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consider my attempt at an answer an extempore. Since you said the math is not important.

Lets make a few assumptions first. Dog is a point object. The width of your car is w.

Lets say you are moving at a speed of c and the dog is moving at a spped of d.

Also lets assume that when yo first notics the dog, it has started crossing the streeet ata random location. Its not a necessary assumption, but does not really alter our answer. So I make it for simplicity.

Finally you are at distance D from the dog when you notice him

This is by no means rigorous, but here is the general idea.

It takes you time T to iht the dog or miss him

T = D/c

In time T the dog can move a distance of D*d/c or Dd/c

Lets assume that the dog started at a location where if he stayed put, he would get hit the car a an offset x from the right corner of the car, and he is moving left.

Probability of hitting dog is 0 if Dd/c >=W -x
is 1 if Dd/c < W - x

Now maybe we can sum or inetgrate over all starting locations x and directions of movement to get a probability.

Looking at that bigger Dd/c lesser the chances of hitting

So slowing down is useful. However if the street is wider than one lane, we must include more parameters, and the results could be different. In fact I believe that we might get more than one minima, and in fact speeding up might be the better thing to do.

Neway the reaon I spent all this time typing this reply is to say,

If the car was travellin at the speeed of light, the probability of hitting the dog is _not_ 1. Just as you can move inside a room and not get to see the sunrise. That light is definitely travelling at the speed of light, and you are infinitesmally slower, but the distance between the sun and the earth allows you to avoid getting hit by that light, if you planned enough in advance [img]/images/graemlins/cool.gif[/img] [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]