It probably shouldn't be going fast enough in the first place for it to be an issue in suburban situations. It should be able to react in time even if a dog/child appears from behind a large parked vehicle. This should also be true of human drvers, but probably isn't.

But yes, deer beside faster roads etc. should probably trigger precautionary measures to ensure reaction times will be sufficient.

Human drivers _shouldn't_ be going fast enough for it to be an issue in the first place, either. We lost that one close to 100 years ago -- https://www.researchgate.net/publication/236825193_Street_Ri... on in audio form https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/episode-76-the-modern... -- and have been living in the resulting hellscape since. No guarantee computer drivers will be drive at speeds safe for humans.

I surely hope that we will be much less forgiving of machines beating our children to death because they had the temerity to play in front of their own house, then when adults beat children to death because they had the temerity to play in front of their own house.

It's despicable that anyone thinks it's acceptable, but it's different to say "you aren't allowed to beat that child to death when you're trying to get home after an exhausting day of work" than to say "Google isn't allowed to beat that child to death in order to sell a few extra taxis".

Because people and, perhaps, objects that can't be readily distinguished from people stand on sidewalks and at curbs all the time without an intent to walk into the street. There's a fine line between defensive driving and driving so conservatively that you're constantly applying brakes because "something" might happen.

But there isn't a fine line between charging into someone with a lethal force so you can get home a little quicker, and letting them live.

Cars driven by humans redesigned our cities. Cars driven by computers will probably redesign them again.

Because a human driver slows down in order to account for their reaction time and ability to continuously track multiple objects around them. Basically, they know that by the time they realize the kid is about to get run over, it will be too late to stop. Computers are already much better at tracking things and reacting to them with millisecond precision.

(That's not to mention the usual disregard for traffic rules - and thus basic safety - an average human driver has, which other commenters have touched on.)