Dad stops kid from crashing bike into parked car (+ link to video)

 Now for the assertion that there is a perfect correlation between the two datasets...

Rich_cb wrote:

You've just failed to interpret the graph correctly.

The pedestrian rate starts falling earlier and approaches parity in the early 90s.

From 1995 onwards the cycling rate starts to fall faster than the pedestrian rate.

So there is clearly a cycling specific factor that becomes significant after 1995.

The pattern fits perfectly with the increasing use of helmets disproving the initial point I was replying to.

Leaving aside the fact that A shows helmet use on one type of road, whereas B shows death rates for all types of injury (TBI or crushing under a lorry) on all types of road,  and there's nothing to indicatethe % kms are by helmet wearers {SHARKS AND ICE CREAM!!!!] 

Graph A starts in 1994 yet we are to look for a rapid decline from the high of 1995 - thats hardly perfect is it?  Lets at least look at a trend including the '94 data points.

Since they are a "perfect correlation" and A is a linear trend, let's try and "smooth" the data by drawing in a "line of best fit" (statisticians would do this more accurately by linear regression techniques, I've done it by eye like a secondary school student). 

I present Exhibit X  

Oh, but that trend line shows the cycling mortality rate drops of less steeply than that of pedestrians  - but there is clearly a cycling specific factor at play here according to Rich_cb so that means increased helmet wear has actually slowed the decline in cycling mortality?

Bloody hell

Of course, we should be trying to fit our trend line to the entire datset not just cherry picking the bit that fits our pre-defined ideas. I give you Exhibit Y

If you don't get membership for this, there is no god.*

* maybe save that for another thread? 

Personally, I'm not sure it is a linear trend - it looks more like a curve to me.  Ideally. I'd use a non-linear regression technique on a control dataset (maybe the death rate for all road user types) and then test that against the figures for each of the different road user types. 

My suspision is that such a model would fit each road user type pretty well - indicate whatever the factors affecting  the falling mortality rate is, any cycling specific factor is likely tonegligable.

I can't be arsed to test this hypothesis properly, so I will draw in the curve by eye (still more scientific than Rich_cb's approach).  I present to the court Exhibit Z 

I could go on, but I'm afraid that might lead to Don Simon slashing his wrists in despair. 

I will finish with my closing statement to the court: in the case of Crown versus Brick Wall,  would Your Honour please now STFU? Otherwise we're all going to have to bang our crowns, temples and any other point on our skull against a  brick wall repeatedly* for some light relief.

* Up to each person whether or not they wear a helmet to do so.

/shitposting   

Let me see, how does it go again? ah, yes...

Yawn.

You're interpreting the graph incorrectly.

* goes to headbang a wall *

...

Rich, are you Haley Joel Osment?

Other evidence? You haven't presented evidence. You are starting to question your own 'evidence' yet clinging on to your blind faith.

Here you go, I'll help. I have a sample of one, me. Wearing a helmet when I hit a big metal pole, I believe, reduced the head injuries I did suffer compared to what I would. I choose to wear a helmet for a 'proper ride'.

There are counter arguments and I'll happily hear them (including increased head circumference meaning I may have missed the pole with my head).

I am not arguing the possibility that helmet use could save lives, I'm arguing your terrible methodology. Furthermore, I'll argue mandatory and any victim blaming culture derived from horse shit elements!

this thread has crashed my brain - now I have to wear a helmet permanently just to stop it leaking out of my head holes!

edit; and yes, it's definitely causal, not just a correlation!

Pedestrians obviously started wearing helmets.

Maybe is down to the rise in mobile phone contracts and network coverage, this fits the timeline. This could be argued to enable quicker 999 calls and therefore quicker overall emergency services response times resulting in lower death rates.
Maybe this effected pedestrians sooner is that the trend to take mobiles with you on a cycle caught on later.

improvement in outcomes for ped's involved in serious trauma maybe due to changes in the way in which hospital services changed response - can't recall were read the article but a move to specialist trauma units at a limited number of locations with ambulances bypassing local hospitals gave some dramatic improvements in survival rates for serious trauma based on experiences from war in Afganistan and going back to terror attacks in NI so 90's would make sense a quick google tells me Royal College of Surgeons produced an influential report in 1988

....its all so complicated 

I'm not sure if this thread is long enough yet.

I've just realised that this thread is still 'live'... 

STOP. JUST. STOP.

Extract from the report posted on head related injuries during the helmet wearing study (http://injuryprevention.bmj.com/content/9/3/266):

Significant decreases were seen among adult and child cyclists. The percentage of head injuries among adults in 1995/96 was 24.7% (n = 1129), and estimated to change by –8.09% (95% CI –6.18 to –10.01). Among children, the percentage of head injuries was 29.6% (n = 1625) in 1995/96, and estimated to change by –8.32% (95% CI –5.35 to –11.28).

I notice from this that children had the greater reduction in head injuries but, according to the helmet wearing graph provided, they were the least likely to be wearing a helmet......

I think everyone is missing seeing the bigger picture.

What we really need to be concentrating on is the following graph and how the age of Miss America is clearly the most important factor in cyclists' longevity.

He doesn't. He doesn't feel he needs to.

"The different pieces of evidence I've presented all support the hypothesis so it is more detailed than just a simple correlation".

So alongside the other funny correlations people have posted we can also throw in that iPhones have reduced cycling casualties, as has the band one direction, gravel bikes, full hd TV's.

It's my hypothesis and by putting two unrelated pieces of data together you can't say I'm wrong...