Laws prohibiting texting while driving have been enacted and their effect measured. Although the number accidents due to a driver being distracted by texting have gone down, the net number of distracted-driver accidents remains unchanged. (Need to find citation.)
The speculated mechanism is that those drivers who are no longer texting are doing something else equally distracting (e.g., eating) so still causing accidents. The law is not effective. They are inherently careless drivers: no amount of law forbidding some activity is going to decrease accidents; it's just whack-a-mole on distracting activities.
Devise a test to determine if someone is an inherently careless driver, and permanently deny them a license and prevent them from driving. Make the inherently careless inherently carless. This will cause furor, like pre-crime.
What causes someone to develop into an inherently careless or careful driver?
The problem may extend beyond driving. Derek Lowe's Things I Won't Work With blog alludes to graduate students unretrainably unfit work with dangerous, often explosive, chemicals.
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