Easy. Everyone with an auto-car gets a HUGE insurance discount,
So... a subsidy, then.
Couldn't you have at least tried?
If private insurance companies decide that self-driving cars are inherently far less of a risk, the market will adjust itself to provide the "subsidy" without the government needing to do anything at all.
Why would I have a car parked for 23 hours a day when I can just call a self-driving pod and have it arrive in minutes?
This will only be true if you live in a densely populated area, since self-driving pod owners will presumably keep their unused vehicles somewhere reasonably secure and centralised. And even then you are going to get peaks and troughs so that you will either have to wait or pay an arm and a leg to get your ride when you want it.
If most people leave their homes for their commute to work at (say) 8am, then calling for a car at 7.55 is going to be an exercise in frustration.
Self-Driving cars to further enhance continuous surveillance by the Corporate State.
Even if you do let it drive you to the bar or liquor store and back, your health insurance premiums just went up in real time (doubly so if you hit a fast food drive thru).
Since that would be trivially easy to circumvent (by letting the car drop you off and pick you up outside a clothes shop round the corner or something) I think your paranoia is showing.
Taxis become much more economical when you don't need a human to drive it any longer.
Imagine the social upheaval of all those now unemployed taxi drivers. And will people in the future understand Scorsese's film?
All the unemployed taxi drivers can become Uber employees on minimum wage riding along as the mandated human backup once the first self-driving car mows down a row of kids waiting for a school bus or something.
A lot of organ transplants come from those killed in car / motorcycle accidents. As deaths sharply decline with self-driving vehicles this will be a grim predicament.
You just need to start a new reality show mashing up the X Factorr and the Hunger Games and you'll have hordes of healthy teenagers begging for the chance to compete and posssibly die.
And then there are the drivers of the OTHER cards on the road. Even if self-driving cars became a reality in 5 years, it will take years, maybe decades, for the cars to become economically priced. And then there are all the existing cars on the road. The average car on US roads is 10 years old, so we have to add at least another 15-20 years before the number of human-driven cars drops to negligible numbers.
Thank you. Everyone here seems to be thinking there will be a magic singularity moment and all cars will become self-driving overnight.
I predict two things to happen in five years:
First, a few rich people will have self-driving cars either as toys, or with a human chauffeur on board as backup.
Second, Uber will push out a fleet of cheap vehicles, which drivers will be allowed to rent out and use as part of the Uber "it's-nothing-like-a-taxi"" service, thereby offloading the insurance/liability issues onto third parties.
I predict that owning a car will soon become a thing of the past, and we won't have to worry about paying insurance and all the other costs associated with owning a vehicle. We'll end up with mass rental pools of vehicles, which are owned, maintained, insured, refueled, etc by the rental company. We'll simply summon a ride using an app, and minutes later the nearest car will pick you up, take you directly to where you want to go, then it'll zoom off and service the next customer (or back to the depo to refuel/recharge).
This post brought to you by the Uber marketing department.
You want autonomous cars, fine, then I'm a passenger with no controls. At which point these things are only economically viable in a rental model... because why the hell would I pay to own one?
I cannot see that everyone will suddenly switch to a rental model, since one of the main advantages of car ownership is that it gives you independence and immediate availability of your transport, unlike having to catch a bus/train or call a cab.
And I doubt that a billionaire is going to be satisfied with calling up a ride in the same vehicle that a pleb just used, unless we miraculously transform society into a more egalitarian one.
New Hampshire, no insurance requirement. Life works fine without force and violence.
So what happens when a drunk on minimum wage living in a trailer kills half your family and cripples the rest?
You sue him for a hundred million and he pays it off at a few dollars a month?
And if he's a reasonably well off, and you bankrupt him for a few thousand that doesn't even cover your hospital bills and loss of earnings?
Compulsory third party car insurance is only a bad idea if you think that anything that government does is wrong on principle. At which point you might as well complain that the government shouldn't use "force and violence" to lock up convicted rapists and murders as it interferes with their freedom.
To further make the point, are bowling, golf, darts, billiards, or auto racing sports? None of them require much in the way of athleticism, yet they are all considered sports and have professionals who can make a living engaging in them
As people have noted below, you're wrong about auto racing, but the others are all games, not sports. Being able to make a professional living out of something is irrelevant. Antique dealers and bricklayers aren't sportsmen.
How is it any less of a sport than, say, chasing a ball around on a field?
