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Driverless Cars
What seemed to be a pipe dream just a few years ago may be reality in 3 to 5 years.
Going to be fun working the bugs out of these.
Going to be fun working the bugs out of these.
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Proponents of self-driving cars say the vehicles can reduce accidents, clear traffic congestion, lower emissions and transport blind or disabled people. Critics argue that the technology is unproven and could be unsafe."
Auto industry speeds toward driverless cars (Detroit News)
Quote of the Day.
I've been on a few long stretches of road where you set the cruise at the speed limit and occasionally nudge the wheel with your knee (I-94 in Eastern Montana for example). If the car was driving itself, I could be scanning the horizon with my binocs, looking for antelope.
Usually I'm having too much fun just looking at the scenery go by. Maybe if I had a longing, boring commute every day, this tech would be handy.
2021 Jeep Wrangler Sahara 4xe Granite Crystal over Saddle
2024 Audi Q5 Premium Plus Daytona Gray over Beige
2017 BMW X1 Jet Black over Mocha
If you cause an at-fault accident, you must let Google do the driving for you for 1-year.
If you can go the following 5 years (after the year of punishment) without an at fault accident, then you start over. If you have another accident in those 5 years, then you get punished with a driverless car for 5 years, again, needing to prove yourself for 5 years to start the cycle over at 1 year punishment again.
So says Dan Neil.
"The danger will come not from auto-piloted vehicles but from the holdouts, those drivers who for whatever reason rely on the faulty, flimsy wetware between their ears. What will be normative? Should manually operated vehicles be the ones to give way? Or should autopilot cars (with special running lights) be especially deferential to their inferior human counterparts?
Nobody cares about driving anymore.
Give people a button that says "Home" and I guarantee they will push it."
Who's Behind the Wheel? Nobody (Wall St. Journal)
That being said, a lot of "drivers" should be forced into such cars.
It's a lot deeper than stimulus. It's control. I'd also worry about data breaches - some idiot upper manager loses a laptop on a flight, a few million people have their info compromised, and the manager ends up with another promotion towards a huge pension.
On the other hand, commuting on a crowded freeway twice a day isn't what I'd call pleasure driving.
Sort of like cave men saying it would be crazy not to be able to go out hunting every day to kill their dinner. Why would anyone want to just go to a restaurant and be given food. Cave men would say that the government is taking away people's ability to go out and hunt for food.
Can people hunt today...sure. But it's restricted by time and location. In the future it might be the same for driving. If you drive on public roads then the cars will drive themselves because it improves safety, efficiency, MPG, etc...but for the minority (like hunters) who want to drive for entertainment, then there will be private locations where they can take their vintage cars and drive around.
But at late evening or on a Sunday, I want to do things myself. I don't know if cavemen got the same enjoyment out of hunting that some of us get from driving. Maybe autonomous cars can be programmed to deal with manually driven vehicles/motorcycles/bicycles - they will have to interact with pedestrians too.
Today probably will be a "good old days" in terms of performance. New cars lack the style of older cars, but they have unparalleled reliability and ease of maintenance compared to the classic muscle days.
Don't hold your breath. It took just about five years to screw up all our new cars with mandatory electronic stability control, and to make us pay for that in the process.
NHTSA Studying Self-Driving Cars, Talking to State DMVs (Inside Line)
I'd let the car take me home in the evening grind, but I wouldn't want the system if it couldn't be disabled at my own whim. Train the system to interact with human driven cars (and motorcycles, pedestrians, etc), and it might have a future.
I wouldn't want the system if it couldn't be disabled at my own whim
Sorry, not gonna happen. Once give up your liberty/authonomy - gone forever. Example: you cannot fully disable ESC on many last model cars. They will tell you that this is a liability issue. One of those "code" words: "safety" or "liability". When you hear them, it means: "shut up and do what you are told". Maybe you'll be allowed to disable it only in specially designated areas with a preapproval of your "flight plan" (apply 10 business days in advance). SL of 35 mph will apply for any manually operated vehicle. "Fast mountain roads" - that is exactly where it will never be allowed, for "safety" reasons.
Hold the engineers and politicians that decided autonomous driving vehicles was a good idea accountable and liable? Hahahahha.... it'll never happen. :sick:
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Damn tru dat!
Where I live, they won't even allow me to take my donkey cart on the freeway!
Oppressive, I tell ya!
"Of those questioned, 79 percent said they would be concerned about equipment failure, like a software glitch or a balky sensor; 59 percent would worry about liability issues, such as where blame would lie in the event of an accident; 52 percent would fret about hackers invading their cars' systems; and 37 percent would be concerned about various corporate and government entities collecting their personal data, such as speed and location."
Driverless Cars? Not in My Garage, Say 88 Percent of U.S. Adults
"A little-noticed amendment to the United Nations Convention on Road Traffic agreed last month would let drivers take their hands off the wheel of self-driving cars. It was pushed by Germany, Italy and France, whose high-end carmakers believe they are ready to zoom past American tech pioneers and bring the first "autonomous vehicles" to market."
Cars could drive themselves sooner than expected after European push (Yahoo)
“There's this myth that people love driving,” Urmson said earlier this month. “But commuting to work in the morning isn't fun. What if we could let people focus on things like texting that they are already doing in their cars, but do it safely?”
Google reveals prototype, plans for self-driving car (Detroit News)
Google To Test Fleet of Self-Driving Prototypes This Summer
nytimes.com/2014/05/28/technology/googles-next-phase-in-driverless-cars-no-brakes-or-steering-wheel.html?_r=0
In some circumstances, I can see this being beneficial, e.g., those who've had a few too many, elderly folks that no longer drive, tourists in unknown city. However, could this eventually put thousands of taxi drivers in the unemployment line?
It was interesting to see the responses from 2012. We see cars now that will warn you not to change lanes and several will stop rather than run into another car. The drivers in these commercials all seem distracted to me. But in truth with the generation now getting to drivers age it seems like fewer and fewer are interested in owning a car. I have seen some of the google cars and it looks like they do work so I guess the new kids could always get a car that drives itself. Worried about information being given to the government? Like it isn't now with Google and face book, twitter, instagram? Not even getting into the NSA and our phones.
On a side note I read a blog that suggests one big advantage would be that you could send the car away after getting to work freeing up parking space. Think what that could do for places like San Francisco.
I also don't see people resisting this movement all that much. Look at how many people don't drive in New York City. Buses, Trains, even cabs and planes don't require any input from the passenger and about half the people living in Manhattan are not driving now. Just food for thought.
Why own a cab when you can hail one?
Also, there's the liability issue which still hasn't been answered, but greater then that, is who's willing to put their life in the hands of a computer? A car can kill you, and you won't much care who's liable if your dead.