BS: Driverless cars - a prediction

Subject: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: Mr Red
Date: 20 Jun 15 - 07:59 AM

well actually two. Both predicated on macho (or drunk) individuals relying on the ability of the vehicle design to anticipate danger.

1) Kids following a craze/game of jumping in front of driverless cars to annoy the passengers as the emergency stop software connects. Or worse have the contents of their laps crash to the floor, eg computers. And even worse, injuries like whiplash or badly placed objects hitting them. Kids will only learn by experience, modulated by Darwin's theory.

2) Drivers of normal cars taking chances hoping that the driverless car will always give way. Which relies on human judgement on the part of the idiot driver, and human judgement on what constitutes well developed software.

The point is: driverless cars have that inevitability of becoming ubiquitous and the debate of the consequences have to be debated. We have to predict things so we can't call them that perennial lie "unforeseen consequences". The cost of not doing it is peoples' lives.

discuss.

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: GUEST,Grishka
Date: 20 Jun 15 - 09:00 AM

There is one safe prediction, which is: most predictions will turn out wrong. Laptop computers in driverless cars? Ridiculous.

Nevertheless I totally agree that the all possible consequences of technology must be discussed earliest and best we can. Most importantly, we must not leave it to business people. The digital revolution has already become a good example of how not to do it. Governments relying on Microsoft for their security - nay, no, never no more!

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: GUEST
Date: 20 Jun 15 - 09:44 AM

But, will they have a simulated back seat driver?

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: GUEST
Date: 20 Jun 15 - 09:46 AM

And, a dummy displaying a middle finger-to simulate reality.

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: GUEST,#
Date: 20 Jun 15 - 09:56 AM

If people can hack government sites, what's to stop them hacking and controlling the steering mechanism on driverless cars? The braking mechanism? Etc.

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: GUEST,punkfolkrocker
Date: 20 Jun 15 - 11:05 AM

ok.. just to be on the safe side...

Driverless and Passengerless cars....

Just send the car out in the rain to the sci fi future 21st century drive thru off licence and chip shop...😎

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: GUEST,Grishka
Date: 20 Jun 15 - 11:17 AM

punkfolkrocker, what about carless cars? Good video telephony can replace almost all traveling. (Too bad that the NSA software will watch as well.) Trains can consist of cars that ride you from house to house. There you change into sportswear and run on your treadmill ...

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: GUEST,punkfolkrocker
Date: 20 Jun 15 - 11:32 AM

All my life I've been an active cyclist & pedestrian
[until feet & ankle problems started setting in a few years ago]
and supporter of affordable efficient public transport...

Never owned a car or motorbike.. not even taken a driving test...

[My wife failed 3 tests 25 years ago before she gave up for good..]

Does that make me a paragon of progressive environmentalist virtue,
or a bit of a stubbornly impractical pillock !!!???

Actually, after even more local bus and train 'economy' cutbacks

it mostly makes me 'housebound'...😬

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: Greg F.
Date: 20 Jun 15 - 11:36 AM

Any time a person abicates the responsibility to think in favor of letting a machine think for him/her is an idiot, and a dangerous one.

When a whole SOCIETY of techno-addicted idiots does so it is in very serious trouble.

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: GUEST,#
Date: 20 Jun 15 - 11:57 AM

Every time I think about this topic the following 30-second scene comes to mind. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xGi6j2VrL0o

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 20 Jun 15 - 12:31 PM

I don't make predictions any more. I find they are frowned upon in some quarters...

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: GUEST
Date: 20 Jun 15 - 01:02 PM

Driverless bicycles and personless skis could be the next useful invention to save us from ourselves.

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: GUEST,Olddude
Date: 20 Jun 15 - 01:11 PM

My wife needs one of those. She drove my brand spanking new car into a pole. Crunched the front fender.. Dang

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 20 Jun 15 - 01:15 PM

What has she got against us Poles? And I see you are only worried about the fender...

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: GUEST
Date: 20 Jun 15 - 01:59 PM

@Mr Red

Sign up on a motoring forum and get some sensible replies rather than rubbish from the "its not trolling because I have a Mudcat id" trolls.

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: GUEST,Grishka
Date: 20 Jun 15 - 02:10 PM

Greg, idiots are the most tolerant community: some are tech addicted, some are anti-tech (not the least ones!) - all creeds, sexual preferences, etc. are represented. OK, some shoot one another, but many shoot only non-idiots, for boredom, frustration, or envy, rather than hatred.

Then there are idiots who sell useless tech to other, even bigger idiots, and thus convert the latter into anti-tech idiots. And there are clever business people who do the same without being caught.

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: GUEST
Date: 20 Jun 15 - 03:05 PM

I predict we will see a driverless car with a gnome as a passenger.

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: Greg F.
Date: 20 Jun 15 - 04:33 PM

Hey, Grishka, I never said the idiot community wasn't equal opportunity.
But letting machines think for them is a relatively new phenomenon & gaining all the time.

By the way, ever withess Oy-Phone withdrawl? It ain't a pretty sight.

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: GUEST
Date: 20 Jun 15 - 04:50 PM

quote: Drivers of normal cars taking chances hoping that the driverless car will always give way.

When manually-driven cars become rare, they'll be able to ignore red lights and stop signs, counting on all the other cars being driverless.

