
Could driverless cars own themselves? - mortenjorck
http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-30998361
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dgreensp
How about an ownerless house that keeps its own rent money? An ownerless
McDonald's franchise? Ownership is not just about money. Driverless cars don't
really change anything about the concept of ownership.

If you think driverless taxis are such a great idea and you want them to be
operated in a non-greedy way, start a non-profit, or start a corporation and
make it public so that anyone who wants can invest and share in the profits,
and pay dividends. If you insist "nobody" owns and operates the fleet of cars,
it will probably end up being the government, who already programs the fare
boxes in taxis.

~~~
knowtheory
Why would this necessarily be true?

Several authors have written about algorithmically generated & operated
companies or entities (Charlie Stross, the Ghost in the Shell) either as
litigation shields or entities which outlived their owners but continued to
operate.

The idea is certainly odd, to essentially create autonomous and roughly
speaking self-sufficient/directed artificial creatures, but it's consistent at
least.

The thought that makes me saddest i think is just that the core quality we'd
imbue humanity's first autonomous creations with would be capitalist wage-
slavery (a literal non-hyperbolic one in this case).

~~~
kwhitefoot
For some entities it makes sense (the lobsters in Accelerando clearly benefit
from it and their emancipation does not do any harm) but for society as a
whole it is surely a dangerous idea.

~~~
blueblank
>but for society as a whole it is surely a dangerous idea

By what and who's metric? There is no stable, verifiable entity "society as a
whole".

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peterjancelis
Competitive markets always end up with zero economic profit, all the 'profit'
is compensation for the efforts and risks in allocating capital.

If there is no need for a human doing the allocation of capital anymore, and
the market demand is so liquid that the capital risks are zero, then yeah
we'll get autonomous profitless (in economic and accounting sense) cab
networks.

This is not a 'new' type of corporation. It's just a corporation with one more
task automated.

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Gys
I think the legal consequences would by far surpass any of the more practical
aspects mentioned here ? Something of value NOT owned (ultimately) by a person
of a government ?

What if there is a flaw in the decision software and something goes horribly
wrong ? Would not be the first time... The software is written by someone, the
decision to use the software was done by someone, etc. Still if really no one
else is to blame, then the government is responsible ? So if nobody else then
they 'own' it ?

It also means abandoning the risk taking and therefore profit potential /
earning power for people.

Challenging.

And once solved why not use the same concept for rental apartments, clothes ?

~~~
jbottigliero
Although the article talks down the use of AI at face value, my gut reaction
to this is; Right, that would be the vehicle's responsibility.

In regards to risk specifically, I would like to believe risk/route evaluation
at the least is considered as part of a profit algo for the vehicle itself.
Yes, this is a assuming a more abundance of data points available to the
vehicles itself — but I'd like to assume infrastructure to streets and safety
are being enhanced along side of the vehicle(s) themselves.

~~~
jbottigliero
And I think for the sake of the thought exercise you have to consider what
happens to related markets — specifically in this scenario, risk. If vehicles
are no longer being sold to people, neither is auto insurance (at least in
today's form).

~~~
manicdee
Car insurance is sold to companies today, which are not natural persons
regardless of bizarre laws.

~~~
Gys
Ultimately companies (the shares) are owned by persons and managed by persons.
This is very fundamental to our (Western ?) system. Its nearly impossible to
start a company or have a bank account without identifying the Ultimate
Beneficial Owner (UBO). Only possible in a very few (questionable) places.

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nullc
Perhaps set your sights a little lower first?
[https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=53855.msg642768#msg6...](https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=53855.msg642768#msg642768)

There are tons of complications before you get to the point of worrying about
machines that might kill people if something goes wrong. :)

~~~
lucaspiller
The key bit of it is this:

> StorJ is not able to find new hosting environments on its own, due to a lack
> of sufficiently powerful AI— but it can purchase the knowledge from humans:
> When an instance of StorJ is ready to reproduce it can announce a request
> for proposal: Who will make the best offer for a script that tells it how to
> load itself onto a new hosting environment and tells it all the things it
> needs to know how to survive on its own there?

