Are autonomous cars a bad idea or am I just afraid of change?

"James Gallagher" (jgallagher) 01/15/2015 at 17:10 • Filed to: None

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As I write this, I'm basking in the glow of a trip down the left lane of I-95. I did a lot of things wrong. I drove too fast, I wove in and out of lanes, I didn't always leave safe following distance, but I'm in a really great mood. A self-driving car would have done a better job, but I would have had a lot less fun.

(Lead image via !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! )

Autonomous cars are threatening more and more to be our future. I don't pay a whole lot of attention to them as I'm cruising the internet, but they're prevalent enough that they've made it into my consciousness. That Audi drove itself to CES, and I don't remember any stories about it ending in disaster. Plenty of cars nowadays can park themselves. Google has its cutesy bubble car plans, and more and more states are legalizing it. The car that drives itself is getting harder to ignore.

Instead of burying my head further in the sand, I want to try to come to terms with the idea that my hands and feet might not be necessary next time I hit the highway. If I'm honest with my lovely readers, and myself I'm terrified, for two main reasons. Let's ignore my other anxieties and my fear of bridges for now.

First of all, at a very basic level, giving up control over my safety makes me nervous. In the admittedly fairly short period since I learned to drive, I've begun to lose trust in other drivers. My dad, who all my life has been sort of a mythic driving god, a wealth of knowledge and experience and confidence, has started to seem like he takes too many risks. Somehow it feels less safe to be going twenty over the speed limit when my friend is driving than it does if I'm behind the wheel.

I've been told that my fears are unnecessary, that I should put more trust in other people and stop being a backseat driver. But when I'm not at the wheel now, as opposed to before I learned to drive, I still pay attention. I'm alert to everything that's going on, I do headchecks every time we change lanes, the whole license-test deal. So as a result, I see every mistake that the other driver is making. I'm often tense, I panic when I see things coming that my driver doesn't seem to. And to make my fears worse, I keep having my fears justified. Only two weeks ago, I was on the receiving end of a lovely t-bone that was not a steak, all while shouting that the light was red and we needed to stop.

I'm not claiming to be a driving god, and I'm sure that I make mistakes. Maybe I make my passengers nervous too. But I am the only person I feel comfortable with as a driver. If I'm going to get in an accident, I want it to be my own failure. When I'm sitting in the passenger's seat, I can't do shit to make sure I'm okay.

An autonomous car would not even be able to hear me yelling. I am utterly not prepared to let a computer drive for me. I can hear all the statistics, understand that its reaction times are better, and all of that, but to sit and stare out the windshield while the car moves itself sounds like a bad dream. The dream of autonomous cars is of course the glass pods that move around cities like mobile living rooms, devoid of any human overrides. Maybe this sort of shuttle system would be less stressful. But in the current crop of vehicles, to sit behind a set of controls and not be allowed to use them, while watching all the potential disasters outside, really makes me hope that autonomous cars will fade into tech history as a gimmicky gadget.

On a less fearful note, I also desperately love driving. I've commuted, I've yelled at the asshole in front of me, I've punched the steering wheel. But none of it has soiled the experience of piloting a car for me. To have such power and such control is an addicting prospect, and after waiting 16 years of my life to get a taste, I'm not having it wrested away after a mere few more years.

In his excellent book Drive , Iain Borden analyzes our love, as a society, of speed. Speed, he writes, is a hypnotic and addicting experience because of the way it makes us feel. Just like the drug of the same name, speed alters the way we perceive reality. Our kinesthetic senses are engaged, the world flashes past us like scenes at a cinema, and we don't feel anything else like it. That's why driving, and driving fast, can become such an obsession. I highly recommend you give it a read, because my weak paraphrasing does it no justice.

In the end, it all comes back to control. I'm addicted to driving just a little bit too fast, I'm addicted to having that control over the world around me. And I'm scared autonomous cars will take that away from me. That's why part of me wants the self-driving car to fail. If I hadn't ever gotten the taste of driving, I think autonomous cars would make a compelling case. But I don't want to kick back on a couch while a box moves me towards my house. I don't want to have to limit myself to a track day if a track becomes the only place I'm allowed to drive. I just want to be able to slot my little hatchback into gear and move into the fast lane.

Chairman Kaga > James Gallagher 01/15/2015 at 17:14

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Once every car on the road has autonomous capabilities, I'll relax. My "In the Year 2000" vision for this technology is that every car on the highway will have programmed destinations, and they'll be sharing this info with every other car. What you'll have is effectively a train, with cars seamlessly exiting, turning, merging, but because of the coordination there won't be any bottlenecks or slowdowns. Just one continuously moving stream of traffic. It'll be beautiful!

