Driverless Cars- Scariest Thing Ever?

[Noofly]

Am I the only one completely freaked out by the thought of driverless cars? I can't even bear it when DH uses the self parking gadget on his car. How am I going to cope in a world of robot cars?

(lighthearted in that yes, I will obviously cope, but am I alone in thinking Eeek?!?!?)

Yes imagine it - a bunch of vehicles programmed to obey the highway code, as opposed to the current situation?

I love the idea! My DS has an eye condition which bars him from having a driving licence but in a driverless car, he imagines he will gave 'control' so will technically be driving

He's very happy about it.

*have not gave. Gah!

How do they work? Do they rely on GPS? What happens if sunspots suddenly knock out a load of satellites and no one is in the car who knows rules of the road? This Way Madness Lies.

Very frightening! One of reasons im driving my old car is how over the top new cars are on electrics. Ive driven past almost brand new cars being mended due to theelectrics whilst mine (hopefully) keeps going. Driverless means more going wrong!

I would rather take my chances with driverless cars than Italian drivers!

YANBU!

The idea freaks me out a bit too.

DH has got a parking thing on his car too and I can't bare it either. I also get the wobbles when you're in those car washes that make your car go through automatically.

I don't know why, a control thing I suppose

What happens when the computer system goes down ?!

Allerretto...you so right there. Dh and i loved watching them parking and driving in rome. Became our after dinner entertainment on honeymoon (sad).

You fly in pilotless planes - well a pilotless plane has a pilot in the seat as a driver less car has. Most plane crashes are down to the pilot and pilot error.

Driverless cars will still have people in them.

It's that convoy of driverless lorries on the M6 that freaks me out.

Ginger...i very rarely fly (think last time was 5 years) and if its politeless im not flying again!!!!

Ipad correction! Im sure pilots are very polite!

Surely driverless cars in themselves are far safer, given that most accidents are caused by human error?! It feels counterintuitive and scary but in reality much safer I would have thought. The vulnerability of the computer and satellite systems is an issue though of course.

DP is really interested in driverless cars and we were talking about the ethical side of it the other day. So if a collision became inevitable in a fully networked driverless car system would the system 'decide' who to sacrifice and who to save, and based on what? The greater good, I guess it would have to be? Would a car that could not slow down in time therefore change course and crash itself, killing the occupant if that was the only option rather than plough into a crowd of pedestrians? I guess in such a system far less people would be killed on the roads overall but the ethical implications of a smaller number of people being killed intentionally are a bit scary to say the least

I don't know what the impact will be so that makes me edgy. I can see all the city-planner type upsides (potentially fewer accidents, less environmental impact, car sharing and workplace/living alterations etc etc) but I think of the massive impact of the car on the way we live now and I'm perplexed to know the outcome.

Eg no need for jobs in sectors like truck driving and taxis, a doubling or tripling of the number of low earth orbit satellites, virtually complete dependence on software engineers and the power grid for well over half of our lives (and the consequent increase in vulnerability), changed patterns of crime, changed planning for infrastructure development etc etc.

And how would we manage the 'handover'?

I just don't know.

It scares me a bit as well.

What if it fails to notice the person who has just walked out onto the road? I assume we can override it with an emergency break or something?

Technology goes wrong all the time, humans make errors all the time, so I guess it's the fear of the unknown.

Plus, how this will affect jobs worries me.

I think that in theory sounds great if they are all driverless.

But a mixture on the roads?

I'm more concerned about them becoming sentient, rising up and enslaving us.

I don't like the notion that the three lanes of driverless mixed traffic all doing 70 and bumper to bumper - because they can be - are so dependent on whether a particular software engineer had a good breakfast on the day he devised the initial program for whatever.

After all, everyone has seen what troubles techy types have just managing Internet sites. Why should they suddenly become superhuman because cars are involved?

I can't be the only person who imagines a Bond-style villain taking control of the driverless car network and steering us all into a big hostage shed, can I?

... People with self-preservation instincts are too dodgy to entrust road safety with so technology-based engineering-based safety systems must be more reliable.

Fukushima, anyone??

Fukushima, anyone??

Yeah, badly located power plant that was hit by a freak power of nature event, not really the software devs fault.

If you think that the end product relies on what breakfast the software dev gets then I presume your really not aware of how reliant you already are, the comparison between websites and embedded software is not even remotely comparable and I suggest you never get on a plane again.

I say ban the Gutenberg press!!

I think I'll allow the Gutenberg press, personally - I read books after all.

Not sure I'd be too comfortable in a Volkswagen these days, though.

I'm fuming ... Chancellor says it will create jobs....

Yeah how bout lorry drivers, taxi drivers, delivery drivers and other people that drive for a living.

It'll be fine. As long as they use computers which are 100% reliable, and the eleventy billion lines of code are perfect, and there are no unforeseen issues. What could go wrong?