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1. You seem to think that driverless cars are unimportant for places like Europe. I think you're deeply wrong. If cars that can equal or exceed the performan

1. You seem to think that driverless cars are unimportant for places like Europe. I think you're deeply wrong. If cars that can equal or exceed the performance of median humans come to the market without adding more than a few tens of thousands of dollars to the cost of the vehicle, I expect that they will rapidly become more popular than current automobiles in Europe (and Europe is far from car-averse -- the Netherlands has about one car per two people), and that they will on the margin significantly (but not catastrophically) reduce usage of public transport. (EDIT: If the pattern of driverless cars is dominantly one of rides-for-hire rather than ownership, the total unit sales of driverless cars might be significantly lower than current unit sales of normal cars, but I would expect driverless cars to rapidly eat most of the passenger-miles of automobiles plus a significant share of the passenger-miles of public transit). 2 and 3: You didn't even remotely address anything I said.

rglullis 4y ago
> The Netherlands has about one car per two people That is not the relevant metric. The important metric is how many trips does the average dutch take by car that could be taken by some more efficient mode? Lots of people in European cities have cars but use them only on the weekend. Or they use the car to go to work on the outskirts of the city, but manage to use public transportation when going to a football match for a night out. Lots of families have only one car when in the US it would be only possible to live if each adult had their own car, etc. > You didn't even remotely address anything I said. You are right, I didn't. Because to me holding self-driving cars as the panacea that is going to solve the issues in the US is ridiculously naive. It is an illusion created by the corporations that are not interested in actually solving the problem and just want to push out more cars, keep people addicted to broken lifestyles and over-consumption. And is backed by short-sighted technologists that see the world through their nerd lenses and don't stop to think if there are better, lower-tech ways to improve everyone's lives.
- aetherson 4y ago
  Nobody held driverless cars as a "panacea" to anything that's completely something you made up. Let's just review this whole conversation: 1. I suggested to a poster who wanted to blame the whole Cruise problem on the garbage truck that garbage trucks do in fact have to block lanes. 2. You then jumped in and said that American should "just" reinvent itself so that cars weren't a big deal. You left it implicit why that was relevant here, but I think I understand you to believe that driverless cars are an unimportant technology. 3. I pointed out that "just" changing the fundamental mode of transit across all of America is in fact a tall order. 4. And then you've gotten less and less responsive to actual points until you get to here where you're now suggesting that driverless cars aren't a panacea, which is an argument nobody made. To affirmatively restate my points: 1. Driverless cars, to be successful, must deal with a lot of messy road conditions, not just the 99% case. 2. If driverless cars do at some point cross the above line and genuinely become equal to or greater than the median human driver, I think they will be an important technology that will improve people's lives -- in both the United States and very significantly (if possibly somewhat less so) in Europe. 3. Driverless cars are plausibly on a much shorter timeline than remaking all of America's physical transportation/density infrastructure, and plausibly much less overall expensive than remaking all of America's physical transportation/density infrastructure. 4. Investment in driverless cars is non-rival to other changes to America's physical transportation/density infrastructure.
  - rglullis 4y ago
    The argument that I am making is simple: the more you push for self-driving cars, the more you are pushing to a car-centric system and the farther you are getting from better, more sustainable solutions. It is not just that is not a panacea, it is that it is a bad medicine.
    - aetherson 4y ago
      I suspect that you will find that your opinions are just not shared, and that people -- everywhere, including in places that you imagine to be ideologically aligned with you -- generally find that driverless cars make their lives better on the margin, if good driverless cars start to exist.

rglullis 4y ago

> The Netherlands has about one car per two people That is not the relevant metric. The important metric is how many trips does the average dutch take by car that could be taken by some more efficient mode? Lots of people in European cities have cars but use them only on the weekend. Or they use the car to go to work on the outskirts of the city, but manage to use public transportation when going to a football match for a night out. Lots of families have only one car when in the US it would be only possible to live if each adult had their own car, etc. > You didn't even remotely address anything I said. You are right, I didn't. Because to me holding self-driving cars as the panacea that is going to solve the issues in the US is ridiculously naive. It is an illusion created by the corporations that are not interested in actually solving the problem and just want to push out more cars, keep people addicted to broken lifestyles and over-consumption. And is backed by short-sighted technologists that see the world through their nerd lenses and don't stop to think if there are better, lower-tech ways to improve everyone's lives.

aetherson 4y ago
Nobody held driverless cars as a "panacea" to anything that's completely something you made up. Let's just review this whole conversation: 1. I suggested to a poster who wanted to blame the whole Cruise problem on the garbage truck that garbage trucks do in fact have to block lanes. 2. You then jumped in and said that American should "just" reinvent itself so that cars weren't a big deal. You left it implicit why that was relevant here, but I think I understand you to believe that driverless cars are an unimportant technology. 3. I pointed out that "just" changing the fundamental mode of transit across all of America is in fact a tall order. 4. And then you've gotten less and less responsive to actual points until you get to here where you're now suggesting that driverless cars aren't a panacea, which is an argument nobody made. To affirmatively restate my points: 1. Driverless cars, to be successful, must deal with a lot of messy road conditions, not just the 99% case. 2. If driverless cars do at some point cross the above line and genuinely become equal to or greater than the median human driver, I think they will be an important technology that will improve people's lives -- in both the United States and very significantly (if possibly somewhat less so) in Europe. 3. Driverless cars are plausibly on a much shorter timeline than remaking all of America's physical transportation/density infrastructure, and plausibly much less overall expensive than remaking all of America's physical transportation/density infrastructure. 4. Investment in driverless cars is non-rival to other changes to America's physical transportation/density infrastructure.
- rglullis 4y ago
  The argument that I am making is simple: the more you push for self-driving cars, the more you are pushing to a car-centric system and the farther you are getting from better, more sustainable solutions. It is not just that is not a panacea, it is that it is a bad medicine.
  - aetherson 4y ago
    I suspect that you will find that your opinions are just not shared, and that people -- everywhere, including in places that you imagine to be ideologically aligned with you -- generally find that driverless cars make their lives better on the margin, if good driverless cars start to exist.