7 ms·

I love this quote: “People are lashing out justifiably," said Douglas Rushkoff, a media theorist at City University of New York and author of the book “Throwin

I love this quote: “People are lashing out justifiably," said Douglas Rushkoff, a media theorist at City University of New York and author of the book “Throwing Rocks at the Google Bus.” He likened driverless cars to robotic incarnations of scabs — workers who refuse to join strikes or who take the place of those on strike. “There's a growing sense that the giant corporations honing driverless technologies do not have our best interests at heart,” Mr. Rushkoff said. “Just think about the humans inside these vehicles, who are essentially training the artificial intelligence that will replace them.” Why is it that for every act of random vandalism or hooliganism, there's always an academic who will find a way to blame the victim?

wwarner 8y ago
Wait -- Scientist kills innocent bystander with his experiment and the public shouldn't be mad about it? Would you have said the same thing if the professor defended Waymo?
- Waterluvian 8y ago
  They should be mad about that. But that's not at all what this guy is complaining about.
- ng12 8y ago
  I feel like this rapidly moves into Trolley Problem territory. 10,000+ people die in a year due to drunk driving, what's the acceptable death toll for rolling out driverless cars as fast as possible?
  - lambda 8y ago
    Because of the uncertainty behind something new, you should have strong evidence that driverless cars are substantially safer than cars with drivers. Additionally, if driverless cars are being tested on public roads, you need laws and practices that are robust enough to prevent the kind of accident that killed someone. They had only one operator in the car, who was responsible for monitoring the car and logging information about its performance. They had specifically disabled safety systems which would have caused it to brake sooner. Even if its expected that driverless cars will reduce fatalities due to drunk or distracted driving, you need to have sufficient evidence of the improvement, safety systems in place for test systems, and public discussion of the tradeoffs and what situations driverless cars might perform worse in than human drivers, because lots of people have behavioral expectations based on human drivers; things like making eye contact with a driver before crossing the street. So yes, it is good to be working on and testing driverless cars, but you need to have a serious sense of humility and safety about it, and not push it, because even if you are incredibly safe you can expect some backlash, but if you miss the mark at all and oversell the safety, you'll get a lot more backlash, with justification, much sooner, which could set the whole program back significantly.
    - the8472 8y ago
      > you should have strong evidence that driverless cars are substantially safer than cars with drivers. No. Considering the other benefits of self-driving cars, such as increased mobility for the elderly, you can at most require that they are as safe as cars with drivers, not necessarily safer. If the benefits were great enough (reduced pollution indirectly saving lives? saved life-years due to more efficient traffic?) one could even accept that they could be a little less safe as far as direct fatalities are concerned.
      - miranda_rights 8y ago
        > If the benefits were great enough (reduced pollution indirectly saving lives? saved life-years due to more efficient traffic?) one could even accept that they could be a little less safe as far as direct fatalities are concerned. I disagree. I'm finding it hard to come up with an example that would make me think it's ok to have more people hit and killed by cars. I'm more than ready for self-driving cars to be a reality, but not if more people will die. "Saved life-years" is not good enough.
        the8472 8y ago
        What does it mean to avoid a fatality other than saving that person's remaining life-years? > I'm finding it hard to come up with an example that would make me think it's ok to have more people hit and killed by cars. Entirely speculative: Heart failure is the leading cause of death in the US. If 100% self-driving traffic could let EMTs arrive faster at the scene that could save more lives than a slight increase from traffic accidents.
      - bumby 8y ago
        I understand your point but I doubt it would work well in reality when it comes to public opinion/backlash. Humans are disproportionately swayed by proximate causes, so deaths directly attributed to self driving cars are going to be more heavily weighted in the court of public opinion.
      - masonic 8y ago
  - gamblor956 8y ago
    Self-driving cars have killed at least 3 people this calendar year despite there being several millions fewer self-driving vehicles on the road. Scale up those proportionate rates, they would be killing far more than 10,000 people a year. So at this point, self-driving cars still have quite a bit of work to go to prove that they are actually safer than a drunk driver, let alone a sober driver.
    - loeg 8y ago
      If you think drunk drivers are bad, sober drivers kill more than twice as many people! The actual number to beat is something like 37,000 annually[0]. And I suspect your "millions" factor has an extra zero or two when you account for (a) miles driven (self-driving cars are probably more highly utilized) and (b) driving conditions (city is more interesting for training data than highway, whereas probably more person-driving is done on highways). [0]: https://www.nhtsa.gov/press-releases/us-dot-announces-2017-roadway-fatalities-down https://www.nhtsa.gov/press-releases/us-dot-announces-2017-r...
      - masonic 8y ago
        Your source doesn't differentiate between sober drivers and drivers not tested for any/all impairing chemicals. Unknown sobriety != sober.
  - jdavis703 8y ago
    Wouldn’t mandatory breathalyzer ignition locks solve this problem? This is a proven technology that shouldn’t kill anyone as it’s being rolled out. Move fast and break things is great for websites and apps, but when human lives are at stake it requires strict ethical considerations.
    - loeg 8y ago
      Interlock breathalyzers have a host of problems that make indiscriminate application problematic. Additionally, judicial remedies can only be applied after someone has already been caught drunk driving. So even if we applied them to all prosecuted drunk drivers, it is not a complete prophylactic.
    - rblatz 8y ago
      What about all the existing cars on the road? What about manual cars that can be push started? Who installs and certifies these, they need calibrated frequently, they are extremely simple to bypass for anyone with even basic vehicle knowledge.
