Driverless cars

I am quite comfortable with the idea of long distance/motorway travel in an autonomous car. I have no doubt traffic managed like this would be quicker, and the journeys less fatiguing but living in a rural area I'm less sure that most of my journeys could be done 'driverless'.

One query I had was about insurance. If I am not driving the car at the time something goes wrong and it is the car systems taking the decisions then who is at fault and who carries the insurance? Will manufacturers be sharing liability?

As for terrorism and criminal hacking; the world does not lack opportunities for those that wish to create mayhem. if you thought of this everyday you'd never leave your bed.

Bruce

Bruce Woodhouse posted:

As for terrorism and criminal hacking; the world does not lack opportunities for those that wish to create mayhem. if you thought of this everyday you'd never leave your bed.

This was my gut reaction to the OP as far as driverless cars relate to terrorism. Evil doers can attach their devices to any sort of technology - drones come immediately to mind and let's not forget about the more rudimentary anthrax spores in an envelope. of any mail system.

I've done a bit of reading lately on AI (artificial intelligence) and it tends to put my mind more at ease than cause concern. Everywhere I go these days I see drivers looking at their smartphones as they roll by. I think advanced safety systems on cars are a gentle introduction to AI and it will be a matter of time until driverless cars attain acceptance as the safer, logical alternative to human error.

I can waste days a month driving for miles and miles and miles on Motorways and queuing for hours and hours and hours in traffic. Given that a car is my only travel option I really wouldn't mind the facility to catch up on work, do some research, hold conference calls or even have a doze on the move if it was safe to do so. But only when I wanted to do so. Things like selectively autonomous cars, hydrogen cell technology, other properly deployed intelligent propulsion systems and all that, will come too late for me to significantly benefit. But maybe I'll be able to drive for more years into old age? If I remember to unplug the car from the house.

Don Atkinson posted:

How soon will some terrorist organisation acquire a fleet of these vehicles, pack them with explosives and…………………

.... an eager gaggle of would-have-been suicide bombers.

How else are they going to get their 72 virgins?

If driverless is an option I can engage, like cruise control perhaps, then yes I may be interested on long motorway journeys or in heavy traffic, or when feeling below par perhaps, but if it is always engaged and I have no choice then you can keep it, I enjoy driving and I like to have control

So if a car thief or joy rider breaks in to take the car...

the car will lock the thief in and drive to the nearest police station 

I tend to associate driverless with ownerless.  Someday I imagine that there will be "driverless" taxis parked everywhere, at least in urban environments...

naim_nymph posted:

So if a car thief or joy rider breaks in to take the car...

the car will lock the thief in and drive to the nearest police station 

During which time they will more than likely trash the inside of your car and walk away with a couple of weeks community service as punishment.

ChrisSU posted:

naim_nymph posted:

So if a car thief or joy rider breaks in to take the car...

the car will lock the thief in and drive to the nearest police station 

During which time they will more than likely trash the inside of your car and walk away with a couple of weeks community service as punishment.

Perhaps it should just drive them into the nearest lake then

You could even drive them to the lake of your choice. I'm sure someone would come up with an add-on the the Find My iPhone app to make this possible.

No you won't, the car's autonomous; it'll decide which lake thank you very much!  

Driverless cars won't be popular. The problem is that they will obey speed limits, stop at stop signs, not run red lights, give way to pedestrians and give cyclists safe clearance. All these things will drive the passengers nuts. Thousands will be late.

Yeah but you will be able to disengage it and drive on the pavement any time you like.

AFAIK driverless cars will still travel in contact with the road. Disengaging would involve a stop for you to move from the backseat to the driver's seat to take control. Much more interesting to be engaged with the smartphone in the backseat anyways. Late for an appointment? Blame the driverless driver - although the software will no doubt leave a digital paper trail of your proceedings.

winkyincanada posted:

Driverless cars won't be popular. The problem is that they will obey speed limits, stop at stop signs, not run red lights, give way to pedestrians andgive cyclists safe clearance. All these things will drive the passengers nuts. Thousands will be late.

Ooopps !

Back to the drawing-board for a software update in line with yet another new EU Directive............

................"what do you mean, it will take 5 years of €ureaucracy  to implement the necessary change, ?" 

Don, after 5 years, they'll realise it needs to be global standard, and try to integrate with the American bureaucracy as well... Cue another 5 years.

At the end of 10 years it'll emerge that the Americans specified the required clearance to cyclists as 7ft.  However when this was then integrated into the global standard, the unit of measurement was missed off, resulting in a required clearance of 7m being implemented.  Thus no driverless car can actually overtake a cyclist except on a motorway!

Harry posted:

Yeah but you will be able to disengage it and drive on the pavement any time you like.

Like this...

http://www.bbc.com/news/video_...o/headlines/36351007

winkyincanada posted:

Driverless cars won't be popular. The problem is that they will obey speed limits, stop at stop signs, not run red lights, give way to pedestrians and give cyclists safe clearance. All these things will drive the passengers nuts. Thousands will be late.

But how will the "car" react  when a cyclist misbehave or take the pi55? Will the reaction be pre programmed by some  cyclist in a lab? 

PS. I do drive and ride and some "so-called" cyclists do pi55 me off every now and so often.

Tony2011 posted:

winkyincanada posted:

Driverless cars won't be popular. The problem is that they will obey speed limits, stop at stop signs, not run red lights, give way to pedestrians and give cyclists safe clearance. All these things will drive the passengers nuts. Thousands will be late.

But how will the "car" react  when a cyclist misbehave or take the pi55? Will the reaction be pre programmed by some  cyclist in a lab? 

PS. I do drive and ride and some "so-called" cyclists do pi55 me off every now and so often.

I'm guessing he cars will be programmed to not kill people. Just a guess, though.

Winki, are you trying to say that  current cars are programmed to do so?

Tony2011 posted:

Winki, are you trying to say that  current cars are programmed to do so?

 

Sometimes seems like it. 30,000 people every year in the US alone. A million worldwide. Every year.

It's not the car so much as the nut that holds the steering wheel.

I occasionally stumble across those dash cam crash videos on my travels. Difficult not to gawp at. A common characteristic of a good half of them is that regardless of who is "to blame" or "in the wrong", nobody seems capable of lifting off. Odd that. Yet familiar.

winkyincanada posted:

Tony2011 posted:

Winki, are you trying to say that  current cars are programmed to do so?

 

Sometimes seems like it. 30,000 people every year in the US alone. A million worldwide. Every year.

Better get them re-programmed in the UK. Ours only kill c.1750pa in a population of c.60m vice a US population of c.300m.

Or perhaps Canada where I'm guessing the ratio is even better ?

It's nothing new... 

"The big foreign car drove itself, but I held the wheel for the sake of appearances."  (Raymond Chandler --Farewell, My Lovely ; Chapter 9)

I get my dog to drive my car  ................