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Public and political perception need to consider autonomous commercial trucking to be safe, rather than safer. "Safer than human drivers" all too easily become

Public and political perception need to consider autonomous commercial trucking to be safe, rather than safer. "Safer than human drivers" all too easily becomes "we can't control when these robot trucks my crash into a mother driving her kids to school," when you put it into the political regulation arena.

gnaritas 11y ago
> Public and political perception need to consider autonomous commercial trucking to be safe, rather than safer. No, safer than humans is the bar.
- dajohnson89 11y ago
  That should be the bar, because it's the morally correct one. But public opinion is far from rational, and corporate interests would choose the suboptimal route if they could get away with it.
emp_zealoth 11y ago
So it's all fine when a lorry rear ends and pancakes a car because the driver fell asleep?
- gambiting 11y ago
  No, but if a driver falls asleep it's clearly their fault, if they survive the accident they will be charged with manslaughter. If a driverless truck rear ends a car because of a glitch or a mechanical fault where it didn't see the car in front for some reason, then I can only imagine the corporation recalling all of them at huge cost, and possibly paying millions of dollars in damages. I think the point is that when humans crash the responsibility is easy to establish, but we have no framework to work with once computers crash(and they will). And no, "they are still safer than humans" is not a valid defense when someone dies.
  - karmacondon 11y ago
    The company making the vehicles will be responsible for any damages, and paying a massive insurance premium I'm sure. There will be legal consequences for gross negligence and anyone damaged will be made whole. I don't see how that's any different than the system we have now. And the emotional appeals cut both ways. How long before the parents of a child killed by a drunk or sleeping truck driver say "Why was he driving anyway? Why wasn't he replaced by a machine that wouldn't drink a six pack and nod off while at the wheel?"
    - moskie 11y ago
      > How long before the parents of a child say ... "Why wasn't he replaced by a machine?" The ultimate point being that the answer might be "decades." It might take that long for the prevailing opinion amongst the public and/or politicians to change that way. And it is affected by the actual accidents involving automated vehicles in the short term.
    - intended 11y ago
      That's partly an effect of being on HN. In non tech circles - the vast majority of the world - people are pretty famous for measuring risks by perception and not statistics. The idea of a robotic truck taking away jobs while also being a risk to life? America would take up mass transit before it buys into that system. Man I can see the headlines and political/ emotional arguments now. Godless SV tech priests rob Americans of the last few jobs they have. 1% and automation, no job left behind.! It's useful to remember that People refused seat belts until the argument was irrefutable. Hell doctors didn't wash hands regularly until it was drilled into their heads that they were infecting patients. And when it come to automated personal care - I bet that People will utterly, vociferously, oppose the loss of their agency in controlling their means of movement. People have romanticized the man and the horse, the man and the bike, the car - but it's because it's a matter of controlling that power. Selling that to the American public and the world at large is a multi generational effort.
      - Al-Khwarizmi 11y ago
- CaptSpify 11y ago
  Nobody is saying this is logical. The point is that people will use this as a hyped-up political foothold to point out why automated drivers are "unsafe" as well as "taking our jobs".
  - visakanv 11y ago
    Fun fact: automated elevators were considered to be "unsafe" and "taking our jobs", too. Somehow we got past that one!
    - CaptSpify 11y ago
      Oh, I absolutely think we will get past this line of thinking. Automated driving is the future. I just don't think it will be a smooth transition.
    - Johnny555 11y ago
      And elevators sometimes kill people, yet few people are afraid of them. Admittedly, deaths are very rare, especially per-trip, 27 per year or 0.00000015% per trip -- self driving cars should be able to get into that level of safety, current automotive fatality rates are around 1 in 100M (or .000001%/mile) http://articles.latimes.com/2011/dec/15/news/la-heb-elevator-safety-death-201112115 http://articles.latimes.com/2011/dec/15/news/la-heb-elevator...
  - radiorental 11y ago
    > political foothold Driver's union versus transportation industry. I have a hunch which way the politicians will sway.
- dspillett 11y ago
  No, but at least from the PoV of public perception the situation is easier to deal with in a way that allays fear. In your example that one drive is taken off the road. That drive is not a problem, and people assume that the remaining drivers are, for the most part, fine and unlikely to make the same mistake. In the automated truck example you can't take that one driver off the road because barring equipment failure they are all the same driver and just as likely to make the same mistake. If one human driver kills in such a manner, people will distrust that one human driver (or at worst that one trucking company, if bad training or other compliance issues are suspected), if one automated truck kills in such a manner people will distrust all automated trucks.
  - snuxoll 11y ago
    Human beings don't have the ability to just attain knowledge and experience by a software updated, autonomous vehicles do. Yes, every autonomous truck on the road may be controlled by the same software exhibiting the same behaviors, but unlike a human they can all automatically be updated with new behaviors and share experiences with each other. This is precisely the goal of IBM's Watson if you will remember, an individual doctor only has their own experience - Watson can aggregate data from a virtually infinite number of data points and that knowledge and experience is shared across the network. Will accidents happen? Yes. But we can learn from them and the collective as a whole benefits, not one individual instance.
    - sqeaky 11y ago
      Likely it will be even better than you describe. Multiple competing companies all with their own software copying what the other teams are doing right. When one fails the others will continue on with lessons learned. Probably a lot like software development today except with a lower threshold for error, and hopefully the appropriate increase QA.
    - dspillett 11y ago
      I agree. As probably does everyone here. Now convince the herd that is the general public, who don't really understand the technology, don't have time for a long explanation, and tend to react with instincts and emotions that haven't had much by way of firmware upgrades for quite a few generations.
saturdaysaint 11y ago
Did cars or trains need to be perfectly safe? Even modestly "safer" autonomous vehicles would save thousands of lives every year and provide priceless benefit to society, giving us millions of productive hours and giving people that can't drive (the elderly and handicapped) new independence.

