In principle, I agree. It's just that, in practice, it's almost certainly impossible to reach safe self-driving cars without a period of 'public beta testing',

In principle, I agree. It's just that, in practice, it's almost certainly impossible to reach safe self-driving cars without a period of 'public beta testing', you'll just never get enough data and experience. Not entirely unlike how there's a period for new drivers where they really aren't safe, but there's no way for them to become safe without going out onto the regular roads and gaining more experience.