The Laws of Physics Trump Traffic Laws 378
New submitter HeLLFiRe1151 sends this quote from Physics Central:
"Here's a practical application for your physics education: using math to successfully beat a traffic ticket in court. Dmitri Krioukov, a physicist based at the University of California San Diego, did just that to avoid paying a fee for (purportedly) running a stop sign. Krioukov not only proved his innocence, but he also posted a paper detailing his argument online (PDF) on the arXiv server."
Re:Partially Blocked View (Score:5, Insightful)
We only have his word that he actually stopped. It would be more correct to say that another car explains why there are multiple scenarios explaining what the officer thought he saw. The only way this really relates to traffic (or other) laws is that western law specifically handles multiple scenarios by stating that the burden of proof is on the accuser to show that the scenario they outlined meets a requisite threshold. Physics is not trumping anything, it merely allows one to illustrate in this case some of those alternatives.
Re:No, you don't know if I was "running a stop sig (Score:5, Insightful)
The vast majority of stop signs are stupid and should be replaced with yield signs.
Re:Partially Blocked View (Score:5, Insightful)
by stating that the burden of proof is on the accuser to show that the scenario they outlined meets a requisite threshold
That threshold, in traffic court, is usually just the officer saying so... not actually proving it. So in this case physics effectively trumped SOP.
Re:Big Bang (Score:4, Insightful)
Are you sure this isn't a plot line the Big Bang Sitcom?
No. This story is vaguely interesting.
Re:I was going to try something similar... (Score:4, Insightful)
Cry me a river. Tell them to be big girls, and cough up some objective evidence.
Tired of this constant bullsh*t in traffic court.
Re:Partially Blocked View (Score:5, Insightful)
Physics explained what the officer saw (or thought he saw) but another car explains what the officer didn't see (Krioukov stopping at the stop sign).
The officer didn't observe him not stopping at the stop sign. The officer ASSUMED he did not stop based on the state of the car he observed before his was obstructed, and the state of the car he observed after it was no longer obstructed.
The officer should be disciplined for taking that shortcut and citing based on a supposed occurence that were not actually directly observed.
Re:I was going to try something similar... (Score:5, Insightful)
No, they'd spend 15s a day pushing the timestamp button, which each time would automatically attach the previous 30s of video to the electronic record for the citation.
Just because something would be time consuming to do with the *current* equipment doesn't mean that it would be time consuming with *proper* equipment.
Utter Sophistry (Score:4, Insightful)
This argument is a shameless piece of sophistry.
It's central argument is "I did stop; a car just passed in front of me and you didn't see.". This is then expanded into 4 pages of unnecessary and probably disingenuous over-analysis.
The entire argument breaks down in FIG 5. Leaving aside this nonsense of measuring angular speed(The human brain interpolates just fine), the author compares two curves in which the equated angular speeds of the car do not translate into the same linear speed. Indeed, at the occlusion point at t~1.5 s, the car corressponding to the blue curve would be travelling at 15m/s, verses the car at constant 8m/s that it is being compared to.
And this is even before we begin talking about how the author is really comparing a car at constant speed to one which reverses back into the stop sign and then drives forward.
I think this kind of thing is described as "sophomoric", and in that that word describes a second year student who is full of their own knowledge with no concept of their own ignorance, I would have to label it as such. The cop was right, pay your ticket Mr. Krioukov, and don't darken the door of the maths department for a very long time.
Re:I was going to try something similar... (Score:5, Insightful)
Which just proves that in many cases tickets are more of a revenue source than they are an enforcement mechanism.
Also the reason why they like to screw with yellow lights to make it harder to stop in time.
Re:This is an April Fool joke (Score:5, Insightful)
I tried to argue a reckless driving ticket using math and physics when I was younger. I was in the right and proved it conclusively based on the officers statement, but the back-woods judge just changed the charge to a misdemeanor and fined me anyhow for "anything you might have done in my county". When I asked about appealing his decision, the judge pointed out that it would cost $300 and him being the only judge, he'd probably say the same thing next time. If the court's looking to collect some money, the court's going to collect that money one way or another.
