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>Having self-driving cars randomly stop short is a quick way to rack up a lot of "not legally at fault", but perhaps morally at-fault, accidents. And I'm prett
by rhino369 7y ago
>Having self-driving cars randomly stop short is a quick way to rack up a lot of "not legally at fault", but perhaps morally at-fault, accidents.
And I'm pretty sure, in most jurisdictions, slamming on the breaks unexpectedly and for no good reason, will get you at least a portion of the liability for an accident. The person who rear-ends you will get some too, but its not always true that you can't be at fault when you get rear-ended.
As you imply, no safety system should rely on others doing their job perfectly. That is an inherently unsafe system.
- JamesBarney 7y agoIf there was an accident and the cops ask you "why did you break suddenly?" and you say something reasonable that's not "to commit insurance fraud" you probably won't be at fault. It's the responsibility of the person behind you to keep a safe following distance.
- karthikb 7y agoI have had the "pleasure" of driving alongside and behind Cruise's vehicles on many occasions here in San Francisco. They will stop dramatically in the middle of a block (empty, no traffic, no pedestrians), edge forward, dramatically stop again, go halfway through the intersection and again...dramatically stop. It feels to me like whoever has written their braking algorithm is using bang bang control.
- rhino369 7y agoSure, but that an issue of evidence. Google, Uber, Tesla, etc. have source code, records, emails, reports, etc. that can potentially prove their cars just break because they aren't good enough drivers. And they have deep enough pockets that lawyers will go after them. 1000% sure Google will end up writing a check if someone dies because they rear-ended a google car that suddenly hit the breaks.