http://thejournalnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080103/NEWS01/801030409
As if we haven’t heard enough exscuses for car v. train incidents, this is a new one. I guess you really shouldn’t take that friendly GPS voice at its word, right?
On a more positive note, the driver will be held liable for the damage caused because of his inability to think for himself.
This is a perfect example of how an education alone will not make you “smart” enough to be a player in our modern world. One can still be extensively classroom educated and stupid/clueless at the same time.
A few of the quotes from the Metro-North spokeperson were, to me, real classics!
from the article:
“One computer brain listening to another,” Brucker said, chuckling, this morning.
Brucker added, “He tried to stop the train by waving his arms, which apparently was not totally effective in slowing the train.”
[(-D]
When you truly screw up…any excuse blaming something or someone else will satisfy your feelings of denial.
This is also a perfect example of how we are allowing technology to do our thinking for us. Does any one out there know, or remember that computers of any type have a built in GIGO factor?? (Garbage In, Garbage Out) In other words, a computer is as good as the software that is running on it, which in turn is as good as the person/people that wrote it.
One would think, that upon seeing the fact that he was being told to turn right onto the railroad tracks, he would have taken a moment to consider that the GPS was telling him to do something wrong…apparently the thought never crossed his mind.
Computers are great things…but… well to quote a line from Tom Clancy’s “Hunt for Red October”. “…it’s one thing to use a computer as a tool, quite another to let it do your thinking for you.”
In regards to education, sometimes it is “better to have common sense without education, than education without common sense”. As a 9-1-1 operator, I dealt with many situations where people simply should have known better, but they didn’t… some examples:
The mixing of bleach and ammonia, so she could get something “really clean”:
The degreasing of automobile engine parts in gasoline, while lighting a cigar
Wanting to search for a gas leak with a match, using the assumption, that, since “natural gas” is “natural” it won’t burn.
The retrieving of a child’s toy airplane glider from the electrical service drop to the home with an aluminum ladder, because, as the caller stated “aluminum isn’t really metal”
Mixing a “shock treatment” for the family swimming pool, in an enclosed back porch, so the fumes woul
Surveyors message board over at www.rpls.com is having fun with this as well. The “Don’t Think - Save Brain Cells” crowd appears to be getting larger.
Wouldn’t register with our errant driver or the newsies, BUT - The GPS worked just fine for the positional tolerances it has. There might be a GIS or a software minor issue (maybe). The big issue remains USER ERROR. (the general public is clueless about GPS or GIS…they just push da’ buttons and it magically works)
Just more proof that there is a difference between intelligence and wisdom. You can be the smartest person in the world, but if you are foolish it won’t save you from killing yourself.
I suppose, this will lead to one of those goofy warning labels that everybody make fun of? I’ll suggest: “Warning: This GPS device is not a substitute for a brain.”
Was the GPS named “Hal”?
I honestly could see them putting this statement into the owner’s manual: “Visually verify that you are intersecting a street before making a turn based on the GPS unit’s directions.” And they’ll stick it in with the line reading: “Do not immerse in water, especially when it is still attached to your car.”
Cut the fellow some slack folks… Maybe he thought this was an area that still has “Street Running”. Maybe he was used to seeing streets with trolley rails in them; that used to be very common.
Then again, I have found that, at least with my GPS system, it is NEVER so accurate in saying WHEN to make the turn that I would be THAT trusting to just turn the wheel at the moment it says, “Turn Right”. Besides, it often tells me to turn at an Interstate exit after I am past halfway around the cloverleaf.
My GPS is definitely low-end. I don’t use it for navigation often, but if I am letting it run while I’m going down the road, it often amuses me by showing me several yards off the road on one side or the other.
And, as I’ve mentioned before, I’ve heard that some truck drivers use their GPS for guidance while driving in less-than-optimum conditions (snow, fog). IIRC, the impression I got was that they essentially couldn’t see the end of their hood, but forged ahead anyhow, based on the display of their GPS.
One time I turned into a compound driving by GPS in very bad fog. The new road turned out to be about 100 yards further down. Another update was needed for the GPS.
I still have the GPS today, a old Rand unit with the programs to run it. Just no laptop for it. I believe it was good to about plus or minus 25 feet radius.
This reminds me of a story that a pilot friend told me. He had a buddy, also a pilot, who was from Europe and never owned a car, using public transportation all the time. He decided to tour the US by renting an RV and driving across country. After going into the back to make a sandwich, he was rudely introduced to the fact that cruise control is not the same as autopilot as the RV rolled off the highway and off into a field.
From the surveyor’s message board:
Re: GPS and RR’s
Posted By sicilian cowboy on 1/4/2008 at 2:09 PM
The crossing in question (Green Lane) is a fairly level, gated crossing, a two lane street crossing two electrified (third rail) tracks. I have crossed this location, while doing some work for Metro North at one of the nearby bridges over the tracks.
Unless this guy got caught between the two gates as they came down, there is no way to be “stuck” at this location.
Look for Green Lane, Bedford, NY in windows live local, they have a nice bird’s-eye ortho view of the crossing.
Modified By sicilian cowboy on 1/4/2008 at 2:10 PM
Somebody please take the techno-lemming’s driving priviledges away and make him start over again - before he kills somebody. (won’t happen, this is “normal” for California)
Priceless!! [bow]
Anyway, the original post made me think of this quote (author escapes me for now), I guess it’s also true for GPS units:
Sometimes a human with a computer is like a monkey with a gun.
I thought I saw this somewhere before http://www.snopes.com/autos/techno/cruise.asp .
I just recieved a navigation unit for Christmas and learned real quickly not to trust them. It was trying to take me all kinds of crazy routes through Milwaukee, and went completely haywire when we were passing through Kansas City on I70. Once we cleared the big cities, it operated just fine. If I depended solely on that GPS unit to get me through Milwaukee, who knows where I may have ended up.
I think I’ll save my money and continue using a road atlas.