Robocars - Autonomous Drive, Self-driving, Driver-less cars

All this legal stuff around who's accountable, insurance etc. (and possible the updating of laws to fit the new model) could potentially delay autonomous cars by years. I wonder how many deaths will occur in that time. The moral thing to do would be to role out what we have now and see what happens.....

...possibly

Would it not just be an accident? Like a real accident.

The same as if another piece of machinery kills someone. Like a gun misfiring or a gas main explosion.

These things are often rare enough that an inquest can find fault and then fix the issue. The same may become possible with autonomous cars: how much easier for a coroner's inquest to rule that some software needs modifying then for it to rule that all human drivers need to be better at driving.

If there truly is blame to apportion then that can also be done. I'm looking at you here, VW.

"hippy were constructing an argument that these situations were unlikely but they seem to be saying that they were of no consequence"

little from column a, little from column b

Hands up who wants to work for Volvo...

Oh.

Bye bye Volvo.

Like planes.

A few people will die, a few airlines will likely go out of business but the whole industry gets safer and nowadays we all take pretty safe flight for granted.

Exactly.

Or train crashes. No one bloodshed the train manufacturers unless there is a massive design fault.

The only fault with trains is that we don't use them enough because road lobby/trucks.

Hippy have you got a source for this table?

This is what I want to happen, but I feel like the blame/sueing culture could have a heyday with this.
Also, that Volvo is saying their developers are to blame is horrific

Isn't the diagram show how human reacted to danger? (other than plowing straight on).

That picture is jokes, the ones with the crowd would've had people in the road for ages so the car would've slowed down, the lone ped would also have been picked up well in advance going towards the road and the car would ensure it could stop in time, even if he ran out from behind something it'd stop or go round him.

Except that Volvo have stated that they as a corporation will take responsibility. They won't be blaming their employees. In the same way that Volvo took an enlightened approach to increased safety across the industry by developing significant safety components without patents, this is a measure that breaks down barriers to developing improved systems throughout the industry. Volvo is probably expecting to take a small hit on short term profitability, long term they'll gain in terms of reputation and in framing development on their terms.
Working for Volvo might be much less fraught than say working for a specialist autonomous vehicle developer with a very different attitude towards blame and responsibility.

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Where does it say they will blame their devs? It just says they will take the blame. Volvo don't exactly have a habit of scapegoating their employees do they? I'm looking at you Volkswagon...

http://caraccidentbest.blogspot.co.uk/2013/12/car-accident-statistics-2009.html

Yeah, this. They gave seatbelts to the world.

Then again, they also gave hat-wearing imbecile drivers to the world so... give with one hand take with another.

Did I say accidents would be made impossible?

I did not say that.. I'm just pointing out that the software must make a decision and that that decision will probably be driven by economic rational considerations that might be in contradiction to own's own personal beliefs.

I said the complete opposite in fact so don't quote your lies.

"Lose a few people in the name of progress - who cares! Get me robocars!"

While I am quite interested in autonomous vehicles I'm not 100% convinced that the movement does not have significant negative impacts, much less dystopic side-effects.

Daimler's automobile vision developed, for example, over the last century from a utopian dream into a suburban nightmare--- an addiction that has created more death in the world than drugs (including its use to finance wars).

Where does it say they will blame their devs?

Volvo is a new company. It is not the same company that brought us the Amazon. It has not been Swedish since 1999. First owned by Ford, today it is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Chinese multi Geely. Even before Volvo sold the company to Ford it was "different". They lost their market in the 1980s and never found their place since.

You replied to me with "I have little doubt that machines can drive cars better than "average" drivers but that still does not make accidents "impossible"." so you implied that I thought accidents were impossible which I clearly did not.

Economical rational considerations? Why do planes have all those life vests and waste all that time with safety briefings. You're going to die if it falls out of the sky. They could save a lot of money by not having or doing those things. It's not just about economics.

Where does it say they will blame their devs?

Why do planes have all those life vests and waste all that time with safety briefings.

Partially for historical reasons but mainly since they are required to.
See for the US: http://www.ecfr.gov/cgi-bin/retrieveECFR?gp=1&SID=bba5ad06518b529c94e1d67a3270196b&ty=HTML&h=L&r=SECTION&n=49y2.1.1.3.12.1.25.5

You're going to die if it falls out of the sky. They could save a lot of money by not having or doing those things. It's not just about economics.

Regulation and liability are real economic issues.

http://www.faa.gov/about/initiatives/cabin_safety/media/cabinsafetyindex.pdf

The point I've been trying to make is that a self-driving car can make a decision over life and death following a heuristic decision matrix that was decided apriori, viz. hardwired into the vehicle, by others (and including only the factors entered into the system, sensors etc.).

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MZGPz4a2mCA(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MZGPz4a2mCA
)

The point I've been trying to make is that a self-driving car can make a decision over life and death following a heuristic decision matrix that was decided apriori.

A self driving car would avoid putting itself in that scenario in the first place.