      - jhbadger 8y ago
        If the law starts now, in 5-10 years the vast majority of old cars will be junked. Sure, there will still be a few old cars, but they will be an insignificant minority. It's not unlike how other rule introductions worked. Nobody banned old cars without seatbelts, they just required that all new cars have them.
- icebraining 8y ago
  Who has Waymo killed?
  - wwarner 8y ago
    Uber killed the pedestrian, not Waymo. But that's hardly any comfort to the elected representatives of Arizona. I suppose the execution, management and oversight of the corporation really matter, but at this early stage of the industry it's hard to look at Uber's traffic fatality and interpret it as anything but negative for Waymo and the other driverless companies.
- freehunter 8y ago
  Wait -- human kills innocent people with their distracted driving and the public shouldn't be mad about it? Where are the people with rocks and knives and guns demanding human-driven cars be forced off the road due to the overwhelming number of people they have killed?
  - whatshisface 8y ago
    People are angry when distracted drivers kill, and when it happens people are forced off the road and in to jail. If reckless driving leading to manslaughter was not illegal, you might see a few angry mobs doing what you describe.
    - stouset 8y ago
      Generally speaking, people are not forced off the road and into jail when they kill others while operating motor vehicles, except in the most egregious cases. It’s a running “joke” in some circles that if you want to kill someone and get away with the crime consequence-free, hitting them with your car and claiming it was an accident is the most reliable way to do it.
      - dingoegret 8y ago
        No.. no it isn't. Where did you even get this idea? Are you planning something? If you kill anyone, at all, self defense even, you are definitely going to jail. Then a magistrate decides what to do with you the next day. There is no situation where someone is dead at your feet and the cops are just like "yeah sure bud see ya later". Even if they believe you. Even if there's video evidence on hand. Lastly, whoever is telling you this "running joke" stop listening to them. You will absolutely be charged with vehicular homicide. Even if you can prove the person jumped in front of your car. A jury can convict you on the basis that the prosecution makes a compelling case that you had a few seconds to break but you didn't. Murder ain't no joke pal.
    - freehunter 8y ago
      Yes but we're not talking about the driver/car/company combo that killed someone. That was a different driver, a different car, and a different company making the hardware/software. Forcing a Waymo car off the road and pointing a gun at the driver because an Uber car killed someone is not the same as what you're describing.
- Aeolun 8y ago
  Wait, are you talking about the person that litterally stepped in front of a driverless car and was killed? Because I can’t see how that would’ve been any different with a human behind the wheel.
munchbunny 8y ago
There's an important difference between blaming the victim and trying to explain why the attackers are doing what they are doing. Rushkoff is doing the latter, not the former, and pretending he's doing the former certainly makes it easier to ignore his point.
- emmelaich 8y ago
  He should not use the word "justifiably" if he's merely explaining.
  - Retric 8y ago
    Context suggests people are justifiably upset, not that these specific actions where justified. Google is putting their community at risk without any form of compensation. Much like dumping toxic waste into public streams it’s public harm for private gain. PS: Never trust a quote that’s that short, it’s been stripped of all meaning.
    - sologoub 8y ago
      Looking at the actual facts, there appear to be little justification for this violence, especially since it affects the human safety drivers the most and they are definitely not any kind of aggressor here. Some recent quotes from the USA Today article covering the Waymo self-driving car hailing service: “"But mostly it just makes me feel safe. One time, the Waymo (vehicle) paused before turning, and I wondered why. Then a car ran the red light and crashed into the median. It saw that car way before I did."” “But the fact remains that after millions of miles of city driving, another 7 billion miles of virtual testing and countless more tests undertaken at a private faux-city facility in California, Waymo vehicles have yet to cause a major accident. When fender-benders do happen, often it's because human drivers bump into the robot cars.” Source: https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2018/10/10/waymo-self-driving-cars-hit-10-million-road-miles-they-aim-public-debut/1536441002/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2018/10/10/waymo-self-d... The real issue is that we need more miles driven to really be certain that this safety record will hold. Thwarting this testing will probably endanger more people because the tech will become mainstream whether anyone likes it or not. It would be a lot better if the tech is over-tested than under-tested.
darkerside 8y ago
> act of random vandalism or hooliganism I'm truly not sure if you're insidiously doing this on purpose, but that seems to be an understatement and mischaracterization of what's going on here. These are targeted acts, more akin to civil disobedience than vandalism. The way you phrase it seems like you're trying to plant a seed that distracts from the point. I try to assume positive intent, but this really seems like a spin job. Could you perhaps elaborate?
- sabalaba 8y ago
  Definition of vandalism: willful or malicious destruction or defacement of public or private property. It's vandalism.
  - someguydave 8y ago
    I am not a lawyer but I would think that if the cars are moving in traffic during the criminal act I suspect that the criminals would get a higher charge (criminal endangerment?)
  - pdkl95 8y ago
    Nobody disagrees that it is vandalism. The darkerside's comment was clearly referring to the characterization of these incidents as: > act of random vandalism or hooliganism darkerside correctly corrects that: > These are targeted acts That should be obvious to anybody that read the article, which contained several statements form the people involved explaining why they vandalized the cars. Calling it "random" acts of vandalism is an extreme misrepresentation of what happened. The vandalism was done for clearly stated reasons.
- WalterSear 8y ago
  More akin to hate crime, really.

