6 ms·

Google's Driverless Future

30 points by thecoffman 13y ago

BruceIV 13y ago
So get the driverless car that isn't run by Google. I get that there are privacy issues, but I still think this article is overly alarmist. As an aside, I expect autonomous driving to be phased in gradually - I'd wager freeways first, then city centers, and rural areas only at the very end. However, once there's a sufficient installed base of autonomous vehicles, I expect it will be illegal to drive manually in those areas, because it kind of defeats the point.
- thrownaway2424 13y ago
  An alarmist article in Reason, you say? How intriguing.
melling 13y ago
It's going to take a long time to get people comfortable with driverless cars. In the meantime, can the technology be immediately converted to "assisted" driving to help avoid collisions, crossing the center line, etc.? Make it a lot harder for people to "bump" into each other. We might be able to get some of the benefits of driverless cars sooner.
- toomuchtodo 13y ago
  Start using it in places you absolutely have to. Retirement communities where the elderly have lost their ability to drive, etc.
  - melling 13y ago
    Wouldn't you want to start with saving people's lives? 30,000-40,000 people die in the US every year.
    - toomuchtodo 13y ago
      Any place where mobility is needed is where you'll want to start. I was simply stating that if uptake was going to be slower due to human irrationality, you'd start where people absolutely need transportation and have no other option. People are much more open minded about a choice when they have no other choice.
- maxerickson 13y ago
  Auto braking, adaptive cruise control and lane keeping are already on the road.
  - elteto 13y ago
    Yes, however the technology has not "trickled down" from high end cars (albeit some car makers are pushing hard on this). We still need to wait a little bit more before we can find some of these on a Civic/Corolla.
- DasIch 13y ago
  Assisted driving technology has existed for years and is deployed in a lot of cars. There is no need to convert this technology, it already exists and is widely deployed. The only thing that prevents this technology from being used in every car is that the price for that technology isn't low enough, yet. Self-driving cars are really just an incremental improvement to what high-end manufacturers like Mercedes or BMW already offer.
  - elteto 13y ago
    > Self-driving cars are really just an incremental improvement to what high-end manufacturers like Mercedes or BMW already offer. So you are telling me that I can go to a Mercedez/BMW dealer right now and get a car that almost drives itself in regular traffic conditions? Simply not true. There's a lot of assisted driving technology (blind spots alarms, HUDs, assisted parking) out there, but nothing like Google's self-driving car.
    - micampe 13y ago
      “The company says it is preparing to launch in 2014 its first batch of autonomous vehicles capable of driving up to 31 miles per hour. The limited speed reflects the technology’s expected initial use in heavy traffic. Volvo says it is working on higher-speed autonomous driving, but isn’t yet disclosing when it would be available. Its prototypes have run thousands of miles of test drives on public roads in Spain and on the company’s test track in western Sweden.” http://blogs.wsj.com/drivers-seat/2012/12/03/volvo-plans-to-roll-out-self-driving-cars-in-2014/ http://blogs.wsj.com/drivers-seat/2012/12/03/volvo-plans-to-... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autonomous_cruise_control_system https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autonomous_cruise_control_syst... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precrash_system https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precrash_system https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lane_departure_warning_system https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lane_departure_warning_system https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robotic_car#Notable_projects https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robotic_car#Notable_projects
      - elteto 13y ago
