Without road-raging human drivers behind the wheel, is the vehicle occupant going to care that they got to nap a few minutes longer on the way to work? Or got to read a few more pages of their novel?
Edit to add: Also, I'm looking forward to autonomous police cars who bringing reliable traffic enforcement to all road users.
I think these cars are going to work brilliantly in very polite and orderly places like Zurich, where everybody takes their turn and neither pedestrians nor bicyclists nor drivers feel put upon by the system. I have no idea how they are going to work here in America where we dump our mentally ill on the streets, and then don't give them sidewalks and crosswalks or any sense of dignity. I have a feeling it's going to work quite poorly.
They can do that now unless you are suggesting running them over as a solution.
No doubt we'll see people doing this, however. Because change is scary.
Just turn around? So the cars will be near spherical in design and with 4 wheel steering? Cool.
There are so many unresolved issues around self-driving cars, and the answer always seems to be "just do this", without any real solution to the problem as described. Self-driving vehicles may well be a good thing, but let's not stick our heads in the clouds and assume "it'll be okay".
Heck an accidental release of confetti would be an interesting experiment.
The cops would only be called if the car is blocked for several minutes or the passenger decides to do so. Nobody cares if the car has to brake for a few seconds and then continues driving as usual. We spend far more time at traffic lights anway.
By motorcycle
(I'm sorry, I could not resist. I tried.)
I would put the ratio of bad pedestrians to bad drivers at 1:1000.
The problem is if they don't and pedestrian gets killed there is not way to resurect the pedestrian, and start over. Therefore, pedestrian's goals is staying alive regardless of what laws are written in the books.
To put it another way, most countries out there have laws about "cars yield to pedestrians on crossings" but in a lot of places I wouldn't want to prove a point or rely on the drivers to obey the law vs just staying alive and in one piece.
> autonomous police cars who bringing reliable traffic enforcement to all road users.
Hmm. Now this is interesting. We are almost there -- red light cameras, speed camers, automated toll booths, cars are always recording and logging their speed, acceleration and hundres of other parameters, onstar system. Now we just need an incentive such as an insurance discount to have cars be remotely disabled and pulled over of they speed too much where it becomes unsafe, or if they run red light.
At first you'd think nobody would buy it, but maybe if car insurance goes from $500 a quarter to $150 there would be some takers. Then before you know it, it would become illegal to drive cars that don't have that feature.
> Pedestrians and cyclists may also learn that they can freely cut off an AI car at anytime they please. Why wait for a walk signal? Why walk all the way to the intersection? Just saunter across anywhere you like, so long as you cross in front of an AI car.
That's probably a good thing. Car drivers need to get out of the mindset that they own the roads.
I hope autonomous cars can help re-enable the peaceful co-existence of multiple modes of transportation on our streets.
[1]: http://www.citylab.com/commute/2012/04/invention-jaywalking/...
... in some parts of the world.
>That's probably a good thing. Car drivers need to get out of the mindset that they own the roads.
The problem with that is the time period before AI cars are ubiquitous. In my area I've already seen pedestrians act far more carelessly now that the pedestrian right of way laws have been enhanced and there's been an uptick in pedestrian fatalities. Sometimes giving people the impression that something is safe makes them behave so much more recklessly than they would have originally.
When a car driver says "careless pedestrian" I hear "inattentive, selfish, driver".
This is probably a cultural thing, because jaywalking isn't a crime here.
Sure the inattentive driver may be an asshole that should not be allowed to drive a car - but he is the one in the 1+ ton tin can and if does not see you, you lose.
Younger generation are crazy to me, I see them crossing the street without even looking up, anywhere, at any time without any consideration for their visibility. I'm one of those inattentive, selfish, driver and it scares me to death.
So what about self-preservation on the road until we get those fancy autonomous cars ? Car can and should drive more slowly, but pedestrians also need to look where they are going. If the street were an industry setting, health and safety regulation would probably prevent you to move if any vehicle was moving at all, even if they were all autonomous. And you would have to go through gory induction video of what happens if you don't respect that rule and either the machine fails or you underestimated inertia.
[1] Sometimes I'm looking at a parking spot, sometimes I'm looking at that cyclist that is tailgating me and will crash in my car if I'm taking slowing down too fast. Sometimes the visibility is not great, sometimes my 2 year old is making a mess. Autonomous car have sensors everywhere but a human driven car only has 1, a very powerful one, but just one.
After about 10-12 seconds, the other cars had cleared, and the crosswalk light had switched from the green hand to the red countdown. She started to make the turn, at which point the two pedestrians literally ran into the crosswalk, and in front of her car, with no warning. Apparently they had just noticed the countdown timer and wanted to make it across the intersection without waiting for another cycle.
Fortunately she noticed the pedestrians and stopped. The pedestrians continued their run across the intersection, apparently oblivious to the fact that they'd almost been struck
Keeping in mind the following:
1. Right turns on red are legal and expected.
2. It is illegal for a pedestrian to enter a crosswalk once the countdown timer starts.
3. Full evaluation of this intersection required visually evaluating an area of 180-200 degrees, but human beings don't have vision that wide, and so it was impossible for the driver to continuously evaluate both the oncoming cars on the left and the pedestrians on the right.
4. Drivers in California are trained to look left while making a right turn.
What was the driver supposed to do in this scenario? Should the driver have been at fault if she had struck the pedestrians, and if so, why?
I was sitting in the passenger seat, so I could evaluate the intersection and see how my friend was evaluating it as well. As far as I could see, she did nothing to violate either California law or driving custom. On the other hand the pedestrians both entered a crosswalk illegally, and also violated section 21950(b) of the California Vehicle Code (which requires pedestrians to exercise due care for their own safety when entering a roadway). So I don't think that if she had struck them, she would have been at fault. But am I wrong? If so, why?
