Yes, lidar is probably a game changer for (indoor) navigation apps for blind people. However, I have yet to see a prototype which surpasses my own hearing. We shouldnt be too intusiastic about technologies coming up, and forgetting the skillset a human has already built-in... Tech is not always helpful, sometimes it is just an artificial gap between you and the rest of the world.
Totally agree about tech not always helpful. Maybe this wouldn’t be helpful for folks who are already skilled at echolocation. Maybe it would be a gateway to learn it, or would be helpful for folks who were not skilled at it for whatever reason? Not sure, of course would need to test and work with folks as it’s developed.
But I know I was able to “virtually echolocate” playing a game to navigate a maze with no previous experience and I thought that was cool.
Blind man here. "for a few days"??? Seriously? This is like saying "If I only would wear a bra for a week, I could give birth to a child!"
I know blind people who wish their echolocation skills were better.
What I am trying to say: expect months or years for training, not days. Besides, it is not only blind people who have excellent directional hearing, conductors are forced by their trade to be able to point at the fiddle player they want to correct. So it is definitely a skill which can be picked up. But it takes some years to get to a level where it is useful.
Few days was a random guess really haha. There was that study where they found people's vision flipped after a week of wearing goggles that project the world upside down. Interesting to hear it's such a complex skill. I suppose I've never really used my sense of hearing to its full potential.
No worries, if they knew what you are planning for them, cats would also be scared of you... Listening to (yours) cars mews is typically enough to read the message. Mine was pretty good at sounding anoyed and/or sugar sweet and/or helpless.
As a blind pedastian, I disagree violently. I typically hurt myself once a week because a careless cyclist put their bicycle in an inappropriate place. In front of a shop, because they are just going in for a minute, for example. Cyclists do the most harm to blind individuals in a city. Cars cant even come close.
Largely because bikes and pedestrians are forced to mix in most areas in the US.
Provide reasonable bicycle infrastructure and the problem starts to resolve itself.
A few local examples... the main road outside my subdivision has a bike lane, but it ends a few blocks before the school, starts again, then stops a few blocks before the shopping center. So, bikes have to move to the sidewalk and interact with pedestrians, dog walkers, children (or enter a traffic lane). Terrible design.
That shopping center has a single bike rack at one end. To get from that rack to the coffee shop on the other side requires a long walk through the shopping center OR walking across a large parking lot. So, people just leave their bikes leaning against the wall outside the coffee shop. Terrible design.
That's an angle I hadn't considered, thank you for bringing it up.
I bike around the city quite a lot, and usually I will have bike parking available, but when I don't, I find the nearest signpost or street lamp and lock it there. I try to be mindful of pedestrians by orienting the bike parallel to the walkway, but I have'nt probably given that enough thought.
Would you mind explaining the physics of how you interact with these or my misparked bicycles, and how they are causing you to hurt yourself ? Is it just that they are parked in your way, or is there something that makes bikes different from other obstacles you have to navigate ?
The biggest difference from otther obstacles is that bikes can fall over, and typically do so while landing on your foot or Achilles Tendon. It can also hurt mightily if you happen to ramm a handlebar into your stomache.
As cyclist myself, of course I’m in danger of hurting myself. Two weeks ago I had a bike accident where I hurt my dominant hand, and I’ve been unable to even hold a glass of water since, because someone parked their bicycle in the middle of the cycle lane in a situation with bad visibility.
I know the issue exists, and I can empathize with your situation. But I’ve also lived in cities with better bike infrastructure and more bike parking spaces, and in those places there were no issues with bikes parked in random places.
> But I’ve also lived in cities with better bike infrastructure and more bike parking spaces, and in those places there were no issues with bikes parked in random places.
This may be true, but it can't be a case of letting shit roll downhill i.e. I'll think about the blind when I park my bike only after sufficient bicycle parking is designated in every part of every city in the world.
The irony is that vegans seem to care about the wellbeing of animals, but seem to forget to care about their fellow humans. Thats all. I can see how you feel this is a cheap shot. However, you are not the one who has been hurt by a fellow humans careless behaviour, so I feel like I have a little bit of an angle to this. People evangelizing run the risk of their other actions also being put on the scale...
I once saw a blind man step out of a bus shelter onto a pavement. A cyclist who was riding on the pavement immediately hit them and knocked them to the floor. The cyclist did not stop, they just shouted 'Sorry' and carried on cycling up the pavement. If cyclists wish to have a good reputation amongst the general public then as a group they need to realise there are some really bad apples spoiling the bunch, and work with everyone else to call them out. I have never ever seen a cyclist call out another cyclist for poor etiquette, and I wish it happened more.
As a white guy I speak out against racism and misogyny, but doing that is not easy and I can not take responsibility for the actions of others. You have to choose your fights, I choose them selectively, and conflicts in traffic is one of the worst kinds.
Take your example, often pedestrians miss that there is actually an bikepath on the pavement. If you have impaired vision it is even worse. There are many more mistakes that are perfectly valid excuses for just saying "Sorry". Even though only a few people in traffic are ass hats, one is often very sure that is what you are witnessing.
Cyclists are like most people we make mistakes, but we are the sme as you statistically speaking.
Hmm, "The Circle" comes to mind. I wonder how many years we are away from this book becoming the reality.
Quit Google Now. Remember that you were always a bit stupid to choose Gmail and bite the bullet and get rid of it. If you are an Android user, I feel your pain.
The only thing I am a bit reluctant to throw away is my YT account. But if the content quality degradation keeps on going, it will eventually be quite easy to throw out.
But she is right. After some time, the old has to make way for the new. There is no way around this. The pandemic has taught this lesson to many people while they were forced to sit alone at home.
I wonder how much CO2 impact the CI revolution in open source really has. While I see how this is convenient, I sometimes wonder if we really need to spin up a 30min build for every PR/commit. I have never heard the community reflect on the impact it has with all the convenient cloud computing. Just spin up a ton of hosts to do your thing, yes? If you can pay for it, its OK? I guess owners of fossil-fuel consuming vehicles think the same. So, where are the environmental activists in the open source area pointing fingers at CI usage?
