I think what terrifies most people right now is, "how safe will they be while riding in a self-driving car?" The companies making these vehicles haven't tested them that much yet and when they do they'll improve the AI and in a few years when people's fears are allayed and they'll be willing to buy these self-driving cars. If they won't be too expensive I'll get myself one.
I don't think I'll be an early adopter on this particular piece of tech. And it's not so much being in on of these things that's so frightening - it's behind outside of them. No way I'm convinced that pedestrian safety is ensured to the degree it is with human operated cars. But we'll probably find out, for better or for worse, pretty soon.
As much as I admire Google for attempting such a difficult technological problem I confess that I will never trust an AI to do something critical like driving my vehicle. I would prefer cars which have partial AI control so that the driver can take breaks in between, but having an outright driverless car is not too viable yet, especially for crowded street in cities. But I will be fine if they use these cars at airports and other places where the route is fixed and there is very little traffic
That thought is also in my head. If that Google Car becomes a reality and is on the showroom, I guess I will have a lot of thinking before buying it. And for sure, it would be an expensive car to own not to mention the complexity of the maintenance. It will be like living the science fiction stories where the human is the master of the computers and devices until one of the computers went haywire and acted like the master to enslave man. With the Google Car, we can be a slave somehow since it has all the controls.
That'd be really weird and I'd be freaked out to even see those driving people around. Isn't there always a possibility of malfunction?
Well, everytime you fly in an airplane it's pretty much a self driving one. But yes, a lot less traffic out there. I wouldn't mind sitting in a self driving car. I sit on taxi's too and it's someone else driving the thing, someone I don't know and I really don't know if he is a good driver or not. In some of these things, I'd trust a robot just as much as a human.
Over 90% of all traffic accidents are user error. Software doesn't get tired, or drunk/high or angry. It does not text or make calls and it does not take it's eyes off the road to look at the cute girls on the sidewalk. The safety improvements alone are enough to convince me of the need for self driving cars. Eventually, down the road far into the future operating a motor vehicle is going to be seen as as past time, something you do on a closed circuit for fun. Did you guys know, the number 1 occupation by workforce size in most US states is a truck driver? Once self operating trucks become widespread then this is going to cause HUGE labour displacement and probably social unrest. This is going to be a very interesting thing to watch develop.
While software might not get tired, drunk or angry, it has been known to malfunction, so it's not as if accidents involving technology have never happened before. I'd be much happier if I was able to override the computer as and when I wanted, and have a steering wheel and pedals I could use just in case. To get into a car and have no authority over what it's going to do, I'd be a lot more wary.
This topic gets more interesting by the minute. I see that most of you also share the same fears as me. I guess for now, the odds of people willing to ride a self-driving car is still low until such time that its safety is fully tested and ensured.
I wonder if people will be able to rent them, and if so would there be an age limit? I've seen video footage of the cars and it looks okay, but I'm not sure how it would cope on a motorway (freeway) or stuck in traffic behind a tractor or lorry. Those are my concerns, and then cyclists too.