wwarner 8y ago

Wait -- Scientist kills innocent bystander with his experiment and the public shouldn't be mad about it? Would you have said the same thing if the professor defended Waymo?

Waterluvian 8y ago
They should be mad about that. But that's not at all what this guy is complaining about.
ng12 8y ago
I feel like this rapidly moves into Trolley Problem territory. 10,000+ people die in a year due to drunk driving, what's the acceptable death toll for rolling out driverless cars as fast as possible?
- lambda 8y ago
  Because of the uncertainty behind something new, you should have strong evidence that driverless cars are substantially safer than cars with drivers. Additionally, if driverless cars are being tested on public roads, you need laws and practices that are robust enough to prevent the kind of accident that killed someone. They had only one operator in the car, who was responsible for monitoring the car and logging information about its performance. They had specifically disabled safety systems which would have caused it to brake sooner. Even if its expected that driverless cars will reduce fatalities due to drunk or distracted driving, you need to have sufficient evidence of the improvement, safety systems in place for test systems, and public discussion of the tradeoffs and what situations driverless cars might perform worse in than human drivers, because lots of people have behavioral expectations based on human drivers; things like making eye contact with a driver before crossing the street. So yes, it is good to be working on and testing driverless cars, but you need to have a serious sense of humility and safety about it, and not push it, because even if you are incredibly safe you can expect some backlash, but if you miss the mark at all and oversell the safety, you'll get a lot more backlash, with justification, much sooner, which could set the whole program back significantly.
  - the8472 8y ago
    > you should have strong evidence that driverless cars are substantially safer than cars with drivers. No. Considering the other benefits of self-driving cars, such as increased mobility for the elderly, you can at most require that they are as safe as cars with drivers, not necessarily safer. If the benefits were great enough (reduced pollution indirectly saving lives? saved life-years due to more efficient traffic?) one could even accept that they could be a little less safe as far as direct fatalities are concerned.
    - miranda_rights 8y ago
      > If the benefits were great enough (reduced pollution indirectly saving lives? saved life-years due to more efficient traffic?) one could even accept that they could be a little less safe as far as direct fatalities are concerned. I disagree. I'm finding it hard to come up with an example that would make me think it's ok to have more people hit and killed by cars. I'm more than ready for self-driving cars to be a reality, but not if more people will die. "Saved life-years" is not good enough.
      - the8472 8y ago
        What does it mean to avoid a fatality other than saving that person's remaining life-years? > I'm finding it hard to come up with an example that would make me think it's ok to have more people hit and killed by cars. Entirely speculative: Heart failure is the leading cause of death in the US. If 100% self-driving traffic could let EMTs arrive faster at the scene that could save more lives than a slight increase from traffic accidents.
    - bumby 8y ago
      I understand your point but I doubt it would work well in reality when it comes to public opinion/backlash. Humans are disproportionately swayed by proximate causes, so deaths directly attributed to self driving cars are going to be more heavily weighted in the court of public opinion.
    - masonic 8y ago
- gamblor956 8y ago
  Self-driving cars have killed at least 3 people this calendar year despite there being several millions fewer self-driving vehicles on the road. Scale up those proportionate rates, they would be killing far more than 10,000 people a year. So at this point, self-driving cars still have quite a bit of work to go to prove that they are actually safer than a drunk driver, let alone a sober driver.
  - loeg 8y ago