        Well the examples you are citing are PR reports or some assisted driving technologies. While some car companies might be working hard on their projects, as of right now, only Google has shown a working prototype performing on street traffic, and their technology is simply not an incremental step from anything else out there, as he claimed. That was the point I was trying to refute, I was not saying that nobody else is working on it but Google.
- yannyu 13y ago
  Maybe some people won't be comfortable with driverless cars at first, but I'm guessing at least 10% of the cars on the road will be driverless within 10 years. Regardless of how people feel about it, once the actuaries get some data to crunch on liability regarding driverless cars, it'll quickly become more expensive to insure your own car than a driverless one.
isaacwaller 13y ago
I think it's too early to make these conclusions. The self driving cars are produced by Google X, and have nothing to do (yet) with the data-collecting Ads division. I would be very surprised if the cars send personally-identifying data back to Google, and I think there would be a considerable public backlash.
pkandathil 13y ago
A person in security told me that a big fear they have is car bombs. You would now be able to send groups of cars to a location without risking human life. That us good enough reason to not want self driving cars. I still think some of the functionality can be used for accident prevention.
- raldi 13y ago
  Would that also have been a good enough reason not to want regular cars?
  - conanbatt 13y ago
    Well, that would require at least one suicide bomber. Its a legitimate concern, you wouldnt want a car getting hacked and doing all kinds of stuff, like deliberately causing an accident.
  - ollysb 13y ago
    Yeah that's a bit like not allowing mobile phones because they can detonate bombs.
- BruceIV 13y ago
  Car accidents kill orders of magnitude more people than terrorists do. I think even if the number of car bombings jumped to 10 times its current level with autonomous cars society would still likely come out ahead.
- ivix 13y ago
  Because setting up a remote control car with a camera is currently impossible? That's trivially easy in comparison to forcing an autonomous car to do something dangerous.
riggins 13y ago
there's a fundamental assumption in this article that I think is very doubtful. this article assumes that part of the customers 'payment' for a self-driving car will be advertising. That seems like a very poor assumption. Personally, I assume google will make money selling a car (or the tech), just like any other business. Just because the search business is free and makes their revenue through advertising doesn't mean that the car business would have the same approach.
- jareds 13y ago
  Could the self-driving tech be the automotive version of Android? Even if Google stripped out personally identifiable data the sheer amount of data they could get for their maps would have to be worth a lot of money. Whether it’s enough to partially subsidize the required research and development as well as weather the automotive industry would be willing to enter an agreement with them are questions I don’t have the answer to.
- munificent 13y ago
  > Personally, I assume google will make money selling a car (or the tech), just like any other business. I am a Googler and I've heard Larry, Sergey, and many on the self-driving car team talk about the project. While I'm sure monetization is on their minds as well, the very clear message from them is that they view this project as changing the world for the better. In today's world, it is very hard not to be cynical, and it's especially hard not to be cynical online without looking like a Pollyanna or a corporate shill but in this case, I believe the opportunity for public good is the strongest motivator for the project. Much like NASA, Google gets tons of ancillary benefits from doing all of this R&D so even if the project itself isn't a revenue generator, it will still deliver value to Google, but I think what gets many of the people working on it up in the morning is the chance to reduce the number of traffic fatalities, to turn parking lots back into parks, and to let people spend time on the road enjoying themselves and not grimly staring at the car in front of them.
  - riggins 13y ago
