Recumbent Accident Rates?

On Fri, 6 May 2011 08:54:12 -0700 (PDT), in rec.bicycles.tech Frank
Krygowski wrote:

Statistics can (and do) show that ordinary cycling does not impose any
unusual risk of serious head injury, despite propaganda to the
contrary. And statistics can (and do) show that widespread adoption
of bike helmets has not had a beneficial effect on serious head injury
rates. Really, that's all that's needed to adequately understand this
issue.

But if you'd like more, an examination of helmet design and
certification standards, plus some knowledge of physics and
physiology, give good understanding of why bike helmets are likely to
be ineffective. You persist in trying to change topics. If you really want to discuss
smoking or handgun safety devices, you might start a different thread.
Well, we could discuss the psychology of those who:
1) fail to study a topic, yet
2) give advice and solicit debate from those who have studied the
topic, and then
3) say "I'm getting bored" instead of "I have much to learn."

Frank, "Ordinary cycling does not impose any unusual risk of serious
head injury," is known as a null hypothesis. Actually, "There is no
correlation between ordinary cycling and elevated risk of serious head
injury," would be how I'd phrase it if I planned to publish my
findings; that's called H0. H1 is: "There is a correlation between
ordinary cycling and elevated risk of serious head injury, p0.05."

So, I go gather data... and (not surprising to you, I expect), I fail
to find any correlation, now... and there *will* be a test on this,
Frank, so pay attention... have I shown H0? Have my data and analysis
thereof demonstrated that "ordinary cycling does not impose any
unusual risk of serious head injury"? They have not; what they have
done is failed to reject that which is assumed to be true until shown
otherwise. Juries don't find people "innocent", sir... when they fail
to convict, it's just that.

What you're doing is waving the null hypothesis as a proven fact, but
people do that all of the time. The automotive seat belt debate is
another good example of that. Do you think auto drivers should wear
seat belts?

On Fri, 06 May 2011 14:36:36 +0100, in rec.bicycles.tech Phil W Lee
wrote:

Only if you don't actually understand them.
Once you understand how the studies were performed, it would be
fundamentally dishonest to select only the seriously flawed ones.
No, he later looks at the SAME data, and cherry picks a subset of it
to produce a result which is in line with his employers expectations.
It's called "policy based evidence making". When are you going to start?
An argument is more than rhetoric and assertion, and nothing you've
produced so far actually qualifies as a valid argument.

A valid argument for what? That studies of this type will tend to be
all over the spectrum? Essentially, you take them all and look for a
general trend.

I'm only concerned with Scuffham in that it demonstrates how, when
faced with contradictory findings, people will accept that which they
already believed and dismiss the rest as conspiracy. That happens
every day.

Of course, I haven't *read* Scuffham; I read and criticize research
for a living. If I ever get through the huge pile of it on my desk, I
have a few novels to read... *then* I'll get to it.

Meanwhile, I *must* turn to other tasks, so I'll leave y'all to...
what were we discussing here? I'm having a senior moment.

In article ,
Peter Clinch wrote:

Helmets work great at stuff like bashing tree-branches out of your way
without getting a scratch or bump off-road, but if they generally helped
on the road for A to B cycling then there needs to be a reason why
serious head injury rates fail to decrease as more of them are worn.
"It's counter intuitive" is not actually good enough (even though I
agree that it is indeed counter-intuitive).

Riding to deliberately run one's head into
tree branches is incomprehensible.

--
Michael Press

In article ,
Phil W Lee wrote:

Tom Lake considered Fri, 06 May 2011 07:26:56 -0500 the
perfect time to write:

[...]

Actually, this topic is starting to bore me. I can't think of a more
trivial topic on which to spend years and thousands of postings.

Bugger off then.
You've had your troll.

Wanted to see this again.

--
Michael Press

On 5/6/2011 7:39 AM, Tom Lake falsely quoted due to improper software
programming:
On Thu, 05 May 2011 21:51:16 -0500, in rec.bicycles.tech Tºm Shermªn™
" wrote:

While I wrote the above words, I did *not* write them as one paragraph.
Combining them is therefore false quotation. Please do not do this again.
If foam bicycle hats were effective, why does making previous non-users
wear them (e.g. Australia and New Zealand) fail to reduce the death rate
due to head injuries? That is all the proof a *rational* person needs
to know foam bicycle hats are ineffective beyond bump and scrape protection.
Those were Zionist lies from the very beginning, promoted by 5th
columnists in the US government (e.g. Wolfowitz, Feith, Perle, Abrams,
Libby), in the lobbying sector (e.g. AIPAC), and in the media (all the
mainstream outlets) in order to have the US fight a war of destruction
on Iraq on behalf of Israel and its goals of regional dominance.

My reader is programmed to strip out existing quoted material and
leave only the current writing to which I reply. When you write your
reply into the body of the previous message, it also deletes empty
lines on either side, so it appears as a single paragraph. If you use
the essay style, then it will leave your paragraphs intact when empty
lines are inside of your text. It deletes my writing, not yours.

You are wrong. Part of my writing is line breaks.

If
your writing depends on mine for its meaning, then you have a problem,
I suppose, but I don't. Get over it; it's a computer thing.

Please desist in this false quotation, as it violates basic standards of
decency in discourse.

I will address your question; however, let's agree on the basics:

Do you agree that quitting smoking is a healthful lifestyle change
that everyone should do?

The early deaths will save on retirement costs.

--
Tºm Shermªn - 42.435731,-83.985007
I am a vehicular cyclist.