    If you think drunk drivers are bad, sober drivers kill more than twice as many people! The actual number to beat is something like 37,000 annually[0]. And I suspect your "millions" factor has an extra zero or two when you account for (a) miles driven (self-driving cars are probably more highly utilized) and (b) driving conditions (city is more interesting for training data than highway, whereas probably more person-driving is done on highways). [0]: https://www.nhtsa.gov/press-releases/us-dot-announces-2017-roadway-fatalities-down https://www.nhtsa.gov/press-releases/us-dot-announces-2017-r...
    - masonic 8y ago
      Your source doesn't differentiate between sober drivers and drivers not tested for any/all impairing chemicals. Unknown sobriety != sober.
- jdavis703 8y ago
  Wouldn’t mandatory breathalyzer ignition locks solve this problem? This is a proven technology that shouldn’t kill anyone as it’s being rolled out. Move fast and break things is great for websites and apps, but when human lives are at stake it requires strict ethical considerations.
  - loeg 8y ago
    Interlock breathalyzers have a host of problems that make indiscriminate application problematic. Additionally, judicial remedies can only be applied after someone has already been caught drunk driving. So even if we applied them to all prosecuted drunk drivers, it is not a complete prophylactic.
  - rblatz 8y ago
    What about all the existing cars on the road? What about manual cars that can be push started? Who installs and certifies these, they need calibrated frequently, they are extremely simple to bypass for anyone with even basic vehicle knowledge.
    - jhbadger 8y ago
      If the law starts now, in 5-10 years the vast majority of old cars will be junked. Sure, there will still be a few old cars, but they will be an insignificant minority. It's not unlike how other rule introductions worked. Nobody banned old cars without seatbelts, they just required that all new cars have them.
icebraining 8y ago
Who has Waymo killed?
- wwarner 8y ago
  Uber killed the pedestrian, not Waymo. But that's hardly any comfort to the elected representatives of Arizona. I suppose the execution, management and oversight of the corporation really matter, but at this early stage of the industry it's hard to look at Uber's traffic fatality and interpret it as anything but negative for Waymo and the other driverless companies.
freehunter 8y ago
Wait -- human kills innocent people with their distracted driving and the public shouldn't be mad about it? Where are the people with rocks and knives and guns demanding human-driven cars be forced off the road due to the overwhelming number of people they have killed?
- whatshisface 8y ago
  People are angry when distracted drivers kill, and when it happens people are forced off the road and in to jail. If reckless driving leading to manslaughter was not illegal, you might see a few angry mobs doing what you describe.
  - stouset 8y ago
    Generally speaking, people are not forced off the road and into jail when they kill others while operating motor vehicles, except in the most egregious cases. It’s a running “joke” in some circles that if you want to kill someone and get away with the crime consequence-free, hitting them with your car and claiming it was an accident is the most reliable way to do it.
    - dingoegret 8y ago
      No.. no it isn't. Where did you even get this idea? Are you planning something? If you kill anyone, at all, self defense even, you are definitely going to jail. Then a magistrate decides what to do with you the next day. There is no situation where someone is dead at your feet and the cops are just like "yeah sure bud see ya later". Even if they believe you. Even if there's video evidence on hand. Lastly, whoever is telling you this "running joke" stop listening to them. You will absolutely be charged with vehicular homicide. Even if you can prove the person jumped in front of your car. A jury can convict you on the basis that the prosecution makes a compelling case that you had a few seconds to break but you didn't. Murder ain't no joke pal.
  - freehunter 8y ago
    Yes but we're not talking about the driver/car/company combo that killed someone. That was a different driver, a different car, and a different company making the hardware/software. Forcing a Waymo car off the road and pointing a gun at the driver because an Uber car killed someone is not the same as what you're describing.
Aeolun 8y ago
Wait, are you talking about the person that litterally stepped in front of a driverless car and was killed? Because I can’t see how that would’ve been any different with a human behind the wheel.

