xkcd #2940: Modes of Transportation
Title Text:
My bold criticism might anger the hot air balloon people, which would be a real concern if any of them lived along a very narrow line directly upwind of me.
alt-text:
A chart that categorizes various modes of transportation based on their practicality and danger level:
Zone of Practicality:
- Trains
- Airliners
- Boats
- Walking
- Cars
- Scooters
- Bicycles
Zone of Specialty and Recreational Vehicles:
- Motorcycles
- Helicopters
- Light aircraft
- Go karts
- Skateboards
- Rollerblades
- Skis
- Unicycles
- Sleds
- Bumper cars
?????:
- Hot air balloons
“Hot air balloons are the optimal mode of transportation, if your optimization algorithm has a sign error.”
I think you underestimate the number of trips per car per day. Most people will take more trips by car per month than they will fly for their lifetime. In Sweden , a country of 10 million, we have about 150 people killed per year from car accidents, yet most adults travel by car daily. That is millions of trips per day, and only half a death.
Yes, and how many die every year from plane crashes in sweden?
If we take a relatively big plane (450 passengers) as an example. One has to fall out of the sky every 3. Years to match the car accident number...
3186 deaths over 10 years VS 1.19 million every year.
(This is globally. Sweden and Norway(where i live) will naturally have pretty radically lower numbers then globally when it comes to road safety.)
But look at that air travel number again: 3186. Over 10 years. Globally. Commercial Air travel is fucking safe. Its horrible for the climate. But its safe.
Whatever way you slice those numbers it comes up air travel i safer. Feel free to find actual statistics that contradict me. :)
Just check the stats https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aviation_safety#Transport_comparisons
Very interesting 🤔
And your point about metrics is pretty spot on.
In the end it becomes an exercise in trying to find the metric that best supports your argument.
We have also been jumping around a bit on geographical limitations. And in for instance Scandinavia, the original premise might be closer to real due to better road safety.
I think implying some sort of myth or ruse is missing the mark hard on this subject.