Self driven cars to eliminate countless jobs.

Self driven cars to eliminate countless jobs, * save countless lives *

I don't mind if it means I can take naps when traveling. It'll be like a time machine. You take a nap and then when you wake up you're there.

My guess is that you'd save at least 20,000 people a year. It could cut down pedestrian deaths by a huge amount too.

My guess is that these tings will be huge product liability lawsuits waiting to happen. Who will be responsible when your self-driving car crashes and injures or kills someone? Remember what happened to poor Aster Boyton?

My assumption is that these cars will save a lot of lives. One can think of any number of reasons why you shouldn't have cars that drive themselves but who cares if it saves lives?

Sadly, it doesn't matter if it saves lives in the aggregate, if it manages to injure one person due to an equipment failure, it's doomed.

Remember this is America, a land where a man can take off in a light plane flying the controls from the back seat by means of ropes tied to the yoke and pedals and his surviving relatives can sue Piper and win in court.

--scott

The idea of people driving themselves around in motorized vehicles at ungodly speeds must have been seen to be a very scarey idea a hundred years ago. The idea took off despite killing and maiming thousands of people a year. Mostly, we're not afraid of the most dangerous things if people find it to be valuable to them.

You know how the old saying goes about ASSumptions.

Why not get rid of cars altogether? Some might object, but who cares if it saves lives? Or if that's too radical, let's make a speed limit of

20 miles per hour universal. Sure, it will take longer to get to one's destination, but who cares if it saves lives?

Will those self driving cars slow down for potholes, will they steer around small things that can puncture tires?

What's your point? People will give up control of their cars because it will make life easier for them - the same reason they use cars in the first place. It will also save a shitload of lives.

A lot of people like to DRIVE, to have 100 percent physical control of their cars. The Joy of Driving. What is next, self piloting for small power boats, small aircraft?

There's no need to state the obvious. A lot of people enjoy riding a horse and buggy. A lot of people enjoy driving at 200 MPH. A lot of people enjoy shooting poison into their veins. What people enjoy has little to do with technological change.

Yeah, about that: 100% control of an object moving at, say, highway-leisurely

60MPH? It takes you 0.1 - 0.4 seconds to blink (say, 0.2s on average). By the time you open your eyes fully, you've traveled 17.6 feet, longer that the car itself. Have you been in control during that time? I don't think so.

That's a good point - 100% control of a car is an illusion. My ASSumption is that people in the future will find it hard to believe that people were allowed to drive cars in such a random, uncontrolled, manner. Of course, the reason we have to do the driving ourselves is because it hasn't been technically possible before.

I was driving in a Christmas parade yesterday and a car on the other side of the median strip just stopped to see what was going on and got rear ended by a truck. Since the car was a Prius and the truck was a truck, the entire back end of the car was like a accordion. Ho, ho, ho.

Have you ever watched that Waterworld movie? Lets DRIVE! Lay your ears back, let your eyes turn red, lay the pedal to the metal, and let er Roar.

Right now they are pretty good about steering around small things that can puncture tires, but they aren't necessarily good at recognizing things like flying plastic bags and tumbleweeds which may look like obstacles but should be ignored.

Potholes, though, are a problem. You need to slow down and you need to take the pothole at a bit of an angle to reduce the shock on your suspension too. I think the hard part is seeing the pothole and identifying the edges of it.

Computer vision has come a long way in the past few years, so I would bet it would be possible. Certainly would need to be done before you could take it on the road in Pennsylvania.

--scott

What's your point? You have no idea if it will "save a shitload of lives" unless you have devised a way to cross the Einstein-Rosen bridge into an alternate universe where this has already taken place. Is that what you've done? What are you doing slouching about here, man, go claim your Nobel Prize!

Hey, if you want to "save a shitload of lives," why not outlaw fast food? One of the biggest killers in the U.S. is heart disease. Some people might complain about not being able to buy a Big Mac, but what's the problem as long as it saves lives? Hey, we could outlaw potato chips and fried chicken as well! Just think of the countless lives that would save!

Hey, as long as you recognize what that makes you look like, it's all good.

Ever been involved in software development, bunky? Ever see someone get killed due to a software error? (I have. Thankfully not my error) Your quasi-religous faith in technology is misplaced.

I'll be sticking with my old, reliable AMC Hornet. Not a single danged computer in the whole vehicle, and no sensors beyond what is needed for the instrument panel.

So what? You would have preferred that a self-driving truck plough through it and maybe some passers-by for good measure due to software or sensor failure? Ho, ho, ho, indeed.

Yes, you do. When you take the slowest and the least reliable element out of a system, it is reasonable to expect improvements in the system's overall performance and reliability.

But the point was, of course, that the OP posted this with clearly negative intent (or more likely just to stir controversy) - i.e. "eliminate jobs". It would not be a complete picture if the fact that ten thousand lives (or more) per year will be saved at the same time is not mentioned. How about accounting for lost productivity and diminished quality of life of those that survived the crash but were injured? I think you need to account for that, too, to have a complete picture.

Wikipedia: "In 2010, there were an estimated 5,419,000 crashes, killing 32,885 and injuring 2,239,000." (This is US only)

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, there were 1,556,510 truck drivers in US (an astounding number of people in this dangerous and low paying occupation - $38K/yr median) and 239,900 taxi drivers and chauffeurs. There are other categories of jobs I did not care to look up, like bus drivers, but for some reason I think there are less of those than the other two. So, there's about 1.8 Million jobs on the line, most of them truck drivers whose jobs may actually be eliminated first because of the profitability, insurance and other "hard" business concerns rather than "soft" saving-lives concerns.

But then, just as it always happens with new tech, some jobs will be eliminated but a lot of new ones will be created. Can they replace all of the 1.8M lost driving jobs? Probably not, but I'm sure jobs created will be less dangerous and more fulfilling than driving a car/truck from point A to point B

In 10 years time the lost 1.8M jobs will be easily absorbed by other industries but lives will continue to be saved by not letting people drive (much).

You seem to be just babbling on - what's your point?