Re:go catch real crooks cops (Score:3, Insightful)
Traffic cop is ultimately one of the most important law enforcement jobs in America. They serve more arrest warrants than anybody else and are the ones most likely to be visible to the population at large. Now, if the officer didn't see the car drive through without stopping, then the ticket shouldn't have been issued.
Re:Actually.. (Score:5, Insightful)
That seem a rather complicated way (Score:4, Insightful)
of arguing "I did stop, but the officer's view was obstructed by another vehicle and hence he couldn't have seen whether I did or did not" and having the officer agree that his view was obstructed.
Re:I was going to try something similar... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Partially Blocked View (Score:4, Insightful)
And that the officer totally missed the difference in position between a car that sails through an intersection as opposed to one that both decelerates to a full stop and accelerates fully up to speed over a period of about 3 seconds,
Hmmm. Maybe...
But I'd really like to see this demonstrated. It would make an interesting project. Mythbusters?
Re:go catch real crooks cops (Score:3, Insightful)
I wish cops would just not pick people on the little tiny things and just let things slide, unless its BLOODY obvious.
Cops shouldn't let things slide they should just be more certain when they issue a ticket. IE they should not make an assumption about a violation, they should actually witness it (or get testimony from a witness). Ever been driving and wonder if someone on a cross street is going to stop? Unwittingly, many people that roll stop signs slow down cross traffic resulting in delaying when the 'roller' would be able to pull out if they had just stop so everyone knows what they are doing. People who only use their blinker 'when necessary' never see the person they nearly hit because no one knew what the hell they were doing.
Re:JUDGE by SKYPE (Score:5, Insightful)
Its way overdue for teachers to be obsolete, except helping the 'challenged' few, s burn those text books, put all courses online and exams online, and marking online, what a teachers for again? Keeping the peace? taking roll calls?
Making sure YOU took the test.
The simple version (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:go catch real crooks cops (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Partially Blocked View (Score:4, Insightful)
And that the officer totally missed the difference in position between a car that sails through an intersection as opposed to one that both decelerates to a full stop and accelerates fully up to speed over a period of about 3 seconds,
I wondered if someone would bring that up. The angular velocity profiles might look similar during the non-obstructed portions, but their integral will not. Could be that a clever prof just used physics to confuse the crap out of a layperson and get out of a "California stop" (ie, a little flash of red tail light, and proceed on your way) ?
Re:Partially Blocked View (Score:5, Insightful)
But many of these cases are moving violations and not subject to jury trials. How do would one go about doing what you say in those cases?
This would never fly in Texas (Score:5, Insightful)
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:go catch real crooks cops (Score:4, Insightful)
While I agree with you about inappropriate policing priorities, I have to say I find your actions in abusing privileged access to a database to be more offensive than those of the person who broke into your car. Your friend at the DCJS who committed that "minor violation" should have been fired and prosecuted. The fact that you were right in the end does not justify the means, and we must never allow that kind of rationalisation to excuse abuse of public trust when officials have access to sensitive personal information.
Re:Actually.. (Score:4, Insightful)
I figure that even if some of the points are technically accurate, they're presented with one hell of a slant.
Yep, it's offtopic - zealots have a habit of doing that - out of enthusiasm, jamming stuff in where it doesn't really fit the discussion.
Re:Partially Blocked View (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem with his partially blocked view defense is he's claiming that his Yaris, is capable of over 1G accelleration from a stop. (10 m/s^2 is more than 9.8 m/s^2). That is supercar like acceleration, even to maintain only up to 20 MPH.
His whole paper is based on breaking the laws of physics for his Yaris, and hiding it so that the judge and officer don't notice.
Re:Partially Blocked View (Score:4, Insightful)
Considering that the crux of his argument (ignoring the smoke and mirrors angular velocity aside), was that he claimed he stopped and then accelerated back to the same speed as before all while he was hidden behind the other car, yes, it really matters. You fell for the same thing the judge did. The verbosity of the whole thing was all designed to hide the core claim, which is what I have said here.