I'm skeptical about self-driving cars
Tuesday, January 5, 2016 by Dave Winer

The various industries involved seem to think that change is upon us. That in a matter of a few years driving by humans will be over. I'd love to hear the step-by-step of this.

I know that Tesla has already released software that makes their cars somewhat autonomous. Have their self-driving cars had any accidents yet? I honestly don't know the answer. 

Is it legal to let your car drive itself? I can't imagine it's legal in New York State. How long before it's specifically illegal everywhere? Government hasn't had a chance to catch up. 

Oh you don't like government? I don't like the idea of being a guinea pig for this. So don't drive you say? I don't. But I still could get hit by one of these contraptions. Who is liable for mistakes the software makes? If it's the driver will their insurance cover it? 

I know you must think I sound like a Luddite. Maybe I do. Or maybe I know how buggy all software is. I don't like that the banking system is all-software. Cars? Seems quite dangerous to me.

  • I've read a bunch of articles about Google's autonomous cars, and consistently what they report is that they have far fewer accidents per mile than human-driven cars. And literally 100% of the accidents that *have* happened have been the other driver's fault. (The majority of these rear-ending them at low speed when the Google car actually stopped for a traffic signal.)

    It's possible they're still limiting them to "easy" scenarios, but considering how many people are drunk, tired, distracted, or just generally shitty drivers, I don't find it hard to believe that on average self-driving cars are going to be safer.