> To your point, we also "pay" ~88,000 lives per year to allow our society to satisfy its recreational alcohol consumption needs, but that is what society has c

> To your point, we also "pay" ~88,000 lives per year to allow our society to satisfy its recreational alcohol consumption needs, but that is what society has chosen. This is a good contrasting point. I think there is an argument to be had about "winnable" battles, though. It's much easier to police roads than it is to police everyone's home for alcohol, for example. It's easier (I imagine) to smuggle some alcohol from another country than it is to import an illegal vehicle. (Aside: some ~10,000 of those alcohol related deaths involved drunk-driving) I agree that there needs to be a careful timeline for legislation. We shouldn't use legislation to bring about change too early. I do think, though, that the transition to autonomous vehicles could occur gradually. First, you make them capable of self-driving. Then, cars start being manufactured without a steering wheel or pedals. Then, all new cars must not have a steering wheel. Then, once a sufficiently high percentage of vehicles are autonomous and without steering wheels, additional legislation could be considered. This would take decades, of course. > There are plenty more reasonable steps to be taken before that... I'm aware that in countries other than the US (like Germany, IIRC), it is harder (in terms of additional and stricter testing) and more expensive to obtain your driver's license. That is something I don't disagree with. On the other hand, the US is a place which is very reliant on cars to get places: the country is larger and more spread out, public transportation is worse, etc. The ideal aspect of self-driving cars in combination with restricting or outlawing human drivers is people can still own them as they always have (prices will come down and used cars will exist) and it should bring down fatalities in a meaningful way. Additional legislation that may prevent people from getting the license they need to drive to their job would not be required. > The list goes on, without copping to the naive, even juvenile, conclusion that outlawing human drivers is logical because autonomous cars are safer. None of this rhetoric convinces me that it is not logical to remove human error from the driving equation.