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Post by jdd2 on Sept 23, 2017 8:48:45 GMT -5
I guess it's an easy google--how many people are killed each year by people-driving cars.
And how many lawyers are involved in the people-driving accidents, and the assumption is there'll be more lawyers in the self/automated driving accidents? Please explain that.
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Post by Marshall on Sept 23, 2017 9:24:07 GMT -5
I think the legal thing will shake out; be a wash. The driverless companies will have deeper pockets than the average schmuck who causes an accident nowdays, so there will be fruitful pursuits for legal ambulance chasers. But, as in the Toyota accelerator thing, the technology will be in place to prove that the vast majority of the accidents will not be the fault of the computer. They'll be some human error.
The assumption is eventually there will be fewer accidents. Of course it's an assumption. And surely that can only happen when virtually everybody is in a driverless vehicle. Humans and computers will not easily mix. We're too unpredictable.
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Post by millring on Sept 23, 2017 9:49:22 GMT -5
And as we are nearing the end of life we will some day step into a driverless car and it will know to take us to the soylent green processing plant.
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Post by RickW on Sept 23, 2017 9:59:49 GMT -5
I have to agree, Marshall. We live in a world of litigation. I’m pretty sure it’ll get sorted, and I don’t really have any doubts that it’ll be way safer in the long run. It can’t be any worse. One question will be how damned scary it’ll be. How close will they come to each other? ![:D](//storage.proboards.com/forum/images/smiley/grin.png) In the city, might not want to watch. The majority of accidents are caused by errors in judgement. Hitting the corner to fast, running the yellow light, changing lanes without looking, driving drunk. All that would disappear. I’m pretty sure there’ll be some horrific crashes, but I’ll be there won’t be anywhere near as many as shows up in the news every day, that were caused by someone being a complete dumbass. And someone will look at the reason for those crashes, and fix it. The harder part is going to be what Peter pointed out: commercial vehicles, and how to get goods to a precise spot to be delivered. All solveable.
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Post by TKennedy on Sept 23, 2017 10:48:28 GMT -5
My solution? Teach dogs to drive cars.
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Post by aquaduct on Sept 23, 2017 11:58:12 GMT -5
I guess it's an easy google--how many people are killed each year by people-driving cars. And how many lawyers are involved in the people-driving accidents, and the assumption is there'll be more lawyers in the self/automated driving accidents? Please explain that. Yes it is easy to Google. I suggest you do that. Start with NHTSA, the agency I used to work for. In fact, I suggest everyone do that. I'm pretty sure most of you will be very surprised. Most folks are extraordinarily innumerate. No comprehension of the reality of numbers. Driving as a self organizing and regulating activity is actually remarkably safe given the number of miles driven each year. It's definitely not a free for all blood bath with carnage littering the streets. Oh, and to be fully numerate, it will be helpful to have comparative scale. Note that roughly 2.8 million people die in this country annually.
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Post by epaul on Sept 23, 2017 12:45:41 GMT -5
... Note that roughly 2.8 million people die in this country annually. And of those 2.8, 2.3 million of them were killed in car crashes. Which is an amazing figure when you account for the the fact that 2.2 million of those 2.8 were killed by handguns, 2.6 million were killed by fatty food, and 3.2 million by acrobatic sex practices. I would stay in the house, except according to statistics, that is where most deadly car accidents occur.
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Post by aquaduct on Sept 23, 2017 13:00:56 GMT -5
... Note that roughly 2.8 million people die in this country annually. And of those 2.8, 2.3 million of them were killed in car crashes. Which is an amazing figure when you account for the the fact that 2.2 million of those 2.8 were killed by handguns, 2.6 million were killed by fatty food, and 3.2 million by acrobatic sex practices. I would stay in the house, except according to statistics, that is where most deadly car accidents occur. Personally I'm aiming for being shot while eating a cheeseburger and having acrobatic sex while driving. I am a statistical nightmare.
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Post by epaul on Sept 23, 2017 13:02:02 GMT -5
According to statistics, you are the norm.
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Post by patrick on Sept 24, 2017 9:45:01 GMT -5
There's a sort of weird technology-fetish cult undercurrent that's been running through society for a while now. I'm not sure when it started...(not all that long ago. If I had to date it, I'd put it at the original "dot com" bubble about 20 years ago, back when nerds went from being nerds to being cool)...but it's as if we've become so acclimated to the pace of technological change, we insist on it. And weirder still, we have lost all sense of skepticism when theoretical future tech is "announced". Amazon is never going to deliver packages by drone. Ever. Elon Musk is not going to produce 500,000 cars in 2018. Yeah, but it was only a few years ago that a lot of "experts" were saying "Elon Musk is never going to be able to sell electric cars in the US." Yet Tesla is a going concern. Oh, and, "There will never be a private space program, its too complex." Yet SpaceX is a going concern. And "Solar power will never be feasible." But what interests me is that these examples are not punished by public opinion for floating their fantasies. Quite the opposite. They are revered as "forward thinking", no matter how absurd their claims become. To look at these obviously ridiculous claims with a jaundiced eye is to invite scorn. "What!?!? You're not a True Believer?!?" Why would public opinion punish anyone for thinking speculatively? Personally, if Elon Musk announced he was going to set up a dinosaur breeding facility a' la Jurassic Park, I wouldn't invest in it, but I wouldn't say he won't succeed. He keeps succeeding against all odds. So it becomes a marketing/branding strategy to announce ridiculous tech advancements, even if they never see the light of day. Amazon went so far as to apply for a patent on their "beehive" drone base concept.
