I think in some cities it may work but I have concerns over the 'morals' of the control system.
If the car is in a situation where it has to serve to avoid a pedestrian that stepped out in front of it. However if it swerves left it will hit a group of old ladies at a bus stop. If it swerves right it will avoid the pedestrian and the bus stop but will drive into a wall possibly killing the people in the car. How does it make that decision? Does it value the life of the owner above others or does it treat all life equally?
We need some laws to govern this. Perhaps... three laws will suffice:
- A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
- A robot must obey orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
- A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.
There. Faultless. Nothing can go wrong now.
Arent they the rules from the film... iRobot starring Will Smith?
They're the rules on which author Isaac Asmiov based numerous stories, starting in 1942 with 'Runaround'. I, Robot was one of those stories, although the Will Smith film was a fairly basic, product-placement-heavy adaptation that briefly touched in them.
Asimov's stories rigorously tested those rules, often proving they didn't work.
In regards to the @kigelia post, yes rules would need to be written to define how a car would deal with such scenarios, but what the post fails to acknowledge is that no human could be expected to make the right decision on instinct (and regularly don't), and the chances of such a scenario occurring would be far lower given a computer is likely to stick to speed limits and spot, and process, danger quicker.
Currently 4% of road miles travelled worldwide are by private hire taxis. By 2030 this is forecast to be 25% and much of that will be driverless runs delivered by the likes of Uber.
This implies that in urban centres people won't need their own cars. The demand for privately owned vehicles and parking spaces might drop by 80%?
And these may well be LPG or electric providing a cure for urban polution. Death rates on the roads will drop, accident rates will drop and therefore insurance premiums should drop.
And the driverless private hire vehicles are already being pilotted across the globe. Uber leads the race but Alphabet, Apple and Volvo are all giving it a crack.
As an aside it should be possible to put trackers and immobilisers on all vehicles to prevent stolen and uninsured vehicles going anywhere.
Of course there will be a Luddite style movement opposing change. Ideally their energies can be utilised to ensure the highest standards of safety?
And this type of innovation is bound to be repeated across many areas of modern living over the next 15 years or so.
As for London, it's a global capital city. One should check Saddiq Khan's policy statements rather than the A-Z map to understand the landscape. Or take a look at the link below:
Maybe it's a bit Luddite of us to assume the future taxi will be road bound. If Amazon's drones take off maybe they could be a model for driverless human transportation too.
The debate about the supposed safety advantages of driverless cars ignores just how many accidents are avoided by skilled/experienced human drivers.
In other words the supposed problem that too many people are killed/injured in car accidents should be turned on its head and we should ask, "Isn't amazing that so few people are killed/injured in car accidents?" (given the sheer number of journeys and the inherent complexity therein).
To use a real world example, a good driver would brake/slow down if they see children playing with a ball on the pavement but a driverless car would presumably only brake if a child actually runs into the road (by which time it will be too late to avoid a collision).
The debate about the supposed safety advantages of driverless cars ignores just how many accidents are avoided by skilled/experienced human drivers.
In other words the supposed problem that too many people are killed/injured in car accidents should be turned on its head and we should ask, "Isn't amazing that so few people are killed/injured in car accidents?" (given the sheer number of journeys and the inherent complexity therein).
To use a real world example, a good driver would brake/slow down if they see children playing with a ball on the pavement but a driverless car would presumably only brake if a child actually runs into the road (by which time it will be too late to avoid a collision).
I imagine in such a brave new world, residential speed limits would drop to 20mph (which the nanny state is already trying to implement nationwide). Arguably, 20mph through residential areas will not seem so slow if you are not the one actually driving the car.
In fact it could be the case, at least to begin with, automated speed limits might be significantly lower than what they are now. Zooming around at 70mph in an automated shell could be a terrifying experience. 50mph might seem more likely.
What I would like to know is how on earth would dozens of automated cars safely, efficiently and quickly maneuver through single-file country lanes with passing places, or crossroads, or spot zebra crossings, or roundabouts or even magic roundabouts? I imagine with driverless cars would come a complete overhaul of the road network.
The debate about the supposed safety advantages of driverless cars ignores just how many accidents are avoided by skilled/experienced human drivers.