gnaritas 11y ago

> Public and political perception need to consider autonomous commercial trucking to be safe, rather than safer. No, safer than humans is the bar.

dajohnson89 11y ago
That should be the bar, because it's the morally correct one. But public opinion is far from rational, and corporate interests would choose the suboptimal route if they could get away with it.

emp_zealoth 11y ago

So it's all fine when a lorry rear ends and pancakes a car because the driver fell asleep?

gambiting 11y ago
No, but if a driver falls asleep it's clearly their fault, if they survive the accident they will be charged with manslaughter. If a driverless truck rear ends a car because of a glitch or a mechanical fault where it didn't see the car in front for some reason, then I can only imagine the corporation recalling all of them at huge cost, and possibly paying millions of dollars in damages. I think the point is that when humans crash the responsibility is easy to establish, but we have no framework to work with once computers crash(and they will). And no, "they are still safer than humans" is not a valid defense when someone dies.
- karmacondon 11y ago
  The company making the vehicles will be responsible for any damages, and paying a massive insurance premium I'm sure. There will be legal consequences for gross negligence and anyone damaged will be made whole. I don't see how that's any different than the system we have now. And the emotional appeals cut both ways. How long before the parents of a child killed by a drunk or sleeping truck driver say "Why was he driving anyway? Why wasn't he replaced by a machine that wouldn't drink a six pack and nod off while at the wheel?"
  - moskie 11y ago
    > How long before the parents of a child say ... "Why wasn't he replaced by a machine?" The ultimate point being that the answer might be "decades." It might take that long for the prevailing opinion amongst the public and/or politicians to change that way. And it is affected by the actual accidents involving automated vehicles in the short term.
  - intended 11y ago
    That's partly an effect of being on HN. In non tech circles - the vast majority of the world - people are pretty famous for measuring risks by perception and not statistics. The idea of a robotic truck taking away jobs while also being a risk to life? America would take up mass transit before it buys into that system. Man I can see the headlines and political/ emotional arguments now. Godless SV tech priests rob Americans of the last few jobs they have. 1% and automation, no job left behind.! It's useful to remember that People refused seat belts until the argument was irrefutable. Hell doctors didn't wash hands regularly until it was drilled into their heads that they were infecting patients. And when it come to automated personal care - I bet that People will utterly, vociferously, oppose the loss of their agency in controlling their means of movement. People have romanticized the man and the horse, the man and the bike, the car - but it's because it's a matter of controlling that power. Selling that to the American public and the world at large is a multi generational effort.
    - Al-Khwarizmi 11y ago
CaptSpify 11y ago
Nobody is saying this is logical. The point is that people will use this as a hyped-up political foothold to point out why automated drivers are "unsafe" as well as "taking our jobs".
- visakanv 11y ago
  Fun fact: automated elevators were considered to be "unsafe" and "taking our jobs", too. Somehow we got past that one!
  - CaptSpify 11y ago
    Oh, I absolutely think we will get past this line of thinking. Automated driving is the future. I just don't think it will be a smooth transition.
  - Johnny555 11y ago
    And elevators sometimes kill people, yet few people are afraid of them. Admittedly, deaths are very rare, especially per-trip, 27 per year or 0.00000015% per trip -- self driving cars should be able to get into that level of safety, current automotive fatality rates are around 1 in 100M (or .000001%/mile) http://articles.latimes.com/2011/dec/15/news/la-heb-elevator-safety-death-201112115 http://articles.latimes.com/2011/dec/15/news/la-heb-elevator...
- radiorental 11y ago
  > political foothold Driver's union versus transportation industry. I have a hunch which way the politicians will sway.
dspillett 11y ago
No, but at least from the PoV of public perception the situation is easier to deal with in a way that allays fear. In your example that one drive is taken off the road. That drive is not a problem, and people assume that the remaining drivers are, for the most part, fine and unlikely to make the same mistake. In the automated truck example you can't take that one driver off the road because barring equipment failure they are all the same driver and just as likely to make the same mistake. If one human driver kills in such a manner, people will distrust that one human driver (or at worst that one trucking company, if bad training or other compliance issues are suspected), if one automated truck kills in such a manner people will distrust all automated trucks.
- snuxoll 11y ago
  Human beings don't have the ability to just attain knowledge and experience by a software updated, autonomous vehicles do. Yes, every autonomous truck on the road may be controlled by the same software exhibiting the same behaviors, but unlike a human they can all automatically be updated with new behaviors and share experiences with each other. This is precisely the goal of IBM's Watson if you will remember, an individual doctor only has their own experience - Watson can aggregate data from a virtually infinite number of data points and that knowledge and experience is shared across the network. Will accidents happen? Yes. But we can learn from them and the collective as a whole benefits, not one individual instance.
  - sqeaky 11y ago
    Likely it will be even better than you describe. Multiple competing companies all with their own software copying what the other teams are doing right. When one fails the others will continue on with lessons learned. Probably a lot like software development today except with a lower threshold for error, and hopefully the appropriate increase QA.
  - dspillett 11y ago
    I agree. As probably does everyone here. Now convince the herd that is the general public, who don't really understand the technology, don't have time for a long explanation, and tend to react with instincts and emotions that haven't had much by way of firmware upgrades for quite a few generations.

saturdaysaint 11y ago

Did cars or trains need to be perfectly safe? Even modestly "safer" autonomous vehicles would save thousands of lives every year and provide priceless benefit to society, giving us millions of productive hours and giving people that can't drive (the elderly and handicapped) new independence.