Remember, people gave us the space age - and also created oops-these-are-remotely-controllable-over-the-internet vehicles. At the scale we are talking one of two things will happen:
1. This will become a huge phenomenon with everyone rushing around every barrier set up by lawmakers (the Internet of (swiftly moving) [heavy] Things) 2. This will be locked down hard by lawmakers and quickly turn into an industry as heavily regulated as aircraft manufacture and only a handful of players will have access to the market, resulting in slower growth and penetration into the entire market.
That's not very charitable. I don't think the basics of an internal combustion engine are that hard for anyone to understand.
Damn it, when someone can hack the cars steering via the internet connected entertainment system, the engine is the least complicated part of the package.
Just think about how retarded our entire thinking on transportation has been.
We first tamed a massive, powerful animal, placed a piece of leather on its back, and prayed that it didn't get too moody and threw us off.
Now we strap ourselves into a piece of metal which 99.99% of us can't even begin to understand, then barrel down roads at 80mph while praying that the guy in the other lane isn't drunk/sleepy/high