4 ms·

Given: (1) sensors necessary to autonomously navigate, (2) large stretches of rural America (out west, maybe 100+ miles to the nearest police station), (3) adap

by ethbro 8y ago

Given: (1) sensors necessary to autonomously navigate, (2) large stretches of rural America (out west, maybe 100+ miles to the nearest police station), (3) adaptable human adversay, (4) no humans to injure on the vehicle ... I just don't see how you economically protect a vehicle (vs cargo value). And more sensors simply mean more things to steal. The minimum law enforcement response time along your entire route is the real issue, and there's no way you decrease that short of drastically increasing police staffing.

jandrese 8y ago
These thieves have to steal from a moving vehicle? Sure it's not impossible, but it's more Hollywood heist than something you'd see in real life. It will almost certainly happen a few times, but for practical purposes the amount of stuff stolen before the guys are caught will be less than what it costs to hire tens of thousands of rent-a-cops to sit in the backs of trucks. Plus, these are thieves we are talking about. Pointing a gun at a human driver and telling them to pull over so they can rob the truck is something that could easily happen today but is extremely rare. The minimum police response time is something that's hard to measure. It might be many minutes 90% of the time, but if you do 10 or 20 of these heists eventually you're going to get unlucky and the cop will happen to be sitting at a speed trap right there are you're busting into the truck. This is the fundamental problem with crime. You will get away with it most of the time, but when you don't you're fucked. It's a lousy career choice because the upsides are modest relatively speaking, and the downsides are huge. If you're going to be a criminal the trick is to steal enough to retire on and then immediately retire. Knocking over one random truck is not going to do it.
- ethbro 8y ago
  You can get a 50 BMG rifle for a few thousand dollars and put a hole right through an engine block. Unload truck at your leisure. That's not even getting into ways to make an automated system stop by putting up an emergency / stop sign in the middle of the road. The risk to stealing is directly proportional to the chance of getting caught, which broadly correlates into something unexpected happening, which is drastically diminished by not having a human driver.
  - jandrese 8y ago
    This assumes the truck has no way to call for help when something goes wrong, or that people driving on the same road won't call the cops on you. Long haul trucking doesn't usually happen on deserted backroads. I'm just saying that the worry about theft is probably overblown. It's almost certainly going to be rare enough that a regular insurance policy will be sufficient protection. People can be hired for exceptional cargo, but that's true today too.
    - ethbro 8y ago
      Have you ever driven interstate east of the Rockies and west of the Mississippi? If not, you'd be surprised how bare it is. Especially if automation kills the truck stops. We'll see. The means are trivial for any enterprising farmer, and I think the moral calculus drastically changes once you remove risk to a human driver from the equation.
  - smileysteve 8y ago
    > You can get a 50 BMG rifle for a few thousand dollars and put a hole right through an engine block. So, how does a single, or even a 2 driver truck prevent this TODAY? The only reason I can think is conspiracy felony murder of 1 or 2 people w/ clubs, guns, cell phones has a higher risk than conspiracy felony larceny? You've concocted a great hollywood heist scene; but if you're Fast and the Furious driving through South America, it's The Rock and the Swat team hanging out in cargo hold you have to worry about; not whether the truck has an autonomous driver or not.
    - ethbro 8y ago
      > So, how does a single, or even a 2 driver truck prevent this TODAY See my last paragraph. Defending an unmanned vehicle is the walls vs guards argument: it's far harder to build an impassible, unguarded wall than it is to build a difficult, guarded one.
      - smileysteve 8y ago
- james_s_tayler 8y ago
  As my IT teacher always used to say "don't go to jail for 50 bucks, go for 50 million"

by ethbro 8y ago

jandrese 8y ago

These thieves have to steal from a moving vehicle? Sure it's not impossible, but it's more Hollywood heist than something you'd see in real life. It will almost certainly happen a few times, but for practical purposes the amount of stuff stolen before the guys are caught will be less than what it costs to hire tens of thousands of rent-a-cops to sit in the backs of trucks. Plus, these are thieves we are talking about. Pointing a gun at a human driver and telling them to pull over so they can rob the truck is something that could easily happen today but is extremely rare. The minimum police response time is something that's hard to measure. It might be many minutes 90% of the time, but if you do 10 or 20 of these heists eventually you're going to get unlucky and the cop will happen to be sitting at a speed trap right there are you're busting into the truck. This is the fundamental problem with crime. You will get away with it most of the time, but when you don't you're fucked. It's a lousy career choice because the upsides are modest relatively speaking, and the downsides are huge. If you're going to be a criminal the trick is to steal enough to retire on and then immediately retire. Knocking over one random truck is not going to do it.

ethbro 8y ago
You can get a 50 BMG rifle for a few thousand dollars and put a hole right through an engine block. Unload truck at your leisure. That's not even getting into ways to make an automated system stop by putting up an emergency / stop sign in the middle of the road. The risk to stealing is directly proportional to the chance of getting caught, which broadly correlates into something unexpected happening, which is drastically diminished by not having a human driver.
- jandrese 8y ago
  This assumes the truck has no way to call for help when something goes wrong, or that people driving on the same road won't call the cops on you. Long haul trucking doesn't usually happen on deserted backroads. I'm just saying that the worry about theft is probably overblown. It's almost certainly going to be rare enough that a regular insurance policy will be sufficient protection. People can be hired for exceptional cargo, but that's true today too.
  - ethbro 8y ago
    Have you ever driven interstate east of the Rockies and west of the Mississippi? If not, you'd be surprised how bare it is. Especially if automation kills the truck stops. We'll see. The means are trivial for any enterprising farmer, and I think the moral calculus drastically changes once you remove risk to a human driver from the equation.
- smileysteve 8y ago
  > You can get a 50 BMG rifle for a few thousand dollars and put a hole right through an engine block. So, how does a single, or even a 2 driver truck prevent this TODAY? The only reason I can think is conspiracy felony murder of 1 or 2 people w/ clubs, guns, cell phones has a higher risk than conspiracy felony larceny? You've concocted a great hollywood heist scene; but if you're Fast and the Furious driving through South America, it's The Rock and the Swat team hanging out in cargo hold you have to worry about; not whether the truck has an autonomous driver or not.
  - ethbro 8y ago
    > So, how does a single, or even a 2 driver truck prevent this TODAY See my last paragraph. Defending an unmanned vehicle is the walls vs guards argument: it's far harder to build an impassible, unguarded wall than it is to build a difficult, guarded one.
    - smileysteve 8y ago
james_s_tayler 8y ago
As my IT teacher always used to say "don't go to jail for 50 bucks, go for 50 million"