In other words the supposed problem that too many people are killed/injured in car accidents should be turned on its head and we should ask, "Isn't amazing that so few people are killed/injured in car accidents?" (given the sheer number of journeys and the inherent complexity therein).
To use a real world example, a good driver would brake/slow down if they see children playing with a ball on the pavement but a driverless car would presumably only brake if a child actually runs into the road (by which time it will be too late to avoid a collision).
I imagine in such a brave new world, residential speed limits would drop to 20mph (which the nanny state is already trying to implement nationwide). Arguably, 20mph through residential areas will not seem so slow if you are not the one actually driving the car.
In fact it could be the case, at least to begin with, automated speed limits might be significantly lower than what they are now. Zooming around at 70mph in an automated shell could be a terrifying experience. 50mph might seem more likely.
What I would like to know is how on earth would dozens of automated cars safely, efficiently and quickly maneuver through single-file country lanes with passing places, or crossroads, or spot zebra crossings, or roundabouts or even magic roundabouts? I imagine with driverless cars would come a complete overhaul of the road network.
Short answer....they won't. We're being led down the garden path by a bunch of billionaire Silicon Valley dreamers on this topic.
The debate about the supposed safety advantages of driverless cars ignores just how many accidents are avoided by skilled/experienced human drivers.
In other words the supposed problem that too many people are killed/injured in car accidents should be turned on its head and we should ask, "Isn't amazing that so few people are killed/injured in car accidents?" (given the sheer number of journeys and the inherent complexity therein).
To use a real world example, a good driver would brake/slow down if they see children playing with a ball on the pavement but a driverless car would presumably only brake if a child actually runs into the road (by which time it will be too late to avoid a collision).
I imagine in such a brave new world, residential speed limits would drop to 20mph (which the nanny state is already trying to implement nationwide). Arguably, 20mph through residential areas will not seem so slow if you are not the one actually driving the car.
In fact it could be the case, at least to begin with, automated speed limits might be significantly lower than what they are now. Zooming around at 70mph in an automated shell could be a terrifying experience. 50mph might seem more likely.
What I would like to know is how on earth would dozens of automated cars safely, efficiently and quickly maneuver through single-file country lanes with passing places, or crossroads, or spot zebra crossings, or roundabouts or even magic roundabouts? I imagine with driverless cars would come a complete overhaul of the road network.
Cross roads, zebra crossings, roundabouts, they can all be catered for, but the country lanes thing sounds like a bit of a challenge and my favorite pub is down a country lane, so solving that problem is, for me, a top priority.
Regarding collision avoidance, driverless cars would be a lot cleverer than newyorkaddick suggests and I would expect them to be better than most, if not all humans.
Country roads should t be an issue as long as maps are accurate enough. Once all cars are automated it would make sense for them to be in continual contact, so they'll know when they're approaching, etc
The speed limit in residential areas should be 20mph. It's daft the same speed limit for a double parked narrow road as some main roads.
Couldn't disagree more. Kids will never grow up with proper spatial awareness if we don't allow them a degree of risk in their lives. They'll grow up as a danger to themselves. They won't ever be able to drive properly so driverless cars would become essential.
In addition, if traffic volumes stay the same, then at any given time there would be more traffic in a given stretch of road and it will all be closer together. That would make getting out of side roads or across junctions more difficult not less.
Is there any actual evidence that lower speed limits save lives? The speed camera partnerships say there is but they are lying. That's because the statistics have a habit of returning to mean and they conveniently forget that.# In addition the more aggressive drivers get fed up with the people that obey the limits and try to overtake them.
# Here's why - a stretch of road has a good accident record but one year there's a couple of serious accidents. The Scamera people put up a camera and trumpet it's effectiveness the following year. But the reality is that the accident levels have just returned to normal as they would have done anyway.