    I'm an admirer of Google. My point, which I was being kind of oblique about, is that IMO its not really logical to expect Google to have the same revenue model for a car as they do for the search service. To me it seems totally reasonable that Google would charge for the software. It's an innovative, valuable product. I see no reason why they shouldn't get paid for that.
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
jareds 13y ago
"But is everyone really so eager to see the automobile, which stands as one of history’s great amplifiers of personal autonomy and liberty, evolve into a giant tracking device controlled by a $250 billion corporation that makes its money through an increasingly intimate and obtrusive knowledge of its customers? " As a blind person the short answer is yes. Unfortunately job opportunities don't always line up with the few cities that have good public transportation and everything I need easily accessible so it's a fact of life that I need to sometimes rely on others to help me get places. I would be willing to give up a lot of privacy if I could have a self-driving car at a reasonable price. While I don’t know how it will turn out I’m hopeful that with Google backing this cost will be driven down into affordable cars, not $100000 cars. I’ll gladly trade a lot of privacy for a $50000 discount on the price of a self-driving car.
- h0w412d 13y ago
  Not to mention the annual 40,000 lives lost and even more injured due to car accidents, and the huge swaths of land that would be freed up when parking lots are no longer necessary. Not everything is about jobs.
  - hexis 13y ago
    Neither is everything about safety or land use efficiency.
- axus 13y ago
  The key word is "everyone". "Everyone" will not be happy about it, but I expect 90% of us will be. Truck drivers might be the hardest hit, but I thought they're still needed to inspect what's being picked up/dropped off, and make sure it's correct.
roc 13y ago
Anyone using Google Now is already sending all the data that constitutes the article's undesirable dystopic vision to Google. And anyone running Android, I suppose, could get an update that began surreptitiously phoning home data. If that's a thing Google wanted to start doing. Short of being in a faraday cage, we also already know cell phones have a habit of not really rendering you 'untrackable' even when lay users think they've turned them off. And, frankly, the phone is a superior vector in the first place, as the car has little idea who's driving it, no real idea who the other occupants might be, and little idea where the occupants actually go when they get out. [1] Yet this article chooses to worry about the cars? I don't see a huge delta between "I have to leave my phone at home to be sure it can't be used to track me" and "I can't use my 'smart' car, if I want to be sure it can't be used to track me". [1] The Gym, the massage parlor and the pizza joint might be in the same strip mall. Your car can't know one or ones you go to, whether you get into a subsequent vehicle and go somewhere else entirely, etc. Your phone can know exactly where you're going, and for how long. The car's data is far inferior. Rather than being a data detectives dream, it seems more like a "better than nothing" fall-back, if the tracked-individual happened to actually leave their phone at home or properly disable it. And anyone smart/aware enough to prevent themselves from being tracked by their phone is smart/aware enough to take a different vehicle, or take the Google car to a transit station/park-and-ride/alibi-establishing-alternate-location/etc.
- NoPiece 13y ago
  Most of your points are great, but I just want to point out that it is not true that your phone can be tracked when it is turned off. That's a misconception that is propagated by a few very poorly written articles that misinterpreted some comments in a court case. No power = no tracking.
  - roc 13y ago
    Isn't the point that not all phones are truly off when the user thinks they're off? i.e. if you can ensure there's no power (removed battery) you can be confident there's no tracking. But if you can't ensure it...
bernardom 13y ago
Seriously? They JUST replaced Google Docs with Drive. They're already moving on to drivele- oh.
andyl 13y ago
