Driverless cars could change everything

[DaFace]

Thought this article was cool to think about.

http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-echochambers-28376929

Driverless cars could change everything


For now, it seems like a novelty - cars that can operate independently of human control, safely cruising down streets thanks to an array of sensors and pinpoint GPS navigation.

But if the technology avoids getting crushed by government regulators and product liability lawsuits, writes the Federalist's Dan McLaughlin, it could prompt a cultural shift similar to the early 20th century move away from horses as the primary means of transportation.

First and foremost, he writes, the spread of driverless cars will likely greatly reduce the number of traffic accidents - which currently cost Americans $871b (£510b) a year.

"A truly driverless road would not be accident-free, given the number of accidents that would still be caused by mechanical and computer errors, weather conditions, pedestrians, bicyclists, motorcyclists and sheer random chance," he says. "But it would make the now-routine loss of life and limb on the roads far rarer."

Computer-operated cars would eventually reshape car design, he says, as things like windshields - "a large and vulnerable piece of glass" - become less necessary. Drivers will be able to sit wherever they'd like in their cars, which could make car interiors more like mobile lounges than like cockpits.

The age required to operate a driverless car is likely to drop, he says. There could be an impact on the legal drinking age, as well, as preventing drunk driving was one of the prime justifications for the US-wide setting minimum age to purchase alcohol at 21 years old.

There's other possible economic fallout, McLaughlin contends, such as a restructuring of the auto insurance industry, the obsolescence of taxi drivers and lower ratings for drive-time radio programmes.

The high-tech security state will also get boost, he writes, as GPS-tagged cars will be easier to track, making life difficult for fugitives and car thieves. Police will also be able to move resources away from operations like traffic enforcement.

Of course, he writes, the towns that rely on speed traps to fund their government services will be facing budget shortfalls. Privacy advocates could also get an unexpected boost, he notes, since traffic stops are one of the main justifications for police vehicle searches.

Finally, there's the prospect of the as-yet-unrealised futurist dream of flying cars. With computer-controlled vehicles that strictly follow traffic rules, McLaughlin says, "the potential for three-dimensional roads becomes a lot less scary and more a matter of simply solving the technological challenge".

Where we're going, we may not need roads after all.

[Buehler445]

The real problem with all of this is sensor calibration/testing. Our combines allow you to monitor freaking everything. But you still have to get out and check periodically to determine if sensors are working properly. I'm sure they can make it more user friendly, but calibrating the damn gps is substantial. It's not terrible difficult, but there are also some real dumbasses on this earth that feel it requisite to drive. Improper calibration of GPS or collision avoidance would be catastrophic.

Also, if the machine is going to execute unaided driving, some real time kinematic sensors would be necessary. That will require some fairly significant infrastructure and would be expensive in rural areas.

[HolyHandgernade]

Airplanes are in the beginning phases of ADS-B which will eventually self sequence the planes (as long as the ADS-B is functioning and all aircraft are so equipped). I think it would move ahead faster if the vehicles were capable of some sort of hover mode. The next step up from bullet trains, that could overfly interstate routes (although overpasses would be a potential hazard!). I suppose instead of HOV lanes they could institute driver-less vehicle lanes where the speed could be increased until you needed to reintegrate with the normal traffic and off ramps. That would drive sales for commuters.

[kaplin42]

Originally Posted by Buehler445

Eh, it takes more look ahead, but I think it's doable.

Would probably be safer than you think. Driver-less trucks don't have drivers that have been awake and on the road for 20 hours. And with Radar and GPS, they could probably be a lot safer than the status quo.

Probably a lot less of this happening. Warning; Terrible Event

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=954_1378470863

Biggest problem with this driver-less thing is that the first accident that happens, people will scream about how unsafe they are, when, as the articles states, currently loss of life and limb is a daily occurrence and no one even blinks an eye at it, and moving to driver-less would have a huge impact on reducing those numbers, but people won't care about that.