Suffolk was one of the first counties to introduce blanket lower speeds through villages throughout the county. Even though some of the roads were A roads. Over two years in the mid-1990s, Suffolk County Council cut the speed limit in 280 villages on main roads from 60 mph to 30 mph. In 85 villages it was cut from 40 mph to 30 mph, and in another 85 cases existing 30 mph limits were extended. It is hard to believe that many of those 280 remotely approached the popular conception of a village. This policy resulted in a noticeable upturn in casualties in following years, some of which a Suffolk coroner directly attributed to inappropriately low speed limits. Part of the problem is that locals know the roads, know the speed limit is rarely enforced and that there's never any pedestrians anyway. They therefore ignore the lower speed limits and drive aggressively when confronted with a visitor who doesn't understand the area.
The key is to drive sensibly and at a safe speed all the time, not to impose arbitrary limits that may or often may not be appropriate.
The speed limit in residential areas should be 20mph. It's daft the same speed limit for a double parked narrow road as some main roads.
Couldn't disagree more. Kids will never grow up with proper spatial awareness if we don't allow them a degree of risk in their lives. They'll grow up as a danger to themselves. They won't ever be able to drive properly so driverless cars would become essential.
In addition, if traffic volumes stay the same, then at any given time there would be more traffic in a given stretch of road and it will all be closer together. That would make getting out of side roads or across junctions more difficult not less.
Is there any actual evidence that lower speed limits save lives? The speed camera partnerships say there is but they are lying. That's because the statistics have a habit of returning to mean and they conveniently forget that.# In addition the more aggressive drivers get fed up with the people that obey the limits and try to overtake them.
# Here's why - a stretch of road has a good accident record but one year there's a couple of serious accidents. The Scamera people put up a camera and trumpet it's effectiveness the following year. But the reality is that the accident levels have just returned to normal as they would have done anyway.
Suffolk was one of the first counties to introduce blanket lower speeds through villages throughout the county. Even though some of the roads were A roads. Over two years in the mid-1990s, Suffolk County Council cut the speed limit in 280 villages on main roads from 60 mph to 30 mph. In 85 villages it was cut from 40 mph to 30 mph, and in another 85 cases existing 30 mph limits were extended. It is hard to believe that many of those 280 remotely approached the popular conception of a village. This policy resulted in a noticeable upturn in casualties in following years, some of which a Suffolk coroner directly attributed to inappropriately low speed limits. Part of the problem is that locals know the roads, know the speed limit is rarely enforced and that there's never any pedestrians anyway. They therefore ignore the lower speed limits and drive aggressively when confronted with a visitor who doesn't understand the area.
The key is to drive sensibly and at a safe speed all the time, not to impose arbitrary limits that may or often may not be appropriate.
'Kids won't develop spatial awareness if they're not dodging cars outside their houses' is possibly my favourite ever take on CL. Thank you for your service.
The speed limit in residential areas should be 20mph. It's daft the same speed limit for a double parked narrow road as some main roads.
Couldn't disagree more. Kids will never grow up with proper spatial awareness if we don't allow them a degree of risk in their lives. They'll grow up as a danger to themselves. They won't ever be able to drive properly so driverless cars would become essential.
In addition, if traffic volumes stay the same, then at any given time there would be more traffic in a given stretch of road and it will all be closer together. That would make getting out of side roads or across junctions more difficult not less.
Is there any actual evidence that lower speed limits save lives? The speed camera partnerships say there is but they are lying. That's because the statistics have a habit of returning to mean and they conveniently forget that.# In addition the more aggressive drivers get fed up with the people that obey the limits and try to overtake them.
# Here's why - a stretch of road has a good accident record but one year there's a couple of serious accidents. The Scamera people put up a camera and trumpet it's effectiveness the following year. But the reality is that the accident levels have just returned to normal as they would have done anyway.
Suffolk was one of the first counties to introduce blanket lower speeds through villages throughout the county. Even though some of the roads were A roads. Over two years in the mid-1990s, Suffolk County Council cut the speed limit in 280 villages on main roads from 60 mph to 30 mph. In 85 villages it was cut from 40 mph to 30 mph, and in another 85 cases existing 30 mph limits were extended. It is hard to believe that many of those 280 remotely approached the popular conception of a village. This policy resulted in a noticeable upturn in casualties in following years, some of which a Suffolk coroner directly attributed to inappropriately low speed limits. Part of the problem is that locals know the roads, know the speed limit is rarely enforced and that there's never any pedestrians anyway. They therefore ignore the lower speed limits and drive aggressively when confronted with a visitor who doesn't understand the area.
