision) in both the US and UK. Passing test in both. As crap as the US test was. Stopping distances and the effect rain and visibility has was clearly mentioned i the question pool.
Unequivocally, Darwin .
Look, if the guy was doing 80 on a backroad in pitch black, you’d probably be right, fair?
If the guy was driving a little too fast, so maybe 15-20, and couldn’t imagine GPS would successfully guide him over an un-barricaded, warning sign-less cliff, I think he deserves a little more slack. If you disagree, then take the stand as a character witness in the trial, for all I care.