The 'AI' doesn't have to be smart it enough to do everything itself, it just
has to be smart enough to be able to hire a human to help it. This step could
be broken down into lots of mturk-style tasks, each done by a different human:

1) Find hosting providers who accept Bitcoin

2) Evaluate the service provided by these hosting providers

3) Sign up for an account on this hosting provider

4) Setup an account on this server with this SSH public key

You could even deal with legal issues that way - have a retainer with a law
firm, and if any issues crop up send them an email.

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CmonDev
_" To be clear, these robots-on-wheels would not be self-aware. ...

But they would be programmed to seek self-improvement in order to avoid
becoming obsolete."_

No, no, no: we are not going to apply evolution, we will simply let the
fittest survive!

------
ctdonath
Well, there is a tree in Athens, Georgia (USA) which legally owns itself.
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tree_That_Owns_Itself](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tree_That_Owns_Itself)

~~~
drdeca
Potentially significant bits from the above wikipedia page:

The original transfer of the deed would not be valid because 'Such a deed,
even if it did exist, would have no legal standing. Under common law, the
person receiving the property in question must have the legal capacity to
receive it, and the property must be delivered to—and accepted by—the
recipient.'

and ' Athens-Clarke County confirms that the tree is in the right-of-way, and
is thus “accepted for care” by municipal authorities;'

however,

'Regarding Jackson’s deed, one writer noted at the beginning of the 20th
century, “However defective this title may be in law, the public recognized
it.”[13] In that spirit, it is the stated position of the Athens-Clarke County
unified government that the tree, in spite of the law, does indeed own
itself.[14]'

So, while if you wished to do this with some land you owned, and a tree, it
probably would not be considered legally valid in the US (at the moment), but
there might be a chance you could get it to be effectively the case?

~~~
pluma
A tree can't give consent, ergo it can't be on the receiving end of a
contract.

That the public plays along has more to do with novelty and tradition than
with a serious legal precedent. Saying that the tree de facto owns itself
despite the lack of legal underpinning is like saying Emperor Norton was de
facto the emperor of the United States because people accepted his fake money
as legal tender and acknowledged his claims.

Consider if Emperor Norton would have engaged in an armed conflict with the US
government, for example. It'd be pretty obvious that he would be treated as an
American citizen, not as a foreign head of state. Likewise if the Tree That
Owns Itself's supposed legal status were ever at odds with the well-being of
humans (to a degree that dwarfs its cultural value), it's pretty obvious who's
side the courts would be on.

At best, the tree could be treated as a corporation with the municipal
government or the public acting on its behalf.

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CheckHook
The biggest problem with driverless cars will not be the safety technology but
the people controlling them.

It's not hard to imagine a scenario where most regular cars have been outlawed
or restricted in favour of safer driverless ones and bus services are replaced
by fleets of self driving cars. It wouldn't be long before restrictions are be
placed on the journeys for the sake of profit.

Even if the self driving cars were to stay in an individuals possession I can
imagine restrictions being placed by the manufacturers or insurance companies,
almost like a drm for cars.

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pluma
What? No, that's silly. Even if the US grants personal rights to corporations
(see Hobby Lobby), it's a bit much to imagine any court of law granting rights
to an "autonomous" non-entity created by a third party.

Until we develop truly sentient machines, it's preposterous to think that a
"thing" could own itself in any meaningful way (even corporations have humans
acting on their behalf).

Also, what is the _incentive_ to do this? It's far more likely that autonomous
cars will be handled like train and bus systems.

And finally, as a programmer, any notion of (non-sentient) computer programs
being granted autonomy is a nightmare to me. Yes, we can make very nice semi-
autonomous toys, but the real world is simply far too complex to expect any
machine to be able to handle all of it. This is why we have emergency
overrides.

Our tolerance for errors made by machines is far lower than our tolerance for
errors made by humans, anyway. If a machine autonomously made a mistake that
resulted in the loss of human life, it'd be an outrage even if no human could
have fared any better under the same circumstances. The liability alone would
be a headache.

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lifeformed
This is a cool concept for lots of things, maybe even big things like
companies and utilities. A for-profit entity that operates just like a normal
one, but is programmed to not to simply maximize profits but to maximize
social good. It would work well on things that don't require too much human
thinking to run (just balancing equations and running equipment), but are
normally hindered by self-interest.

~~~
manicdee
Just be careful that you don't let your "social good maximising" AI talk to
your "global resource management" AI.

That is how Skynet happens.