The key is to drive sensibly and at a safe speed all the time, not to impose arbitrary limits that may or often may not be appropriate.
You what?!
The speed limits are to protect drivers and pedestrians, being hit by a car doing 20mph is still dangerous enough to kill small children. Hell a car rolling at 2mph can kill.
Your angle on this must be a joke surely? You really think Jo Public that speed anyway has the common sense to drive sensibly and at a safe speed without any prompting?
A swarm of driverless taxis held up traffic for hours at a junction after one of the first public trials of the technology went wrong.
More than a dozen autonomous vehicles operated by driverless car company Cruise in San Francisco came to a halt for around two hours before employees made it to the scene on Wednesday.
The company has not revealed what caused the vehicles to stop or why multiple cars suffered the fault at the same place. Several were stationary at the entrance to the crossroad junction, while others were stopped at the exit.
Cruise, backed by General Motors, started charging passengers for driverless taxi rides in San Francisco last week.
It is one of the first real-world robot taxi services in a major city. Vehicles do not have a safety driver in the front seat.
I’d like to know how a driverless car will pull out of a T junction to join busy traffic. In London you have to make eye contact with the driver and plead to be let in.
I’d like to know how a driverless car will pull out of a T junction to join busy traffic. In London you have to make eye contact with the driver and plead to be let in.
Make all cars driverless?
Give driverless cars priority so drivers must stop if they see a driverless car trying to cut in?
It’s a serious answer to cutting car journeys to improve the air quality/carbon emissions in major cities.
Makes sense to me.
Everywhere in the next 10 years.............not a chance. The switch to electric cars won’t be completed by then due to the charging problems so driverless will still be a gimmick
Yesterday I was driving along the M25 when I tried to open a bag of peanuts I had bought earlier. After a couple of unsuccessful attempts at opening the peanuts, I switched on the Adaptive Cruise Control and also another extra called Pilot Assist.
Pilot Assist keeps the car central in the lane using the white lines on the road to guide it.
The car was now driving itself. It was a bit weird but I managed to open the Peanuts and also open a bottle of Water before I resumed driving the car.
Yesterday I was driving along the M25 when I tried to open a bag of peanuts I had bought earlier. After a couple of unsuccessful attempts at opening the peanuts, I switched on the Adaptive Cruise Control and also another extra called Pilot Assist.
Pilot Assist keeps the car central in the lane using the white lines on the road to guide it.
The car was now driving itself. It was a bit weird but I managed to open the Peanuts and also open a bottle of Water before I resumed driving the car.
It worked fine and I felt safe.
How were the screaming passengers in the back? Did they nibble your nuts?
Yesterday I was driving along the M25 when I tried to open a bag of peanuts I had bought earlier. After a couple of unsuccessful attempts at opening the peanuts, I switched on the Adaptive Cruise Control and also another extra called Pilot Assist.
Pilot Assist keeps the car central in the lane using the white lines on the road to guide it.
The car was now driving itself. It was a bit weird but I managed to open the Peanuts and also open a bottle of Water before I resumed driving the car.
It worked fine and I felt safe.
Both these technologies have been around for years and are fitted to standard cars, still miles away from driverless though
Yesterday I was driving along the M25 when I tried to open a bag of peanuts I had bought earlier. After a couple of unsuccessful attempts at opening the peanuts, I switched on the Adaptive Cruise Control and also another extra called Pilot Assist.
Pilot Assist keeps the car central in the lane using the white lines on the road to guide it.
The car was now driving itself. It was a bit weird but I managed to open the Peanuts and also open a bottle of Water before I resumed driving the car.
It worked fine and I felt safe.
Both these technologies have been around for years and are fitted to standard cars, still miles away from driverless though
But that is the way we are going to get to driverless cars. We are progressing through the 4 or 5 stages defined many years ago. Each element required for driverless is being introduced, first as an add-on, then as standard so that pretty much everything needed will have been standard for some time, having gone through exhaustive testing in millions of cars in live situations. It’s still going to be fun though !
Comments
Asimov's stories rigorously tested those rules, often proving they didn't work.
