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Google cars are going no more than 25 mph and are lightweight. Different thing all together. Here is the big thing - the driverless truck has to operate in a u

by pm24601 10y ago

Google cars are going no more than 25 mph and are lightweight. Different thing all together. Here is the big thing - the driverless truck has to operate in a uncontrolled environment that can result in human death. Who is the responsible party? The trucking company? The software developer? Additionally we are talking situations where a computer can't have any reaction interruptions for hours and hours. No reboots. No garbage collection pauses. No panics. Can this be done? Maybe. But at what cost? It might be that the best role for the computer is helping a truck driver be safer -- not to replace the truck driver.

maccard 10y ago
I'm walking down a busy road with traffic passing me at ~30mph at the moment. Anecdotally, the last 4 cars have had one person in the car who has either been texting on a mobile phone, applying makeup, eating breakfast, and playing with the radio. Do you think the reaction time of the guy who's texting his boss saying he's late would be faster or slower than the driverless car that was in a long garbage collection, if I were to step in front of him? You do have a point on liability, and I don't have an answer better than a centralised pool of money that everyone pays in or out of.
- pm24601 10y ago
  Yeap. And if one of them hits you, they are liable. How many software developers want to be held criminally responsible for deaths? Some times we get so fascinated by technology, that we forget that the technology has to fit within human society. Remember the whole concept of product/market fit - if the market rejects the product: it doesn't matter how "cool" the technology is.
  - GrumpyYoungMan 10y ago
    >How many software developers want to be held criminally responsible for deaths? Nope. Short of gross negligence in design, that seldom happens in any engineering field. How many people were criminally charged in the Challenger disaster? None.
    - pm24601 10y ago
      7 people died in the challenger disaster. 30,000 people die each year in car related fatalities. Completely different order of magnitude. Additionally, going up on a rocket is a fundamentally risking proposition done by adults. Having a driverless vehicle that glitches, applies power instead of brakes, and kills a bunch of pretty young girls.... well that makes the 5 oclock news and 11 oclock for many, many days. People get charged with crimes.
      - GrumpyYoungMan 10y ago
        How many criminal charges were filed against individual engineers for any those 30,000 fatalities last year? How many were convicted? None and none. You're illustrating my point for me quite nicely. Frankly, I can't think of a criminal conviction, even at the corporate level, for design flaws in the auto industry without going all the way back to the Ford Pinto.
icebraining 10y ago
Additionally we are talking situations where a computer can't have any reaction interruptions for hours and hours. No reboots. No garbage collection pauses. No panics. You mean, just like existing ones? It's not like we're still driving purely mechanical cars. Current production vehicles already have plenty of software managing stuff.

by pm24601 10y ago

maccard 10y ago

I'm walking down a busy road with traffic passing me at ~30mph at the moment. Anecdotally, the last 4 cars have had one person in the car who has either been texting on a mobile phone, applying makeup, eating breakfast, and playing with the radio. Do you think the reaction time of the guy who's texting his boss saying he's late would be faster or slower than the driverless car that was in a long garbage collection, if I were to step in front of him? You do have a point on liability, and I don't have an answer better than a centralised pool of money that everyone pays in or out of.

pm24601 10y ago
Yeap. And if one of them hits you, they are liable. How many software developers want to be held criminally responsible for deaths? Some times we get so fascinated by technology, that we forget that the technology has to fit within human society. Remember the whole concept of product/market fit - if the market rejects the product: it doesn't matter how "cool" the technology is.
- GrumpyYoungMan 10y ago
  >How many software developers want to be held criminally responsible for deaths? Nope. Short of gross negligence in design, that seldom happens in any engineering field. How many people were criminally charged in the Challenger disaster? None.
  - pm24601 10y ago
    7 people died in the challenger disaster. 30,000 people die each year in car related fatalities. Completely different order of magnitude. Additionally, going up on a rocket is a fundamentally risking proposition done by adults. Having a driverless vehicle that glitches, applies power instead of brakes, and kills a bunch of pretty young girls.... well that makes the 5 oclock news and 11 oclock for many, many days. People get charged with crimes.
    - GrumpyYoungMan 10y ago
      How many criminal charges were filed against individual engineers for any those 30,000 fatalities last year? How many were convicted? None and none. You're illustrating my point for me quite nicely. Frankly, I can't think of a criminal conviction, even at the corporate level, for design flaws in the auto industry without going all the way back to the Ford Pinto.

icebraining 10y ago

Additionally we are talking situations where a computer can't have any reaction interruptions for hours and hours. No reboots. No garbage collection pauses. No panics. You mean, just like existing ones? It's not like we're still driving purely mechanical cars. Current production vehicles already have plenty of software managing stuff.