
Why self-driving cars are doomed - joeyespo
https://yinwang0.wordpress.com/2016/03/22/why-self-driving-cars-are-doomed/
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joefarish
_They only come out in sunny days, driving around the few simple and nice
roads in the Mountain View area._

They have to start somewhere, I am sure they will expand the scope of testing
once they are satisfied with progress (regulation permitting).

 _Google is going to be liable for every accident that is caused by its self-
driving cars_

That _might_ be true now but it doesn't mean it will always be true. The self-
driving cars will still need to have insurance, which would presumably be paid
for by the owner of the car. I would also expect customers to sign some sort
of EULA which would limit Google's liability. Ultimately I would expect
Google's liability to limited to something akin to gross negligence.

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HillaryBriss
"So Google is going to be liable for every accident that is caused by its
self-driving cars. How much money has Google to pay all the damages, medical
expenses and lives of people? Can any amount money be able to pay for people’s
lives? Nope."

I'm not sure why the author says this.

Real juries do award damages in finite dollar amounts to address the loss of
human lives.

Human lives are negotiated into dollar amounts by large corporations too. When
someone dies in an accident at Disneyland the corporate lawyers usually
negotiate a private dollar amount settlement with the victim's family.

And look at the history of the the Ford Pinto. Ford Motor Company was blamed
for car-explosion related deaths, but the company survived the lawsuits and
settlements. Ford is still profitably making cars today.

Also, if accident rates are brought low enough -- so low that human drivers
are considered more risky than computer drivers -- independent insurance
companies will offer affordable policies to car owners. In this way, the
liability will be spread away from Google to large insurance pools.

And consider how the legal environment will evolve to make self-driven cars
acceptable as part of an overall reasonable risk-for-productivity trade off.
If millions of hours of productive time are given back to drivers who are
currently stuck in several hours of traffic every day, society might well
accept a few hundred deaths a year as a reasonable price to pay for that
convenience and productivity gain.

Finally, if more lives are saved by eliminating drunk human drivers than are
destroyed by accidents caused by computer-driven cars, the law might actually
start to favor such cars.

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dev1n
I wouldn't call self-driving cars _doomed_ if they can't see that a mattress
strapped to the top of a car is a bad idea. The point is that they can make
the smartest decision based on when that mattress is torn off the roof.
Obviously this could also be used in conjunction with a driver taking over.

self-driving cars are not doomed.

~~~
DerekL
> Obviously this could also be used in conjunction with a driver taking over.

If it requires a driver to take control to avoid a crash, then it's not self-
driving. “Self-driving” or ”fully autonomous” means no human driver at all.

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sharemywin
There are already self driving cars on the road. And they seem to be
outperforming human drivers. Could be marketing fluff, but The have a fleet of
them driving around.