In regards to the @kigelia post, yes rules would need to be written to define how a car would deal with such scenarios, but what the post fails to acknowledge is that no human could be expected to make the right decision on instinct (and regularly don't), and the chances of such a scenario occurring would be far lower given a computer is likely to stick to speed limits and spot, and process, danger quicker.
I'm guessing the congestion charge would need to rise to around £500 a day
In other words the supposed problem that too many people are killed/injured in car accidents should be turned on its head and we should ask, "Isn't amazing that so few people are killed/injured in car accidents?" (given the sheer number of journeys and the inherent complexity therein).
To use a real world example, a good driver would brake/slow down if they see children playing with a ball on the pavement but a driverless car would presumably only brake if a child actually runs into the road (by which time it will be too late to avoid a collision).
In fact it could be the case, at least to begin with, automated speed limits might be significantly lower than what they are now. Zooming around at 70mph in an automated shell could be a terrifying experience. 50mph might seem more likely.
What I would like to know is how on earth would dozens of automated cars safely, efficiently and quickly maneuver through single-file country lanes with passing places, or crossroads, or spot zebra crossings, or roundabouts or even magic roundabouts? I imagine with driverless cars would come a complete overhaul of the road network.
Regarding collision avoidance, driverless cars would be a lot cleverer than newyorkaddick suggests and I would expect them to be better than most, if not all humans.
In addition, if traffic volumes stay the same, then at any given time there would be more traffic in a given stretch of road and it will all be closer together. That would make getting out of side roads or across junctions more difficult not less.
Is there any actual evidence that lower speed limits save lives? The speed camera partnerships say there is but they are lying. That's because the statistics have a habit of returning to mean and they conveniently forget that.# In addition the more aggressive drivers get fed up with the people that obey the limits and try to overtake them.
# Here's why - a stretch of road has a good accident record but one year there's a couple of serious accidents. The Scamera people put up a camera and trumpet it's effectiveness the following year. But the reality is that the accident levels have just returned to normal as they would have done anyway.
Suffolk was one of the first counties to introduce blanket lower speeds through villages throughout the county. Even though some of the roads were A roads. Over two years in the mid-1990s, Suffolk County Council cut the speed limit in 280 villages on main roads from 60 mph to 30 mph. In 85 villages it was cut from 40 mph to 30 mph, and in another 85 cases existing 30 mph limits were extended. It is hard to believe that many of those 280 remotely approached the popular conception of a village. This policy resulted in a noticeable upturn in casualties in following years, some of which a Suffolk coroner directly attributed to inappropriately low speed limits. Part of the problem is that locals know the roads, know the speed limit is rarely enforced and that there's never any pedestrians anyway. They therefore ignore the lower speed limits and drive aggressively when confronted with a visitor who doesn't understand the area.
The key is to drive sensibly and at a safe speed all the time, not to impose arbitrary limits that may or often may not be appropriate.
A swarm of driverless taxis held up traffic for hours at a junction after one of the first public trials of the technology went wrong.
More than a dozen autonomous vehicles operated by driverless car company Cruise in San Francisco came to a halt for around two hours before employees made it to the scene on Wednesday.
The company has not revealed what caused the vehicles to stop or why multiple cars suffered the fault at the same place. Several were stationary at the entrance to the crossroad junction, while others were stopped at the exit.
Cruise, backed by General Motors, started charging passengers for driverless taxi rides in San Francisco last week.
It is one of the first real-world robot taxi services in a major city. Vehicles do not have a safety driver in the front seat.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2022/07/01/swarm-malfunctioning-driverless-taxis-brings-traffic-halt-hours/
Give driverless cars priority so drivers must stop if they see a driverless car trying to cut in?
I'm looking forward to it! It's going to be fun!
Yesterday I was driving along the M25 when I tried to open a bag of peanuts I had bought earlier.
After a couple of unsuccessful attempts at opening the peanuts, I switched on the Adaptive Cruise Control and also another extra called Pilot Assist.
Pilot Assist keeps the car central in the lane using the white lines on the road to guide it.
The car was now driving itself. It was a bit weird but I managed to open the Peanuts and also open a bottle of Water before I resumed driving the car.
It worked fine and I felt safe.
Did they nibble your nuts?