That's not done for any real intellectual property protection. No rational observer thinks Amazon is going to have those things running inside of the patent protection window. Amazon filed that application as an act of pure branding propaganda. They want to create an image of perpetual technological leadership. That's not the only reason to file a patent. You also file patents to PREVENT someone else from filing that patent. Since Amazon filed, they can block others from even doing research into that area. Likewise, if they didn't, Jeff could just file a speculative patent and then stop Amazon from even doing any research on it without paying him. I think the regulatory issues surrounding drones flying over cities with packages are far greater than the technical issues. All that feeds into my evolving thoughts on self driving cars. I think we've been conditioned to look at the hype uncritically. I think companies have a market incentive to promote that hype, far beyond any realistic capability. Given the complexity of the task relative to contexts where existing robotics/automation systems are productive (at least a couple of orders of magnitude greater), I don't think we are nearly as close to this as "they" want us to believe. I don't think self-driving cars or trucks are all that far off. They're expensive now because they are being hand built by people with advanced degrees. Once they get designed into a car from the start and built by robots, they will be far cheaper. I can imagine a self-driving smart car capable of delivering your kids or your aging parents to school or the doctor, etc. Or curbside delivery of your groceries or dry cleaning or prescriptions. Send your car to those places, someone (or a robot) puts your stuff in and it comes home. I don's see that truck drivers are going to be needed for long for loading and unloading trucks. Loading docks, etc., were designed with people in mind. Redesign them for driverless trucks pulling up to robots doing the loading/unloading and it all becomes clear. In fact, by eliminating labor, and all the issues with it, a lot more possibilities come to mind.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 28, 2017 19:32:38 GMT -5
How soon until there's a country song in which the singer laments about his truck leaving him too? Hmmm. Where's my pen?
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Post by xyrn on Sept 28, 2017 19:38:10 GMT -5
My solution? Teach dogs to drive cars. ![](https://i.pinimg.com/736x/6a/3c/3d/6a3c3d5857b0598de4dee382ed0bd185.jpg)
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Post by casualplayerpaul on Sept 29, 2017 13:04:32 GMT -5
Ever hear of a Pittsburgh Left?
(From Wiki): The Pittsburgh Left is a colloquial term for the driving practice of the first left-turning vehicle taking precedence over vehicles going straight through an intersection, associated with the Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania area.
I call it the Asshole Left, and it is not something you only see in Pittsburgh.
If you are a good driver, you can see these jerks from a mile away. It's probably saved you from a few fender-benders or worse.
I want to know how self-driving cars will see that sort of maneuver before I sign on.
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Post by brucemacneill on Sept 29, 2017 13:26:26 GMT -5
That "Pittsburgh left" happens all over Pennsylvania. We had to get used to it living on the east end of the state. It's a little like the "3 on the yellow and 2 on the red" stoplight in Michigan, or the "He who gets there first has the right of way" in Massachusetts. Frankly, once you get used to it the "Pennsylvania left" beats the hell out of driving in New York. It's a courtesy because once the ones going straight get moving no body is taking a left until the next light change. We lived about a mile from the local mall in Pa. and at Christmas time it could easily take 45 minutes to get home from the mall area and if you needed to take a left to get home forgetaboutit.
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Post by Doug on Sept 29, 2017 13:59:04 GMT -5
We have the biggest 4x4 pickup law here. Who ever has the biggest pickup has the right of way.
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Post by drlj on Sept 29, 2017 16:26:51 GMT -5
I am all for it. I could sit there in the backseat picking a few songs, drinking boutique beer, eating cheese curds, Maid-Rites and pork loin sammies and let the robo-driver do all the work. Heaven, I tell ya. Where do I buy one of them things?
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Post by millring on Sept 29, 2017 16:53:02 GMT -5
Where do I buy one of them things? You order them online and they self-deliver to your door.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 30, 2017 8:28:09 GMT -5
Where do I buy one of them things? You order them online and they self-deliver to your door. Sure but who's going to answer the door? You mean I have to get up?
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Post by millring on Sept 30, 2017 8:37:54 GMT -5
You order them online and they self-deliver to your door. Sure but who's going to answer the door? You mean I have to get up? That's what the garage door remote is for.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 30, 2017 8:50:29 GMT -5
Sure but who's going to answer the door? You mean I have to get up? That's what the garage door remote is for. There's a remote for the house? Ours is in the darn car and then ... who's going to walk out to the garage? And back?
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