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On the subject of city situations that a self-driving car might have trouble with, I'll relate a story I heard years ago when living in the Boston area: An out

On the subject of city situations that a self-driving car might have trouble with, I'll relate a story I heard years ago when living in the Boston area: An out-of-state driver pulled up to a Y intersection -- for concreteness, let's imagine this as an upside-down Y, with our driver arriving on the right leg. There was continuous traffic flowing up the left leg and out the top, oblivious to the stop sign on their side of the intersection. (On top of that, there was a police car parked on the side of the road nearby, oblivious to their obliviousness. It was clear that the social contract was that that particular stop sign was inoperative when traffic was heavy.) So the driver turned to his passenger, a local, and asked "what do I do? how do I get in?" The answer came back: "You have to convince them you're serious."

b_emery 13y ago
I learned the same lesson crossing streets (as a pedestrian) in Rome by watching the locals. Make eye contact, go, and be consistent. The drivers are so alert (because you have to be), that they will stop. Once I learned how to walk across the street there, I had everything I needed to know in order to attempt driving.
lutorm 13y ago
I had similar experiences with merges around Boston: the painted lane markings, if they were even visible, seemed to be treated as mere suggestions and people just squeezed in semi-randomly. Of course traffic barely moved, so it wasn't really dangerous, but I can imagine an automated, defensive-driving robot just waiting until the end of days.
- toastedzergling 13y ago
  This is my personal favorite intersection right outside of Boston where I've witnessed at least 2 accidents comutting: https://goo.gl/maps/OKlnT https://goo.gl/maps/OKlnT
brownbat 13y ago
That's the problem for the 99% humans 1% driverless scenario, the inverse is equally troubling to me. Driving currently involves a range of aggressiveness strategies, it may have hit a certain equilibrium mix of insane and polite drivers. If 99% of the cars dodge whatever you do, then you're messing with the metagame. Suddenly driving like a maniac, forcing all the polite computers out of your way gets you everywhere faster. If driverless systems become common, they'll almost have to be required.
- wtallis 13y ago
  As long as my self-driving car is allowed to report you to the Highway Patrol, I can't see this becoming a problem. It's just another one of those issues that's a lot more easily solved than what's been done to get driverless cars to their current state of capability.
talmand 13y ago
The only way it could probably handle other drivers breaking the law in that type of scenario is for it to be programmed to break the law in a similar manner, or to do nothing. Which oddly enough, is often the same choices we are given as human drivers. All the more reason to move everyone to driver-less cars that respect the law and the space of other vehicles on the road.
mentos 13y ago
This is an excellent point. My guess is that computer drivers will just have to be polite and will be taken advantage of. But maybe they could offer some sort of incentive to other drivers on the road. Imagine getting a check in the mail for allowing a Google car to merge into your lane. Or on the flip side, a ticket for cutting one off?

b_emery 13y ago

I learned the same lesson crossing streets (as a pedestrian) in Rome by watching the locals. Make eye contact, go, and be consistent. The drivers are so alert (because you have to be), that they will stop. Once I learned how to walk across the street there, I had everything I needed to know in order to attempt driving.

lutorm 13y ago

I had similar experiences with merges around Boston: the painted lane markings, if they were even visible, seemed to be treated as mere suggestions and people just squeezed in semi-randomly. Of course traffic barely moved, so it wasn't really dangerous, but I can imagine an automated, defensive-driving robot just waiting until the end of days.

toastedzergling 13y ago
This is my personal favorite intersection right outside of Boston where I've witnessed at least 2 accidents comutting: https://goo.gl/maps/OKlnT https://goo.gl/maps/OKlnT

brownbat 13y ago

That's the problem for the 99% humans 1% driverless scenario, the inverse is equally troubling to me. Driving currently involves a range of aggressiveness strategies, it may have hit a certain equilibrium mix of insane and polite drivers. If 99% of the cars dodge whatever you do, then you're messing with the metagame. Suddenly driving like a maniac, forcing all the polite computers out of your way gets you everywhere faster. If driverless systems become common, they'll almost have to be required.

wtallis 13y ago
As long as my self-driving car is allowed to report you to the Highway Patrol, I can't see this becoming a problem. It's just another one of those issues that's a lot more easily solved than what's been done to get driverless cars to their current state of capability.

talmand 13y ago

The only way it could probably handle other drivers breaking the law in that type of scenario is for it to be programmed to break the law in a similar manner, or to do nothing. Which oddly enough, is often the same choices we are given as human drivers. All the more reason to move everyone to driver-less cars that respect the law and the space of other vehicles on the road.

mentos 13y ago

This is an excellent point. My guess is that computer drivers will just have to be polite and will be taken advantage of. But maybe they could offer some sort of incentive to other drivers on the road. Imagine getting a check in the mail for allowing a Google car to merge into your lane. Or on the flip side, a ticket for cutting one off?