More, or less visible?

[Browser]

Sparked by the 'Daft Antics' thread and the picture put up of the home-made chopper with five of the classic Ever Ready grey headlights I got to wondering. You used to hear about people getting knocked off their bikes at night as a kid. Indeed, my brother fell foul of the stopped-at-a-junction-and-my-dynamo-powered-light-went-out-SMACK phenomenon. But nowadays, when we are in the realm of retina-searingly bright front and rear lights e.g Dinotte, Hope, Smart Superflash etc, why are we still in collisions with cars?
The old Ever Ready rear lights were OK, but the aforementioned grey fronts were pathetic, but I can't remember legions of near misses?
Am I missing the obvious or is it just the 'more cars and more cyclists = more accidents' syndrome?

 

[HLaB]

One theory is as well as a population increase, cars have got safer (for the driver anyway) and as we are a risk seeking species the has driver compensated for this feeling of safety by driving more recklessly. Thats only on theory however, you also have more powerful cars, etc.

On the other side of the coin (playing devils advocate here), without looking at the figures is their really more accidents collisions or is it just we are made more aware of them by more media.

 

[tyred]

I suspect, like many things, it's just we get constant news coverage of everything now and the health and safety brigade are ever present to warn us of dangers of things that many people have been doing safely for many years.