Smart phones already track everything. The privacy battle was lost long ago.
fatjokes 13y ago
As a person who can't drive and refuses to learn, I can't wait for the coming driverless future. All hail Google!
- elteto 13y ago
  If you don't mind me asking, why do you refuse?
  - Egregore 13y ago
    As a person who learned to drive later than my peers I can say that it is a lot of stress.
    - elteto 13y ago
      Both my parents learned well into their 40s and I can confirm that it was very stressful for them during their first couple of years.
  - fatjokes 13y ago
    So many downsides (increased danger, maintenance costs for vehicle, insurance costs, can't drink then drive). The only upside (mobility) can be compensated with money (i.e., cabs). It does suck when I want to go on a roadtrip though.
    - elteto 13y ago
      Don't you think that the same could be said about pretty much everything? Regarding driving, a lot of the risks can be mitigated by being a defensive driver and by purchasing cars with good safety features. I find your reasoning very interesting, I just can't imagine not having a car, but I live in a place where you are pretty much forced to have one because of the distances and the bad bus service. Oh and I also love driving :)
      - fatjokes 13y ago
marmot1101 13y ago
When weighing the balance between even through the lens that this article presents, the driverless car is still a net good. Google potentially knowing if I have cancer is an ok exchange if it reduces the very real chance of death, injury or legal problems that my commute presents me every day.
vilaro 13y ago
I don't know about other people, but I would use a driverless car just for the countless hours it would save me from sitting behind the wheel wasting my time either stuck in traffic, waiting at stop lights, or just plain driving from point A to point B. I don't know how much time the average American spends behind the wheel in a lifetime, but this reason alone would be enough, not to mention the decrease in accidents.
mdip 13y ago
I can only take an example from my own life: I'm a licensed motorcycle rider, I use it as my primary form of transportation when it's over 50F rain or shine. Being a motorcycle rider, I can never get a ticket for not wearing a seat belt, or driving with all of my doors open (silly analogy, I know). All of these safety devices don't apply and riding a bike requires substantially more skill and practice than the weekend course required in most US states to receive a license. Arguably it is an incredibly dangerous way to travel compared with driving or riding in a car and it's still legal. I wonder if the guy/gal of the future who decides they want to reject driver-less cars won't resemble the modern motorcycle rider in this way. I can see those of us who love our motorcycles standing up for (and probably being) supporters of "driver's rights". I made that up, but a similar movement among riders resulted in my state lifting the mandatory helmet law despite outrage from non-riders. I can't imagine the state getting away with banning motorcycles. I don't believe it'll have enough support to ban drivers in a driver-less majority world. The other issue is one of need for such legislation. The author states that the automobile stands as one of history’s great amplifiers of personal autonomy and liberty. Liberating? For some of us, but probably not most of us. I think more people see it as a tool to get from their home in suburbia to work/kids to baseball practice. Most people see driving as something they have to do rather than want to do and will be happy to get rid of the chore if the price was right. Those of us who do find it liberating will be part of an enthusiast market that has always existed for both cars and motorcycles. We'll be the ones taking the most risk and consequences for taking that risk, while the driver-less passenger will, arguably, be much safer. EDIT: Grammer/structure. Boo
- will_work4tears 13y ago
  You bring up some good points, I think it's a great idea to make it tougher to get a driver's license and driverless cars will allow those that can't pass, or aren't interested in driving themselves the ability to get around. Older people need to get places too, but it becomes clear that many, past a certain age, cannot do so safely.