On 5/6/2011 10:43 AM, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On May 6, 10:46 am, Tom wrote:
On Thu, 5 May 2011 21:50:22 -0700 (PDT), in rec.bicycles.tech Frank

wrote:
Oh. Well, _that's_ certainly conclusive!

What have you read on this subject?

Do you mean on the subject of research methodology?

No, on the subject of helmet efficacy. Also on the more fundamental,
related subject: realistically evaluating the risk of serious head
injury while cycling.

I got bored with the silly helmet topic long ago... do as you please.

... and the fox said "I'm not interested in those grapes anyway.
They're probably sour." - Aesop

- Frank Krygowski

+6.02x10^23

--
Tºm Shermªn - 42.435731,-83.985007
I am a vehicular cyclist.

On 5/6/2011 7:15 AM, Tom Lake wrote:
On Thu, 05 May 2011 21:56:23 -0500, in rec.bicycles.tech Tºm Shermªn™
" wrote:

We have been over the problems with Scuffham changing conclusions many
times. Comparing rates over 4 decades apart is hardly them same as comparing
consecutive years before and after Lidditeâ„¢ mandatory foam bicycle hat
use implementation.

More falsified quotes from Tom Lake, due to anti-social
software programming.

My point was that studies on the efficacy of protective clothing span
a wide range of findings. By carefully choosing findings that support
*my* side of the discussion and dismissing those which tend not to, I
can "prove" just about anything.

That tactic isn't new to studies of protective clothing. In fact, any
topic that doesn't lend itself to an experimental method (abortion,
the death penalty, gun control, and auto seat belts come to mind) will
tend to that type of debate.

Scuffham finds helmets don't work and you wave his work like the US
flag at Ground Zero. Later, he looks at more data and finds something
else. "That study is INVALID!" you say. I say that whether a study
is valid or not depends on whether or not it supports your prejudice,
not on its data and methods.

Obviously Scuffham caved to political pressure. Duh.

But, then... having been around Usenet a few days, I expected that.
In a day or so, I'll move on. I can only argue about something as
trivial as this for a short time.

Do not let the door hit you in the arse on the way out.

--
Tºm Shermªn - 42.435731,-83.985007
I am a vehicular cyclist.

On 5/6/2011 8:42 AM, Phil W Lee wrote:
[...]
Bugger off then.
You've had your troll.

+6.02x10^23

--
Tºm Shermªn - 42.435731,-83.985007
I am a vehicular cyclist.

On May 6, 1:12*pm, Tom Lake wrote:
On Fri, 6 May 2011 08:54:12 -0700 (PDT), in rec.bicycles.tech Frank



Krygowski wrote:
Statistics can (and do) show that ordinary cycling does not impose any
unusual risk of serious head injury, despite propaganda to the
contrary. *And statistics can (and do) show that widespread adoption
of bike helmets has not had a beneficial effect on serious head injury
rates. *Really, that's all that's needed to adequately understand this
issue.

But if you'd like more, an examination of helmet design and
certification standards, plus some knowledge of physics and
physiology, give good understanding of why bike helmets are likely to
be ineffective. *You persist in trying to change topics. *If you really want to discuss
smoking or handgun safety devices, you might start a different thread.
Well, we could discuss the psychology of those who:
1) *fail to study a topic, yet
2) *give advice and solicit debate from those who have studied the
topic, and then
3) say "I'm getting bored" instead of "I have much to learn."

Frank, "Ordinary cycling does not impose any unusual risk of serious
head injury," is known as a null hypothesis. *

Sorry, but no. It's a report of findings from examinations of data.
(And please note, your clumsy attempt to rephrase it as a hypothesis
omitted a very important part of my statement, the word "unusual.")

Actually, "There is no
correlation between ordinary cycling and elevated risk of serious head
injury," would be how I'd phrase it if I planned to publish my
findings...

:-) You're a long way from publishing any findings, Tom. For one
thing, you're too far behind on the reading - or IOW, you don't know
nearly enough about the topic.

For another thing, your clumsy hypothesis is a tautology. There's
_some_ correlation between elevated risk of head injury and cycling.
And motoring. And walking for transportation. And descending stairs
(a very strong one, that last); and jogging... Need I go on?

But back to this discussion: You keep trying to retreat into topics
you _may_ know more about (like smoking) or to hide behind definitions
of terms we already know (like "null hypothesis"). Those tactics
won't work.

What you need is a full retreat, then a thorough study of real-world
data, plus some critical analysis of the helmet promotion and helmet
skeptic research. Many of us have done that, and many helmet skeptics
have adopted that position based on what we learned.

And BTW, if you really do read and review research for a living, as
you claim, your apparent assumption that one study (say Scuffham 2) is
as good as another (say, Scuffham 1) is strange indeed! Seems you're
claiming your job is worthless!

- Frank Krygowski

On Fri, 06 May 2011 17:55:53 -0500, in rec.bicycles.tech Tºm Shermªn™
°_° " wrote:

You are wrong. Part of my writing is line breaks. Please desist in this false
quotation, as it violates basic standards of decency in discourse.The early
deaths will save on retirement costs.

Well, Tom, calling someone a "liar" for trimming extra levels of
redundantly quoted text is a little over the top, don't you think?
How does that behavior square with "basic standards of decency in
discourse"?

Since there all of the feelings of indecency and dishonesty over my
news reader's settings, perhaps we should simply go our separate ways?
I see no point in a long flame war, anyway.