Once driverless cars are shown to be objectively safer, of course it
makes sense to make them generally available on the road. But the
lawyers must be rubbing their hands at the thought of all those
interesting lawsuits that will have to be argued in the first few
years from when the car manufacturers decide it's time.
What if these cars are safer in good conditions but not so when
visibility is poor? If the car suggests that you take over and you
don't, are you liable? If you feel like having a drive on a nice day
and take over, are you more liable?
You clicked that EULA back in 2018 accepting all of their terms and
conditions. You must have, otherwise the car wouldn't start. When the
T&Cs change in 2019 and you object to one of the new provisions, what
do you do--sell the car?
What if you're measurably safer if you have an accident in your
driverless Tesla, but pedestrians and occupants of other vehicles are
a little less safe. Overall the roads are slightly safer but can you
accept that slightly higher risk on my behalf?
This has suddenly become topical for me as we're looking at buying a
car with the option of a driver-assistance system called Eyesight. Is
it objectively safer? Is the added safety worth the added cost? Is it
reliable? Does it just encourage you to drive a little less
attentively, so you can finish that important SMS knowing that the car
will almost certainly save you if the car in front stops suddenly?
Interesting times.
--- Stuart
----- Original Message -----
From: austechwriter@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
To:"austechwriter@xxxxxxxxxxxxx"
Sent:Mon, 25 Jul 2016 15:53:41 +1000
Subject:atw: Re: Driverless cars (Was: OT I hate it when I am this
right)
In a certain way it’s really quite simple. With person-controlled
driving you have a certain number of accidents of various levels of
seriousness. With driverless driving you will also have a certain
number. To justify driverless you have to have fewer (you could say no
worse than the same number but I don’t think people would accept
that). In fact, Elon Musk says that his cars will only be allowed to
go proper autopilot when they have 10 times fewer accidents – when
he says “have” I guess he means according to the data collected on
their autopilot features (when not operated as true autopilot) both
from the cars and drivers themselves – perhaps this data is not
exactly the same as “for real” data but if they’re only going to
go “live” when they think that driverless is at the
10-times-better level then surely it will be at least significantly
better if not 10 times better.
http://mashable.com/2016/07/21/elon-musk-future-cars/#HNbVG8m0y5qm
[1]
Petra Liverani
Technical Writer / UX Designer
TMC Systems Development
Operational Systems
Infrastructure and Services
Transport for NSW
T 02 8396 1617 | F 02 8396 7950 | M 0401 023 961
25 Garden St, Eveleigh NSW 2015
FROM: austechwriter-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:austechwriter-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] ON BEHALF OF Stuart
Burnfield
SENT: Monday, 25 July 2016 3:03 PM
TO: Austechwriter
SUBJECT: atw: Driverless cars (Was: OT I hate it when I am this right)
This broadcast on the ABC RN Ockham's Razor programme was obviously
inspired by Christine's post and our recent discussion on ATW:
PONDERING THE PROSPECTS OF DRIVERLESS CARS
http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/ockhamsrazor/pondering-the-prospects-and-pitfalls-of-driverless-cars/7553938
[2]
It doesn't provide any easy answers but asks some interesting
questions.
--- Stuart
Links:
------
[1] http://mashable.com/2016/07/21/elon-musk-future-cars/#HNbVG8m0y5qm
[2]
http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/ockhamsrazor/pondering-the-prospects-and-pitfalls-of-driverless-cars/7553938