This is insanity on the level of blaming the sun for your lack of vision. If you can't see shit, you first and foremost need to stop.
Growing up it was always drilled into us to look both ways before crossing, even in the crosswalk. Now people can't be bothered to look even one way.
Also note, it doesn't have to be a "government" thing, where you'd expect some protection (at least on paper). It can be a completely private affair between the car makers and insurnace companies.
In fact it is already almost there and it is called CLUE ( https://www.privacyrights.org/clue-and-you-how-insurers-size... ) -- a database used by insurance companies to evaluate indivicuals and record the claims they've made in the past. Feed info from these self-driving cars into them and you can't even claim any privacy or constitutional rights were violated.
I've long wondered why the toll authority does not simply do the math on entry and exit and send citations to the top 5-10% of speeders. It's generate many thousands of dollars in revenue for sure.
Maybe it's time to split up societies? Some people seem to value absolute freedom to do anything (and freedom from consequences). Others prefer having things actually work and be nice for everyone.
I'm being somewhat facetious, but there are several ways to fund local governments, including but not limited to:
A. Tax the people directly based on $ASSET (usually income, or property, or a combination of the two). B. Lower direct taxes as well as state and federal grants, and fines from enforcement.
As someone who doesn't necessarily mind sending a few dimes on the dollar to the government, and doesn't speed often enough or at such egregious speeds that I'm subject to hyperbolic "highway shakedowns," I kind of prefer B to A because it results in a lower effective tax rate for me.
In Sweden this extra tax provides free schooling up to and including university (you even get paid going to higher education US$300+/month in grants), low cost health care with a cost ceiling (US$130/year), affordable child care, social security net, local government owned and (well) managed infrastructure (power, water, fibre, roads, etc.)
Our local government is funded through direct taxation. My local government tax rate is 30.2%.
Not sure it tells the whole story though. VAT is not included in effective tax rate AFAIK (as defined in the Economist article).
[1] http://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicdetail/2012/10/focus-4
[0] http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/dec/07/florida-wo...
Are you saying the world would be better off if she had gotten away with a hit and run?
I could even see all insurance getting cheaper, since the risk of accidents for all cars should decrease as the mix of cars gets more and more automated.
Insuring an automated car will be cheaper. Insuring a manually operated car will be more expensive.
What's "proper" about raising the prices for no reason? If they start pricing human drivers higher than they currently do, some other insurer will just undercut them.
It would be cool if what you describe actually happened, but in the real world, premiums only ever move long-term in one direction: up.
right now, in california, you are only required to carry on the order of $35,000 in liability insurance.
Now, personally, I think this is completely crazy, that it defeats the whole point of liability laws, etc, etc, but the point is that unless you change that, even if the rates go way up for human drivers, if the insurance companies can continue to sell plans that are limited to only $35K in liability, people who don't fear bankruptcy will still very likely be able to buy that legally-minimal insurance for not all that much money.
(that "basic" insurance costs me $150 for the whole year and allows me to drive anywhere within EU for unlimited period of time. I also have full comprehensive cover for which I pay another $500 for a full year that insures me against damages to my own vehicle and provides EU-wide breakdown cover).
Generally speaking, only poor people carry the minimum liability insurance. Everyone else carries limits closer to yours, at least for damage to people; I mean, doing 3 million in damage to a human, I can see that. Doing that much damage to property would be... completely destroying a really nice house, which is unlikely. Also, by American standards, your rates look unrealistically low. maybe you could get something close to your level of liability coverage for that much every month.
But... uh, yeah, this brings up another point (and why I don't know how much just a few million in liability would cost) - everyone who isn't poor here carries what's called "uninsured motorist" coverage... this is essentially insurance that covers damage to me if someone with minimum coverage is at fault and I get hurt and they can't pay.
As for relative price typically one would be looking at around $300-600 per year, depending on age, driving history, type of car etc. Granted with our universal health care I suspect that our average out-of-pocket medical expenses for injuries from car accidents are lower than the US.
But you raise the interesting point that it might perversely be safer to make automated cars less safe. Make them just dangerous enough that people won't be deliberately stupid around them.
Once we automate everything, then what?
There is still a lot to work for once we remove the more mundane parts of our existence.
A bit of a specious comparison which assumes that the degree and quality of the technology are irrelevant.
There was no Deep Mind during the Industrial Revolution.
or
I don't know
Whatever we want.
And, I wonder what it is in human nature or recent history that makes so many believe that this will be even remotely close to how things actually unfold. That property rights will somehow cease to exist or that those who control the various automata won't simply accrete more economic power unto themselves, relying on ever fewer humans with whom to share that power. Yet, somehow, they will share the spoils such that the masses of unnecessary humans may live comfortably without expending the slightest effort.
It need not be a full-on sci-fi style dystopic future to be problematic. We are already seeing degrees of the problem. On our relentless quest to automate humans into obsolescence, seems that we should occasionally pause to consider the consequences in the context of what we know to be true of human nature and history.
If we all assume that AI cars are going to be very conservative and very competent drivers, will people take advantage of that? Will human drivers become even bigger assholes that cut off AI drivers at every possibility, knowing that an AI will not hit them? Why wait in a big line for an exit, when you know an AI car will always let you in. The AI driver won't even mind, as it has no emotional state, so why not?
Pedestrians and cyclists may also learn that they can freely cut off an AI car at anytime they please. Why wait for a walk signal? Why walk all the way to the intersection? Just saunter across anywhere you like, so long as you cross in front of an AI car.