30 points by thecoffman 13y ago

So get the driverless car that isn't run by Google. I get that there are privacy issues, but I still think this article is overly alarmist. As an aside, I expect autonomous driving to be phased in gradually - I'd wager freeways first, then city centers, and rural areas only at the very end. However, once there's a sufficient installed base of autonomous vehicles, I expect it will be illegal to drive manually in those areas, because it kind of defeats the point.

thrownaway2424 13y ago
An alarmist article in Reason, you say? How intriguing.

melling 13y ago

It's going to take a long time to get people comfortable with driverless cars. In the meantime, can the technology be immediately converted to "assisted" driving to help avoid collisions, crossing the center line, etc.? Make it a lot harder for people to "bump" into each other. We might be able to get some of the benefits of driverless cars sooner.

toomuchtodo 13y ago
Start using it in places you absolutely have to. Retirement communities where the elderly have lost their ability to drive, etc.
- melling 13y ago
  Wouldn't you want to start with saving people's lives? 30,000-40,000 people die in the US every year.
  - toomuchtodo 13y ago
    Any place where mobility is needed is where you'll want to start. I was simply stating that if uptake was going to be slower due to human irrationality, you'd start where people absolutely need transportation and have no other option. People are much more open minded about a choice when they have no other choice.
maxerickson 13y ago
Auto braking, adaptive cruise control and lane keeping are already on the road.
- elteto 13y ago
  Yes, however the technology has not "trickled down" from high end cars (albeit some car makers are pushing hard on this). We still need to wait a little bit more before we can find some of these on a Civic/Corolla.
DasIch 13y ago
Assisted driving technology has existed for years and is deployed in a lot of cars. There is no need to convert this technology, it already exists and is widely deployed. The only thing that prevents this technology from being used in every car is that the price for that technology isn't low enough, yet. Self-driving cars are really just an incremental improvement to what high-end manufacturers like Mercedes or BMW already offer.
- elteto 13y ago
  > Self-driving cars are really just an incremental improvement to what high-end manufacturers like Mercedes or BMW already offer. So you are telling me that I can go to a Mercedez/BMW dealer right now and get a car that almost drives itself in regular traffic conditions? Simply not true. There's a lot of assisted driving technology (blind spots alarms, HUDs, assisted parking) out there, but nothing like Google's self-driving car.
  - micampe 13y ago
    “The company says it is preparing to launch in 2014 its first batch of autonomous vehicles capable of driving up to 31 miles per hour. The limited speed reflects the technology’s expected initial use in heavy traffic. Volvo says it is working on higher-speed autonomous driving, but isn’t yet disclosing when it would be available. Its prototypes have run thousands of miles of test drives on public roads in Spain and on the company’s test track in western Sweden.” http://blogs.wsj.com/drivers-seat/2012/12/03/volvo-plans-to-roll-out-self-driving-cars-in-2014/ http://blogs.wsj.com/drivers-seat/2012/12/03/volvo-plans-to-... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autonomous_cruise_control_system https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autonomous_cruise_control_syst... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precrash_system https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precrash_system https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lane_departure_warning_system https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lane_departure_warning_system https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robotic_car#Notable_projects https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robotic_car#Notable_projects
    - elteto 13y ago
      Well the examples you are citing are PR reports or some assisted driving technologies. While some car companies might be working hard on their projects, as of right now, only Google has shown a working prototype performing on street traffic, and their technology is simply not an incremental step from anything else out there, as he claimed. That was the point I was trying to refute, I was not saying that nobody else is working on it but Google.
yannyu 13y ago
Maybe some people won't be comfortable with driverless cars at first, but I'm guessing at least 10% of the cars on the road will be driverless within 10 years. Regardless of how people feel about it, once the actuaries get some data to crunch on liability regarding driverless cars, it'll quickly become more expensive to insure your own car than a driverless one.

isaacwaller 13y ago

I think it's too early to make these conclusions. The self driving cars are produced by Google X, and have nothing to do (yet) with the data-collecting Ads division. I would be very surprised if the cars send personally-identifying data back to Google, and I think there would be a considerable public backlash.

pkandathil 13y ago

A person in security told me that a big fear they have is car bombs. You would now be able to send groups of cars to a location without risking human life. That us good enough reason to not want self driving cars. I still think some of the functionality can be used for accident prevention.

raldi 13y ago
Would that also have been a good enough reason not to want regular cars?
- conanbatt 13y ago
  Well, that would require at least one suicide bomber. Its a legitimate concern, you wouldnt want a car getting hacked and doing all kinds of stuff, like deliberately causing an accident.
- ollysb 13y ago
  Yeah that's a bit like not allowing mobile phones because they can detonate bombs.
BruceIV 13y ago
Car accidents kill orders of magnitude more people than terrorists do. I think even if the number of car bombings jumped to 10 times its current level with autonomous cars society would still likely come out ahead.
ivix 13y ago
Because setting up a remote control car with a camera is currently impossible? That's trivially easy in comparison to forcing an autonomous car to do something dangerous.

riggins 13y ago

there's a fundamental assumption in this article that I think is very doubtful. this article assumes that part of the customers 'payment' for a self-driving car will be advertising. That seems like a very poor assumption. Personally, I assume google will make money selling a car (or the tech), just like any other business. Just because the search business is free and makes their revenue through advertising doesn't mean that the car business would have the same approach.