munchbunny 8y ago

There's an important difference between blaming the victim and trying to explain why the attackers are doing what they are doing. Rushkoff is doing the latter, not the former, and pretending he's doing the former certainly makes it easier to ignore his point.

emmelaich 8y ago
He should not use the word "justifiably" if he's merely explaining.
- Retric 8y ago
  Context suggests people are justifiably upset, not that these specific actions where justified. Google is putting their community at risk without any form of compensation. Much like dumping toxic waste into public streams it’s public harm for private gain. PS: Never trust a quote that’s that short, it’s been stripped of all meaning.
  - sologoub 8y ago
    Looking at the actual facts, there appear to be little justification for this violence, especially since it affects the human safety drivers the most and they are definitely not any kind of aggressor here. Some recent quotes from the USA Today article covering the Waymo self-driving car hailing service: “"But mostly it just makes me feel safe. One time, the Waymo (vehicle) paused before turning, and I wondered why. Then a car ran the red light and crashed into the median. It saw that car way before I did."” “But the fact remains that after millions of miles of city driving, another 7 billion miles of virtual testing and countless more tests undertaken at a private faux-city facility in California, Waymo vehicles have yet to cause a major accident. When fender-benders do happen, often it's because human drivers bump into the robot cars.” Source: https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2018/10/10/waymo-self-driving-cars-hit-10-million-road-miles-they-aim-public-debut/1536441002/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2018/10/10/waymo-self-d... The real issue is that we need more miles driven to really be certain that this safety record will hold. Thwarting this testing will probably endanger more people because the tech will become mainstream whether anyone likes it or not. It would be a lot better if the tech is over-tested than under-tested.

darkerside 8y ago

> act of random vandalism or hooliganism I'm truly not sure if you're insidiously doing this on purpose, but that seems to be an understatement and mischaracterization of what's going on here. These are targeted acts, more akin to civil disobedience than vandalism. The way you phrase it seems like you're trying to plant a seed that distracts from the point. I try to assume positive intent, but this really seems like a spin job. Could you perhaps elaborate?

sabalaba 8y ago
Definition of vandalism: willful or malicious destruction or defacement of public or private property. It's vandalism.
- someguydave 8y ago
  I am not a lawyer but I would think that if the cars are moving in traffic during the criminal act I suspect that the criminals would get a higher charge (criminal endangerment?)
- pdkl95 8y ago
  Nobody disagrees that it is vandalism. The darkerside's comment was clearly referring to the characterization of these incidents as: > act of random vandalism or hooliganism darkerside correctly corrects that: > These are targeted acts That should be obvious to anybody that read the article, which contained several statements form the people involved explaining why they vandalized the cars. Calling it "random" acts of vandalism is an extreme misrepresentation of what happened. The vandalism was done for clearly stated reasons.
WalterSear 8y ago
More akin to hate crime, really.