[DaFace]

Originally Posted by kaplin42

Biggest problem with this driver-less thing is that the first accident that happens, people will scream about how unsafe they are, when, as the articles states, currently loss of life and limb is a daily occurrence and no one even blinks an eye at it, and moving to driver-less would have a huge impact on reducing those numbers, but people won't care about that.

Yep. Humans have an inherent need to blame someone when things go wrong, and even if it's clear that computers care considerably safer than humans, there will still be lots of angst if they can't blame someone.

[Rain Man]

Originally Posted by Buehler445

The real problem with all of this is sensor calibration/testing. Our combines allow you to monitor freaking everything. But you still have to get out and check periodically to determine if sensors are working properly. I'm sure they can make it more user friendly, but calibrating the damn gps is substantial. It's not terrible difficult, but there are also some real dumbasses on this earth that feel it requisite to drive. Improper calibration of GPS or collision avoidance would be catastrophic.

Also, if the machine is going to execute unaided driving, some real time kinematic sensors would be necessary. That will require some fairly significant infrastructure and would be expensive in rural areas.

That's an interesting point. I wonder if every car would have multiple sensors, and when more than one of them starts disagreeing, the car drives itself to the dealer and gives them your credit card number.

Now that I think about it, they could build maintenance checks into the system. At 3 o'clock in the morning, your car opens the garage door and drives itself in for a checkup once every three months.

[The Franchise]

Originally Posted by kaplin42

Would probably be safer than you think. Driver-less trucks don't have drivers that have been awake and on the road for 20 hours. And with Radar and GPS, they could probably be a lot safer than the status quo.

Probably a lot less of this happening. Warning; Terrible Event

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=954_1378470863

Biggest problem with this driver-less thing is that the first accident that happens, people will scream about how unsafe they are, when, as the articles states, currently loss of life and limb is a daily occurrence and no one even blinks an eye at it, and moving to driver-less would have a huge impact on reducing those numbers, but people won't care about that.

Plus you wouldn't have to worry about logging hours with a driver-less semi-truck. You could just make it so they run overnight all at the same time.

[Rain Man]

Originally Posted by Pestilence

Plus you wouldn't have to worry about logging hours with a driver-less semi-truck. You could just make it so they run overnight all at the same time.

You could link them up into convoys pretty easily, too. Put them one car length apart and roll them all together. You'd just have to put all braking controls under the first truck.

The occasional wreck would be pretty spectacular, but they'd be rare.

[Zebedee DuBois]

First the robots take our jobs, then they take our hobbies. Now they take our excuses for being late to things.

[teedubya]

Originally Posted by cdcox

Impossible. If a robot golfer can't break par, there is no way it will ever be able to drive a car as well as a human.

Self-Driving Cars: Google cars go over 300,000 miles with no accidents.

http://buff.ly/1odFkBv

I'd say the technology is getting pretty close.

[mdchiefsfan]

Car theft would drop dramatically as well. Press the home button on your fob, and it returns to you. Hell report it stolen and the man knows the location of it from its GPS.

[HemiEd]

A bad week for driverless cars. Maybe the AI needs to learn more?

Self-driving car company Cruise cuts its fleet in San Francisco by 50% after a Thursday night accident involving a firetruck; city voted two weeks ago to allow Cruise and Waymo to operate autonomous cars around the clock

San Francisco Robotaxi Expansion: Cruise Crash Injures 1 and Other Mishaps

At least three traffic incidents involving robotaxis occurred in San Francisco this week, according to multiple news and social media reports, shortly after the state granted approval for autonomous vehicle companies to expand their operations throughout the city and start charging money for rides.

One crash Thursday night injured a passenger inside a Cruise driverless car at Polk and Turk streets. The robotaxi was hit by a fire engine as it entered the intersection on a green light at around 10 p.m. Thursday, according to a tweet from Cruise early Friday. The fire engine was on its way to an emergency scene. Cruise's tweet said the injuries were not severe, but the robotaxi passenger was taken to a local hospital.