jareds 13y ago
Could the self-driving tech be the automotive version of Android? Even if Google stripped out personally identifiable data the sheer amount of data they could get for their maps would have to be worth a lot of money. Whether it’s enough to partially subsidize the required research and development as well as weather the automotive industry would be willing to enter an agreement with them are questions I don’t have the answer to.
munificent 13y ago
> Personally, I assume google will make money selling a car (or the tech), just like any other business. I am a Googler and I've heard Larry, Sergey, and many on the self-driving car team talk about the project. While I'm sure monetization is on their minds as well, the very clear message from them is that they view this project as changing the world for the better. In today's world, it is very hard not to be cynical, and it's especially hard not to be cynical online without looking like a Pollyanna or a corporate shill but in this case, I believe the opportunity for public good is the strongest motivator for the project. Much like NASA, Google gets tons of ancillary benefits from doing all of this R&D so even if the project itself isn't a revenue generator, it will still deliver value to Google, but I think what gets many of the people working on it up in the morning is the chance to reduce the number of traffic fatalities, to turn parking lots back into parks, and to let people spend time on the road enjoying themselves and not grimly staring at the car in front of them.
- riggins 13y ago
  I'm an admirer of Google. My point, which I was being kind of oblique about, is that IMO its not really logical to expect Google to have the same revenue model for a car as they do for the search service. To me it seems totally reasonable that Google would charge for the software. It's an innovative, valuable product. I see no reason why they shouldn't get paid for that.

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

jareds 13y ago

"But is everyone really so eager to see the automobile, which stands as one of history’s great amplifiers of personal autonomy and liberty, evolve into a giant tracking device controlled by a $250 billion corporation that makes its money through an increasingly intimate and obtrusive knowledge of its customers? " As a blind person the short answer is yes. Unfortunately job opportunities don't always line up with the few cities that have good public transportation and everything I need easily accessible so it's a fact of life that I need to sometimes rely on others to help me get places. I would be willing to give up a lot of privacy if I could have a self-driving car at a reasonable price. While I don’t know how it will turn out I’m hopeful that with Google backing this cost will be driven down into affordable cars, not $100000 cars. I’ll gladly trade a lot of privacy for a $50000 discount on the price of a self-driving car.

h0w412d 13y ago
Not to mention the annual 40,000 lives lost and even more injured due to car accidents, and the huge swaths of land that would be freed up when parking lots are no longer necessary. Not everything is about jobs.
- hexis 13y ago
  Neither is everything about safety or land use efficiency.
axus 13y ago
The key word is "everyone". "Everyone" will not be happy about it, but I expect 90% of us will be. Truck drivers might be the hardest hit, but I thought they're still needed to inspect what's being picked up/dropped off, and make sure it's correct.

roc 13y ago

Anyone using Google Now is already sending all the data that constitutes the article's undesirable dystopic vision to Google. And anyone running Android, I suppose, could get an update that began surreptitiously phoning home data. If that's a thing Google wanted to start doing. Short of being in a faraday cage, we also already know cell phones have a habit of not really rendering you 'untrackable' even when lay users think they've turned them off. And, frankly, the phone is a superior vector in the first place, as the car has little idea who's driving it, no real idea who the other occupants might be, and little idea where the occupants actually go when they get out. [1] Yet this article chooses to worry about the cars? I don't see a huge delta between "I have to leave my phone at home to be sure it can't be used to track me" and "I can't use my 'smart' car, if I want to be sure it can't be used to track me". [1] The Gym, the massage parlor and the pizza joint might be in the same strip mall. Your car can't know one or ones you go to, whether you get into a subsequent vehicle and go somewhere else entirely, etc. Your phone can know exactly where you're going, and for how long. The car's data is far inferior. Rather than being a data detectives dream, it seems more like a "better than nothing" fall-back, if the tracked-individual happened to actually leave their phone at home or properly disable it. And anyone smart/aware enough to prevent themselves from being tracked by their phone is smart/aware enough to take a different vehicle, or take the Google car to a transit station/park-and-ride/alibi-establishing-alternate-location/etc.