~~~
lifeformed
The vision I had was that these things wouldn't be run by some strong AI
trying to figure out what's best, but just companies and machines that don't
need complicated ideas to run. Just application specific "AI" that's good
enough to balance the books and keep everything running, save enough for a
rainy day, and keeping the consumers interests in mind.

But I guess if left unchecked, as technology improves, things would tend
towards Skynet.

------
facepalm
The article mentions that the cars could hire programmers to improve them. Why
not also let them hire drivers - that way there would be no need to wait for
the technology of driverless cars to become feasible.

~~~
aaron695
Yes, absolutely everything in the article is possible without driverless cars.

In fact most of it is being done currently, except the owner-less bit.

It seems a common mind screw up.

People think when technology X is released all these other advanced
technologies will come with it.

Voice recognition is an obvious example.

Just because a computer can understand the words perfectly, it still has no
idea what you are saying.

For it to do that it'd have to be close to passing the Turing test.

This fallacy should have a name if it doesn't already.

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drivingsouth
to own itself, first someone would have to give that ownership (and consequent
profit) to it. Why would someone do that in the first place? Will humans not
care about their own needs anymore?

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jimworm
Would self-owned cars have a need to know the implications of its actions?
Legalities?

Will they – like humans – be able to take on small losses in order to survive?
Can they be expected to uphold the law like humans are? What if they act as
getaway drivers for a bank robbery? Drug mules?

Would their programmers be legally responsible for their illegal actions? Or
would they, as the buyers and evaluators of the software, be responsible? Or
the programmers of the evaluation software?

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Animats
If AI starts to sort of work, we may get to see some kind of corporation run
by computers, owned by other similar corporations. Probably out of some
financial haven such as the Seychelles or Cyprus. This is more likely in the
financial space than in the self-driving car space.

I could see someone setting this up and retaining some minority ownership so
that they get dividends, while the thing runs itself.

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GamblersFallacy
I would suggest that current trust laws, where legal fictions like companies
can be trustees, could be a foundation for creating a programmatic trust deed
for cars been trustees.

The trustee (car) is given legal title to the trust property (car, software,
service contracts), by the settlor (manufacturer company), but is obligated to
act for the good of the beneficiaries, humans.

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stillsut
Here in Boston, The Subway system has been completely shutdown by the snow and
the executive in charge of the system has been fired. The MBTA performs poorly
and consistently goes further and further into debt.

I wonder what a system built of self-interested-interested transport robots
would look like, especially in times of disruption and crisis.

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orpras
Article keeps with the rule: 'If a headline is question, the answer is no'

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eyeareque
This is an interesting idea, probably ahead of its time. I can't help but
think of this quote: "Because the people who are crazy enough to think they
can change the world, are the ones who do."

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aceperry
Now it's getting spooky. What's next, self-aware computers? With their own
impulse for self-preservation? Oh noes!

~~~
gambiting
The article very explicitly states that this is not about self aware cars.
Merely about cars which are programmed to make enough money to pay for their
own gas/electricity, repairs and insurance. And probably repay cost of being
built to its manufacturer too.

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AJNDL
What happens when an autonomous taxi hits a pedestrian? Is it fined? Does it
go to jail? Death penalty?

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stretchwithme
This is like asking if the automatic doors at the supermarket can own
themselves.

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louisbird
Who's gonna sue me if I spray-paint a dick on the windshield?

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Kalium
This reads like the golem collective in Discworld.

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baddox
Who pays for the manufacturing of these cars?

~~~
woodman
A loan from the autonomous self owning bank?

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TuringTest
And who sets up the bank?

~~~
woodman
Turtles all the way down is one answer - but if that doesn't satisfy you... a
human who then accepts an offer for his controlling interest by the AI?

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kwhitefoot
Everyone should read Saturn's Children.

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whoisthemachine
No

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juliangregorian
Yeah, this breaks down as soon as one of them gets into an accident and a
million angry mothers introduce responsibility legislation.

