Driverless Cars, Good Idea, Horrible Idea?

Untrue. Sure, people screw up. Accidents happen. However, many accident free, perfect drivers exist. Too say otherwise is either ignorance or trolling.

I've never stopped.. They cannot put an autonomous car on the road. When, not if, it kills someone, lawsuits will rightfully start flying.

I'm kind of torn on the whole thing. If the driverless cars are shown to be statistically superior in terms of accident prevention, it wouldn't make much sense to oppose it. Additionally, if the programmers are approaching this correctly and utilize things like Bayesian artificial intelligence, the programs would actually get "smarter" the more they're used, driving the accident rates down even further and perhaps even making driverless cars safer by several orders of magnitude.

On the other hand, the biggest problem with this technology is, well, people. Trying to program this in a bubble is difficult but, as Altima said, holy crap will there be lawsuits whenever anything goes wrong in the real world. Security will also be an issue, as there will always be jackwads trying to hack your car or finding ways to exploit the systems. It's a huge risk for investors.

It's a huge risk for everyone. For what? So you can nap while "driving"..

When that day comes i'll change my tune, but it is a long way off.

Car companies have already had issues with malfunctioning cars that have maimed and killed people through no fault of the driver.

Those car companies still exist.

Security is -and always will be- an ongoing issue in every industry that utilizes any type of technology. Airlines, pacemaker companies, credit card companies, and garage door companies have all had to deal with this.

Those companies still exist.

Accident free and perfect drivers are not the same sets. A perfect driver (one who obeys all traffic laws, rules, and regulations) would not necessarily be accident free. Utter *** who cause accidents for other people can remain accident free. Funnily enough, that's been the point of the article regarding modifying the driving algorithms.
This what insurance is for.

The problem is humans.

And it has cost them millions if not billions of dollars. You really think that cost hasn't been past down the line?

Reading comprehension is a wonderful thing.

lol, yeah. Insurance solves all the problems.

So?

Do you think we should stop driving cars because people sue?

Nope, I'm just pointing out the problems with driverless cars. What are you trying to do?

Yes....

All car companies get lawsuits, so that is not just a problem with driverless cars that is a problem with all cars...

Sure, all car companies get lawsuits. But as it stands they're not held liable for each and every crash. When it's their systems doing the driving, it's going to get more tricky. I'm not saying it's impossible to make it work, but it's certainly not the status quo as you seem to be implying.

You say this like it's a brilliant conclusion and can simply be remedied. Good Luck getting humans off the road.

No, they aren't and neither will driverless cars, especially when the accident is not their fault. Which is every accident driverless cars have been in, so far.

However, ignoring -for example- VW having cars in the 70's combust or goodyear tires cause accidents in the 90's -that would otherwise not have happened- to illustrate that driverless cars will somehow have new lawsuits is ignoring a lot of cases where car companies/tire companies have already been at fault for causing damage, maiming, and death.

I'm not saying driverless cars will not undergo lawsuits (of course they will), but acting like this will be anything new (car companies held accountable for mistakes in their design) is silly.

Quoting a stat that driverless cars have twice as many accidents as normal cars but not pointing out the stat that they have never been at faul is -at best- misleading.

Humans caused the accidents get not the driverless cars. The human drivers involved got the tickets or were sued, not the driverless car companies.

Acting like it isn't something new is unbelievable. Two humans get in an accident, one or both is responsible.

One AI car kills a human, or worst yet causes a massive pile-up and multiple deaths. Who is responsible for that? Saying the owner of the AI car is unacceptable.

Why do you not understand that if those driverless cars had a real driver, NO accident would have even occurred! Why does this not register in your mind?

Because it is an utterly unsubstantiated claim? You could just as well have said that all of the incidents would have ended in fatalities.

their accident rates are twice as high as for regular cars



You're good at making them at least.

Ravael, want to take this one? Correlation, causation, false comparison, etc.
I'm making no such claim. I'm pointing out the absurdity of making such a claim.

I was holding off on that one until I actually knew what the reasoning behind the double rate was. If none of those accidents were caused by the driverless cars, that's a very good sign. I know I've avoided accidents simply because of human intuition, though. It'll be interesting to see how they deal with random acts of unpredictable human stupidity.

What, a logical machine deal with the randomness of human stupidity?

I'm surprised that the accident rate isn't at least quattuordecuple the rate.

I really don't care if there's more accidents as long as those accidents result in fewer fatalities and serious injuries.

Fender benders dealing in little to no serious-to-fatal injuries are a system that can be hammered out and tweaked until it's right.

But the second the system actually becomes one that keeps our goods and people moving and is less lethal it's a system worth adopting.

Of course driverless cars will result in less fatalities and serious injuries if there's nobody in the vehicle to be injured and/or killed.

I'm clearly discussing use in a practical fashion similar to the way we already utilize vehicles. -.-;

And I was just yanking your chain.

If the technology is made standard itd be totally amazing: But until then, youll have driverless cars senselessly being the targets of accidents cause people are still at the wheel of their car being inept as *** on how to operate a motor vehicle.

Wait 10+ years when even used cars have the software :)