NoPiece 13y ago
Most of your points are great, but I just want to point out that it is not true that your phone can be tracked when it is turned off. That's a misconception that is propagated by a few very poorly written articles that misinterpreted some comments in a court case. No power = no tracking.
- roc 13y ago
  Isn't the point that not all phones are truly off when the user thinks they're off? i.e. if you can ensure there's no power (removed battery) you can be confident there's no tracking. But if you can't ensure it...

bernardom 13y ago

Seriously? They JUST replaced Google Docs with Drive. They're already moving on to drivele- oh.

andyl 13y ago

Smart phones already track everything. The privacy battle was lost long ago.

fatjokes 13y ago

As a person who can't drive and refuses to learn, I can't wait for the coming driverless future. All hail Google!

elteto 13y ago
If you don't mind me asking, why do you refuse?
- Egregore 13y ago
  As a person who learned to drive later than my peers I can say that it is a lot of stress.
  - elteto 13y ago
    Both my parents learned well into their 40s and I can confirm that it was very stressful for them during their first couple of years.
- fatjokes 13y ago
  So many downsides (increased danger, maintenance costs for vehicle, insurance costs, can't drink then drive). The only upside (mobility) can be compensated with money (i.e., cabs). It does suck when I want to go on a roadtrip though.
  - elteto 13y ago
    Don't you think that the same could be said about pretty much everything? Regarding driving, a lot of the risks can be mitigated by being a defensive driver and by purchasing cars with good safety features. I find your reasoning very interesting, I just can't imagine not having a car, but I live in a place where you are pretty much forced to have one because of the distances and the bad bus service. Oh and I also love driving :)
    - fatjokes 13y ago

marmot1101 13y ago

When weighing the balance between even through the lens that this article presents, the driverless car is still a net good. Google potentially knowing if I have cancer is an ok exchange if it reduces the very real chance of death, injury or legal problems that my commute presents me every day.

vilaro 13y ago

I don't know about other people, but I would use a driverless car just for the countless hours it would save me from sitting behind the wheel wasting my time either stuck in traffic, waiting at stop lights, or just plain driving from point A to point B. I don't know how much time the average American spends behind the wheel in a lifetime, but this reason alone would be enough, not to mention the decrease in accidents.

mdip 13y ago

I can only take an example from my own life: I'm a licensed motorcycle rider, I use it as my primary form of transportation when it's over 50F rain or shine. Being a motorcycle rider, I can never get a ticket for not wearing a seat belt, or driving with all of my doors open (silly analogy, I know). All of these safety devices don't apply and riding a bike requires substantially more skill and practice than the weekend course required in most US states to receive a license. Arguably it is an incredibly dangerous way to travel compared with driving or riding in a car and it's still legal. I wonder if the guy/gal of the future who decides they want to reject driver-less cars won't resemble the modern motorcycle rider in this way. I can see those of us who love our motorcycles standing up for (and probably being) supporters of "driver's rights". I made that up, but a similar movement among riders resulted in my state lifting the mandatory helmet law despite outrage from non-riders. I can't imagine the state getting away with banning motorcycles. I don't believe it'll have enough support to ban drivers in a driver-less majority world. The other issue is one of need for such legislation. The author states that the automobile stands as one of history’s great amplifiers of personal autonomy and liberty. Liberating? For some of us, but probably not most of us. I think more people see it as a tool to get from their home in suburbia to work/kids to baseball practice. Most people see driving as something they have to do rather than want to do and will be happy to get rid of the chore if the price was right. Those of us who do find it liberating will be part of an enthusiast market that has always existed for both cars and motorcycles. We'll be the ones taking the most risk and consequences for taking that risk, while the driver-less passenger will, arguably, be much safer. EDIT: Grammer/structure. Boo

will_work4tears 13y ago
You bring up some good points, I think it's a great idea to make it tougher to get a driver's license and driverless cars will allow those that can't pass, or aren't interested in driving themselves the ability to get around. Older people need to get places too, but it becomes clear that many, past a certain age, cannot do so safely.