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Helicopter Crashes While Filming Autonomous Audi
telomerewhythere writes "A helicopter commissioned by Audi to film its autonomous Audi TT climbing Pikes Peak crashed early this morning. Four people on board were hurt, the pilot seriously. It's a surreal story — a manned vehicle crashes while the one climbing a mountain driven only by computers and sensors carries on. Here's more on the autonomous Audi, a project undertaken with the help of Stanford University."
Never say never. It's just a matter of time. Even if some situations are hard to automate, a large percentage of all driving hours (freeway driving, I would think) could be automated much more easily.
The motivation to reclaim driving time is huge. People spend / waste a fantastic amount of time driving. I couldn't find global figures, but apparently Americans spend over 100 hours per year commuting (not driving in total - just commuting); the total driving figure in Israel is 577 hours per year; and about 40% of mothers in the US spend over 2 hours per day driving. Then there are truck drivers and delivery workers whose annual total must be closer to a couple thousand hours per year (i.e. basically their whole life).
Dishwashing machines are very popular, and how much time do they actually save, 20 minutes per day? I can't think of anything the average person more, that could be automated as easily, as driving.
...is that the car called to report the accident.
WARNING: Smartphones have side effects--most of them undocumented.
We were up on Pikes Peak last weekend staffing a charity hike event when the autonomous car itself also crashed, running off the road somewhere. The wrecker they sent up to fetch it also broke down blocking the road, so they had it shut down for a while getting yet another wrecker up the mountain to help relocate the first one, and get the car out of there.
That thing has some sort of bad omen surrounding it. Everything mechanical around it, including itself, seems to break or crash! I'm amazed nobody has been killed yet, especially with the helo going down on the side of the mountain (that usually ends very badly, so my props go to the pilot for keeping everyone alive).
Assuming the autonomous systems actually work most of the time car insurance providers could make a bundle offering discount rates for the feature (only slightly of course, they are evil), and then gradually raising the rates for the lack of the feature. So eventually we won't be able to afford to drive manual vehicles. At least I can read my kindle on the way to work.
refactor the law, its bloated, confusing and unmaintainable.
Human beings have no business driving. I know this statement bothers a lot of people, but the statistics bear it out. I, for one, will gladly hand over my keys the day I can buy an autonomous vehicle, and never think twice about it. Driving is a chore 99% of the time, and one that I'd be just as happy to turn over to a computerized device as any other chore.
Human beings have no business being alive either. I think statistics will bear that one out too. Look, I recognize that there are plenty of activities, even plenty of transportation activities that don't require me to be in control. For example, we routinely travel by means that have someone or something else doing the driving (passenger trains, airlines, etc). And these means of travel are usually (at least in the developed world) safer than if I were driving myself. But driving is "do it yourself" mobility. In exchange for a somewhat elevated chance of injury and death, you gain a great deal of freedom.
Second, driving engages me. It is often fun to drive a car.
Ultimately, safety is not the key point of driving or for that matter, it isn't always a chore. Else we never would have left the house in the first place. And an autonomous system won't be able to cover all those needs that formerly used a human driver.