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > James Gallagher 01/15/2015 at 17:14

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My much shorter response - no, autonomous cars have some serious FOREBODE, and the infrastructure required to make them practical *everywhere* might just as well be a sneaky way to trick people back onto the railroads through hideous expense. Maybe.

jkm7680 > James Gallagher 01/15/2015 at 17:15

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Yes, They're stupid.

HammerheadFistpunch > James Gallagher 01/15/2015 at 17:19

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Yes.

JustWaitingForAMate > James Gallagher 01/15/2015 at 17:29

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A mix of autonomous and driven cars on the road is what scares me. How will they co-exist? how safe will it be for occupants in each? Will the design of these auto cars as the years progress lead to unsafe situations for manual driving and force the purchase of an auto car?

If every car on the road was autonomous, and networked, and aware and the system had a 99% success rate, and I can't be blamed if my car suddenly decides it wants to taste human blood and drives through an orphanage, I've got no issue with them.

There's a book a read a few years ago that touches on autonomous cars in So-Cal 2027. They're basically set up like a tram system, all networked and handle all aspects of the driving, the 'driver' just chooses a destination. People just chill in them, no seat belts, screwing around, and every once in a while there's a crash, and it's bad. They put it down to SITS (something in the silicon) and no system is 100% perfect. The only people that drive real cars are the EMS teams that have to then get out to the crash as the whole auto car grid shuts down.

E92M3 > JustWaitingForAMate 01/15/2015 at 17:54

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Have you seen the way most people drive today? They'd rather tweet than focus on driving their 4000lb missle. Every 3rd red light the person in front completely misses the light turning green and needs a honk to bring them back to reality. Bring on the autonomous cars as long as they can be switched to manual mode for when you WANT to drive.

JustWaitingForAMate > E92M3 01/15/2015 at 18:35

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The problem with that is, you've just introduced a level of uncertainty/risk into an automated system.

Here's a scenario. Pack of auto cars, all of them driving at 100 km\h, a meter apart, all networked. This tech already exists. Car 1 rapidly brakes, car 2 does, car 3, etc etc etc. They're all in communication with each other, it's all automated, it's all fine.

Introduce a manual driver into the middle of the pack and do the same.

Having a mixed system impacts the efficiency of the automated cars to cater for the manual cars.

I'd prefer all or neither.

Axial > James Gallagher 01/15/2015 at 18:52

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Autonomous cars are a bad idea not because they are unsafe, but because they invite all sorts of shitty legislation and business practices that make it easier for companies to suck you dry more thoroughly than they already do.

It'll get even worse once autonomous cars become the majority. You think it costs a lot to run your Corvettes and Ferraris now? You ain't seen nothin', yet.

whiskeybusiness NOW A DANGER TO CROWDS NEAR YOU > James Gallagher 01/15/2015 at 20:15

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I would like to remind anyone who thinks this is a remotely good idea that even if all cars on the road are autonomous, interconnected, and whatever else they had to be to work well, imagine them when they get say, 10 years old. My 2004 Focus has lost its central locking twice, its radio intermittently, and it occasionally decides the cabin is too drafty for the tailgate to remain in the closed position. How will all of these complex computer systems hold up to constant hot/cold cycling, the elements, and the general apathy most drivers have towards maintenance? No thanks, Ill take my ordinary car, and probably at a significant discount.

f86sabre > James Gallagher 01/15/2015 at 20:48

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First, something to remember before you comment on my reply. I'm here. That means I love cars as much as any of you. Now to my reply...

1) Do you have a grandparent or older relative who shouldn't be driving? Bad eyes or slow reflexes? Maybe a mild stroke? Can you think of what a godsend a self driving car would be to them? It would mean mobility. A way to get to the store, or visit friends or the park as opposed to being stuck where they are. It may mean a few more years of living at home before they move into the home...or in with you.

2) have you ever flown in a commercial aircraft? 500 MPH, 250,000 lbs self driving car rolling along at 35,000 ft. They even have auto-land.

E92M3 > JustWaitingForAMate 01/15/2015 at 23:31

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The "manual" driven car will still have crash avoidance systems that take over. As you know a lot of cars already have automatic emergency braking if it decides you're about to rearend someone. That technology will be required on all cars in a few years. It's going to happen whether we like it or not. In a few decades a lot of people won't even own a car. They will summons a car from their smartphone (an autonomous taxi if you will). They will be parked all over town at charging stations waiting for the next customer. We'll be complaining about our tiered mileage plans like we do with data plans now.

JustWaitingForAMate > E92M3 01/16/2015 at 01:51

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The future scares me and I don't like it. I don't like it at all.