Hemingway: 'There are only three sports: bullfighting, motor racing, and mountaineering; all the rest are merely games.'
I really don't get bullfighting, but the point is that a sport has to involve (a) physical prowess and (b) a serious risk of dying. Traditional "field sports" like hunting, shooting and fishing fail by this second measure, as billiards fails by the first.
How about a theory that connects classical physics, electrodynamics, special relativity and gravity, and explains everything from the stability of atoms and molecules to the accelerated expansion of the universe?
I long for the good old days when regular contributor Bennett Haselton could be relied on to provide frequent, lengthy pieces full of length and frequency.
Sheer paranoia is a good preventative measure. I was once rear ended by an SUV coming down a hill at about 45 while I was stopped waiting to turn left. Getting slammed that hard just once was enough to make damn sure I look in my rear view mirror every time I stop any place where someone might possibly rear end me, ready to hit the gas if need be. What we need is an AI that does that from the get-go, without getting burned first.
This is precisely the sort of thing that riding a motorbike teaches you. You do not relax your vigilance ever while you are on the road. But it's just too easy to do so in a car.
She's the CEO of a charity. Shouldn't she be doing it for free? If doing it is a full time job, then perhaps they should find someone with a trust fund who doesn't need any more money to do the job.
I think you're confusing the CEO with people like the "honorary president" or whatever.
One of the connundrums is that to detail exactly where money is spent requires additional auditing which then ends up with higher overheads.
It's only a conundrum if you're one of those idiots who think charities can magically operate with all the employees working for no pay and paying for their own computers, offices and travel expenses.
Slashdot Mirror
The automotive aftermarket parts is a massive industry by sales alone.
I'm sure you'll still be able to buy stick on spoilers, furry dice and day glo wheel lights for your self-drive car.
Easy. Everyone with an auto-car gets a HUGE insurance discount,
So... a subsidy, then.
Couldn't you have at least tried?
If private insurance companies decide that self-driving cars are inherently far less of a risk, the market will adjust itself to provide the "subsidy" without the government needing to do anything at all.
IMO, if a plan flat-out requires a taxpayer subsidy in order to function, it's a bad plan.
I guess that rules out any form of defence spending then. Oh, wait, that's always different isn't it?
Why would I have a car parked for 23 hours a day when I can just call a self-driving pod and have it arrive in minutes?
This will only be true if you live in a densely populated area, since self-driving pod owners will presumably keep their unused vehicles somewhere reasonably secure and centralised. And even then you are going to get peaks and troughs so that you will either have to wait or pay an arm and a leg to get your ride when you want it.
If most people leave their homes for their commute to work at (say) 8am, then calling for a car at 7.55 is going to be an exercise in frustration.
Self-Driving cars to further enhance continuous surveillance by the Corporate State. Even if you do let it drive you to the bar or liquor store and back, your health insurance premiums just went up in real time (doubly so if you hit a fast food drive thru).
Since that would be trivially easy to circumvent (by letting the car drop you off and pick you up outside a clothes shop round the corner or something) I think your paranoia is showing.
Taxis become much more economical when you don't need a human to drive it any longer.
Imagine the social upheaval of all those now unemployed taxi drivers. And will people in the future understand Scorsese's film?
All the unemployed taxi drivers can become Uber employees on minimum wage riding along as the mandated human backup once the first self-driving car mows down a row of kids waiting for a school bus or something.
A lot of organ transplants come from those killed in car / motorcycle accidents. As deaths sharply decline with self-driving vehicles this will be a grim predicament.
You just need to start a new reality show mashing up the X Factorr and the Hunger Games and you'll have hordes of healthy teenagers begging for the chance to compete and posssibly die.
And then there are the drivers of the OTHER cards on the road. Even if self-driving cars became a reality in 5 years, it will take years, maybe decades, for the cars to become economically priced. And then there are all the existing cars on the road. The average car on US roads is 10 years old, so we have to add at least another 15-20 years before the number of human-driven cars drops to negligible numbers.
Thank you. Everyone here seems to be thinking there will be a magic singularity moment and all cars will become self-driving overnight.
I predict two things to happen in five years:
First, a few rich people will have self-driving cars either as toys, or with a human chauffeur on board as backup.
Second, Uber will push out a fleet of cheap vehicles, which drivers will be allowed to rent out and use as part of the Uber "it's-nothing-like-a-taxi"" service, thereby offloading the insurance/liability issues onto third parties.