Eventually manual driving could be banned because of that sort of thing. And maybe that's a good idea, if the driverless cars really turn out to be good at not crashing into things and therefore could eliminate the obscene numbers of motor vehicle deaths we have with humans at the wheel.

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: Donuel
Date: 20 Jun 15 - 05:24 PM

Many predict that many truckers will lose their jobs.

I thought about it and the only advantage to human drivers will be their willingness to willingly risk their life in conditions the robot would shut down. Imagine, machines will have a stronger survival instinct than humans.

There will be fewer deaths with robots.

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: Jack Campin
Date: 20 Jun 15 - 05:32 PM

A driverless car is where the car bomb meets the pilotless drone.

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: Ed T
Date: 20 Jun 15 - 07:09 PM

It seems the trucs have aready hit Caax's oil sands.

Canada s oil sands 

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: Ed T
Date: 20 Jun 15 - 07:12 PM

Oops-It seems like the driverless trucks have already hit Canada's Oil Sands:

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 20 Jun 15 - 08:34 PM

Mind, it'd be good to be able to have a few drinks in the pub and drive home safely.

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: Greg F.
Date: 20 Jun 15 - 09:17 PM

There will be fewer deaths with robots.

I personally don't care how many dead robots there are. The more the merrier.

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: Jack Campin
Date: 21 Jun 15 - 03:51 AM

I could say the same about car owners.

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 21 Jun 15 - 03:55 AM

predict we will see a driverless car with a gnome as a passenger.

Nah. We don't use cars.

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: BobL
Date: 21 Jun 15 - 04:17 AM

Jumping red lights and dangerous driving will still be against the law, and driverless cars will have dashcams as standard.

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: Mr Red
Date: 21 Jun 15 - 06:59 AM

All dashcams give you is proof of blame. Providing you are alive to sue. In the UK, video has to be agreed by the plaintiff that is constitutes the truth. Though the police may have more sway.

The camera doesn't lie, but it can't tell you everything, unless it sees every whichway. I wish mine had been a dual camera device. Tailgaters are as big a menace.

Sign up on a motoring forum and get some sensible replies rather than rubbish from the "its not trolling because I have a Mudcat id" trolls.
If I had the interest in motoring in general I would peruse the forums, but I am willing to be proved wrong that I strongly suspect trolls inhabit those forums also, and they may not be light-hearted jokers. And how steeped in the history of the common working man are they? Folkies have a different perspective. The ones I would respect, even as GUESTs, would reveal themselves.
One of the definitions of a troll is anonymity.

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: GUEST,Beer lovin' Musket
Date: 21 Jun 15 - 10:08 AM

Assuming you aren't classed as being in control of the vehicle, no more arguing over whose turn it is to drive!

Bring it on.

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 21 Jun 15 - 02:51 PM

Surely dashcams are as much, or more, about ensuring that a driver with one knows that if they cause an accident that will be revealed.

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: BobL
Date: 21 Jun 15 - 03:31 PM

Indeed they are. Great incentive to drive carefully!

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: Mr Red
Date: 21 Jun 15 - 04:40 PM

It certainly has that effect, but I can assure you the intention of getting one was because of the standard of driving these days.
Plus:
1) my sister had a minor prang in NZ years ago and the driver just got out, blamed her and after the usual exchanges of blame, and some pretty obvious facts about the relative importance of each road at the junction, he said "you can't prove anything" and took off.
2) a boss had a similar incident but the driver took off without stopping. The boss was too cute for that one, so he reported it to the police and made sure his story was in place, in case the idiot reported it and the boss was on the back foot immediately. The other driver reported it an hour later and as a result got a letter from the boss's solicitor. End of. Except the cost of repair. Our company paid.

But with a video they would have got compensation via their insurance companies.

My point about driverless cars could be more serious. What if those braving the situation mistook a driverless car and it turned out the owner was drivng. And the driver didn't respond quite as quickly. Until all cars are driverless the potential for such errors of judgement is there.

I have my dashcam - what are you doing about it?

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: BobL
Date: 22 Jun 15 - 03:22 AM

I think a driver "braving the situation", whether or not the target car was driverless, might be considered by the courts as careless or even dangerous. I don't what law there is against careless or dangerous pedestrians, however the maximum penalty for such behaviour is death.

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: Mr Red
Date: 22 Jun 15 - 04:57 AM

very true, but imagine what the comics like the "Sun" would make of it. I am not sure what comics Murdoch claims he owns in the US but in the UK they are barely classable as newspapers.

Basically a craze of jumping in front of cars as a joke would be a cause celebre Murdoch could ride the coat tails of. It would be of concern to everyone who used public &/or their own transport, driverless or no. Politicians would act. Discussing it now means we would at least have answers half finished, in waiting.

FWIW Murdoch controls 100% of News Corp, and owns 18%!

Subject: RE: BS: Driverless cars - a prediction
From: Mr Red
Date: 01 Jul 15 - 11:25 AM

On TED.com Goggle expound the virtues of driverless cars and tut at one motorist. Which demostrates what I was trying to explain.

http://www.ted.com/talks/chris_urmson_how_a_driverless_car_sees_the_road

At one stage the video shows two driverless cars and a sensible gap between. And a motorist drives between the stationary cars stops then drives on. Obviously the driver spotted that the driverless car would always stop. Just as well Goggle got their algorithms sorted on recognising a car sidewas and not moving off. Now had that been at high speed the occupant would have whiplassh by now. Goggle wouldn't dare show that incident.