In a separate blog post, Cruise said their car detected that an emergency vehicle was approaching and began to brake, but was unable to stop before the fire truck crashed into it.

The San Francisco Fire Department declined to comment.

A second crash happened in the Mission at 26th and Mission streets early Friday, according to Cruise and San Francisco police.

In response to the crash, a Cruise spokesperson said, “Last night one of our vehicles was proceeding through a green light at 26th and Mission in San Francisco when it was struck by another vehicle running a red light at a high rate of speed. The AV detected the vehicle and braked, but the other vehicle made contact with our AV. There were no passengers in our AV and the driver of the other vehicle was treated and released at the scene.”

San Francisco police also confirmed the crash and said that they responded to a report of a crash at 26th and Mission at 12:19 a.m. Friday. There, they found an adult male driver, a passenger, and their car as well as an autonomous vehicle. The driver was treated for non-life-threatening injuries by medics, police said.

Police said there was significant damage to both vehicles after the crash and said that the male driver was at fault, but that drugs or alcohol did not appear to be a factor.

Separately, another Cruise vehicle also drove into wet concrete in a construction area and got stuck on Golden Gate Avenue between Fillmore and Steiner streets in the Western Addition on Tuesday, according to SFGATE.

Cruise acknowledged the incident in a tweet Thursday.

There have been other high-profile incidents with Cruise robotaxis prior to this week.

Just a day after the state approved the expansion of robotaxi services in the city, nearly a dozen Cruise vehicles stalled and snarled traffic in San Francisco's North Beach and near Outside Lands music festival. Cruise blamed the music festival for the snafu.

https://sfstandard.com/2023/08/18/cr...ent=newsletter

[DenverChief]

Originally Posted by DaFace

Just thinking through it, these things WILL get figured out in the next couple decades. It could happen very quickly, or it may take a while, but it'll get done. The technology is already too close to a reality for it not to happen.

So given that, the implications are incredible to think about. Off the top of my head (and summarizing some from the article and elsewhere), here are a few. These are all, of course, purely theoretical depending on how things work out.

• Cars could take kids to and from school on their own, freeing up parents.
• People who are visually impaired would have a way to get around much more.efficiently, potentially increasing the portion of blind people who can reasonably work.
• Traffic congestion could be reduced dramatically, as human reactions are the cause of a huge amount of it currently.
• Drunk driving could be reduced dramatically.
• Car sharing could become the norm since you could potentially have a huge fleet of cars-on-demand to show up when you need them.
• The elderly could stay mobile much further in their lives, improving longevity and quality of life dramatically.

It's fascinating to consider all the possibilities. If it works perfectly, I think it could be as big of a cultural revolution as the internet.

Could finally loosen the airlines grip on travel - I'd more likely take a day and a half to travel in a car if I didn't have to constantly pay attention

[HemiEd]

Originally Posted by DenverChief

Could finally loosen the airlines grip on travel - I'd more likely take a day and a half to travel in a car if I didn't have to constantly pay attention

Just a thought, but you might want to read the article in the post just above yours.
I probably should have started a new thread but this one had popped up in my search.

[Couch-Potato]

Originally Posted by HemiEd

Just a thought, but you might want to read the article in the post just above yours.
I probably should have started a new thread but this one had popped up in my search.

Automatic cars are still the future. The only reason this accident made the news is because it was between an automated vehicle & a manual one. How many manual cars crashed that day across the country?

Consider how much better a calculator performs simple functions relative to a human, and that the AI in this collective swarm of cars is learning at an exponential rate over time while a human's ability to drive deteriorates with experience.

[BuckeyeTheDog]

What am I going to do when the AI driven automatic car always drives through Popeyes and orders me a chicken sandwich?

Joking- but there is so many new ways to make money here- even starting with new free time and decisions to make when you’re in the car. And so so many ways for the government to tax this activity. Trust me, they will more than make up for there loss of revenue from traffic tickets, etc.