> Extend this thinking to ... - all able to simply cut off a self driving car knowing it will give way.
But this is already the case; if I jump into slow moving traffic in a (western) city centre the cars will let me through, possibly even without honking. The only things to fear are distracted drivers (which is the same with the AI, because I can't know whether the AI sees me) and the occasional madman, but those are rare.
What's more interesting as you point out are situations where other drivers will take advantage of the AI's adherence to rules and safety. That's going to be especially fun in cities like Napoli, where things like driving through red signal are completely normal. It's probably not going to work there at all in its current state.
Would stepping out in front of a car be illegal?
https://laist.com/news/transportation/understanding-new-cali...
If "person walks in front of car" event is rare, then the automatic car stop saving a life or minimising injury is nice. Saved a person from a bad day for a minor inconvenience for the car people.
If a NY city worth of people do it without regard, then cars will be gridlocked.
My guess is:
- Assuming self driving cars that that stop for pedestrians are common
- then laws against deliberately walking in front will exist
- to judge the dispute of "deliberate" there will be more cameras, because why wouldn't there be...
As you say, if you know the cars will stop and let you go, this power will corrupt.
Extend this thinking to bicyclists, skateboarders, delivery riders, motorcyclists, car enthusiasts driving themselves - all able to simply cut off a self driving car knowing it will give way.
But there is more adversarial out there.
AI input hacking to get known responses. Cars disabled because of gang tagging on sensors.
Car enthusiasts or privacy enthusiasts (privacy shouldn't require enthusiasm but here we are...) updating car firmware/software. People with full physical access!
And we haven't touched on the ethical stuff which is a world of discussion in itself.
Self driving cars by evolution in current societal rules etc will take a LONG time.