The Self Driving car has been 5 years out for the last 40 years, much like the Flying Car I was promised.
With any luck all the fabulousnesses will converge and we'll have a fusion-powered true AI car on Mars in 15 years.
I predict that owning a car will soon become a thing of the past, and we won't have to worry about paying insurance and all the other costs associated with owning a vehicle. We'll end up with mass rental pools of vehicles, which are owned, maintained, insured, refueled, etc by the rental company. We'll simply summon a ride using an app, and minutes later the nearest car will pick you up, take you directly to where you want to go, then it'll zoom off and service the next customer (or back to the depo to refuel/recharge).
This post brought to you by the Uber marketing department.
Here's a hint: they don't pay actuaries large sums of money purely to attract their sunny personalities to the team.
You want autonomous cars, fine, then I'm a passenger with no controls. At which point these things are only economically viable in a rental model ... because why the hell would I pay to own one?
I cannot see that everyone will suddenly switch to a rental model, since one of the main advantages of car ownership is that it gives you independence and immediate availability of your transport, unlike having to catch a bus/train or call a cab.
And I doubt that a billionaire is going to be satisfied with calling up a ride in the same vehicle that a pleb just used, unless we miraculously transform society into a more egalitarian one.
That is a good argument for nationalising insurance, I agree.
New Hampshire, no insurance requirement. Life works fine without force and violence.
So what happens when a drunk on minimum wage living in a trailer kills half your family and cripples the rest?
You sue him for a hundred million and he pays it off at a few dollars a month?
And if he's a reasonably well off, and you bankrupt him for a few thousand that doesn't even cover your hospital bills and loss of earnings?
Compulsory third party car insurance is only a bad idea if you think that anything that government does is wrong on principle. At which point you might as well complain that the government shouldn't use "force and violence" to lock up convicted rapists and murders as it interferes with their freedom.
"How could such an advanced culture have staged such bloody spectacles?"
Because however you doll up humanity..... people are very primal under the surface, and are capable of a great many violent things.
The Romans didn't have Call of Duty.
To further make the point, are bowling, golf, darts, billiards, or auto racing sports? None of them require much in the way of athleticism, yet they are all considered sports and have professionals who can make a living engaging in them
As people have noted below, you're wrong about auto racing, but the others are all games, not sports. Being able to make a professional living out of something is irrelevant. Antique dealers and bricklayers aren't sportsmen.
How is it any less of a sport than, say, chasing a ball around on a field?
Hemingway: 'There are only three sports: bullfighting, motor racing, and mountaineering; all the rest are merely games.'
I really don't get bullfighting, but the point is that a sport has to involve (a) physical prowess and (b) a serious risk of dying. Traditional "field sports" like hunting, shooting and fishing fail by this second measure, as billiards fails by the first.
How about a theory that connects classical physics, electrodynamics, special relativity and gravity, and explains everything from the stability of atoms and molecules to the accelerated expansion of the universe?
Yay, Time Cube!
I long for the good old days when regular contributor Bennett Haselton could be relied on to provide frequent, lengthy pieces full of length and frequency.
Why is there a different standard for referring to someone's heritage depending on their skin tone?
Have you really never come across the concept of "racism"?
Sheer paranoia is a good preventative measure. I was once rear ended by an SUV coming down a hill at about 45 while I was stopped waiting to turn left. Getting slammed that hard just once was enough to make damn sure I look in my rear view mirror every time I stop any place where someone might possibly rear end me, ready to hit the gas if need be. What we need is an AI that does that from the get-go, without getting burned first.
This is precisely the sort of thing that riding a motorbike teaches you. You do not relax your vigilance ever while you are on the road. But it's just too easy to do so in a car.
She's the CEO of a charity. Shouldn't she be doing it for free? If doing it is a full time job, then perhaps they should find someone with a trust fund who doesn't need any more money to do the job.
I think you're confusing the CEO with people like the "honorary president" or whatever.
One of the connundrums is that to detail exactly where money is spent requires additional auditing which then ends up with higher overheads.
It's only a conundrum if you're one of those idiots who think charities can magically operate with all the employees working for no pay and paying for their own computers, offices and travel expenses.
15000 troupes were sent to Haiti
Mime? Contemporary dance? Avant garde theatre?
I do think someone has their priorities a bit confused.
There was a long-standing experimental attempt to have a society based on no taxes and private benevolence. It was called the Nineteenth Century.