Self-Driving Cars: Answering the Objections

We have covered the safety risks of autonomous vehicles as well as potential privacy risks and risks to our personal freedom. Now let's answer some of those objections.

It turns out that most of the arguments against self-driving cars are beside the point.

Kids showing less interest in driving and car ownership. Right. They are ALREADY less interested. Self-driving cars didn’t cause it.

Loss of autonomy? That only happens if we GIVE UP AUTONOMY. The price of liberty is eternal vigilance. If we lose it, it’s because we gave it away, not because autonomous vehicles took it.

Self-driving car companies abusing our data? We have to put rules in place about our data. We have to do this anyway where social media, mobile phones, and web apps are concerned. Again, it is our responsibility to see to it that new technologies are implemented in a way that protect our rights.

Safety: there is hardly any argument. The only way to argue against self-driving vehicles is to say they won't work (which they will) are that the lives they will save are not worth saving (which they are.) If we go to fully autonomous vehicles and they kill 10,000 people per year, we will be saving 20,000 lives per year. Everyone, even some of the harshest critics of self-driving cars, expects them to perform better than humans.

Going forward we need caution, humility, and optimism. Before long, the math in favor of autonomous vehicles will be undeniable.

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/J3JcpqILH10" frameborder="0" allow="autoplay; encrypted-media" allowfullscreen></iframe>

WT 420-733

Eternity Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) | Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License | http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0