Google says its driverless cars are ready for the urban commute

[KakaoDj]

Inautonews article

Kitguru article

 

Advancements in the self-driving car business  The google cars can finally handle a city situation, which is an essential part of driving around. I would definately ride in a driverless car, how about you guys? It could significantly reduce accidents.

 

Well, Google seems to have overcome that aspect, as the project’s leader said in a blog entry that test cars can now handle thousands of mind boggling situations that would have rendered the car useless a year or two ago.

 

This post has been promoted to an article

[SirRoderick]

Ehmmm, you first...

[Phage]

No and yes

Not good if you're a person who drives public transport

Yes if you're drunk af and need to go home at 3am at night

So do you still need a drivers license to sit in the driver seat? ~.^ or is a human sized robot driving?

[LOLPhilips]

Yarrrr,

 

I'll never be giving up the helm to a computer.

This be asking for accidents.

[Syfes]

This clip from Top Gear from a few years ago pretty much sums up my thoughts on this: http://youtu.be/9rIfLLEdRYM?t=5m2s

[techswede]

Self driving cars are retarded. If you don't want to drive then get on a bus. If you want to drive then you get a car. 

If you can't drive and still own a car then you should f***ing learn. Or get in the short bus. Because that was a dumb move and you're risking peoples lives.

 

And another thing

What makes google think that a person that can't be arsed to drive his own car will bother to maintain it? 

And the software in these cars will surely need to be updated?. Will the owner bother? Nope. It'll be just like javaupdate.

Can the computer handle a motorway blowout? Hell no. And i bet that would give the sensors a kick in the teeth when the tire blows.

[KakaoDj]

Self driving cars are retarded. If you don't want to drive then get on a bus. If you want to drive then you get a car. 

If you can't drive and still own a car then you should f***ing learn. Or get in the short bus. Because that was a dumb move and you're risking peoples lives.

 

And another thing

What makes google think that a person that can't be arsed to drive his own car will bother to maintain it? 

And the software in these cars will surely need to be updated?. Will the owner bother? Nope. It'll be just like javaupdate.

Can the computer handle a motorway blowout? Hell no. And i bet that would give the sensors a kick in the teeth when the tire blows.

Buses are so fakkn expensive here in Norway, if i want to travel to school, it takes me 4 minutes by bus, and it costs 10$ each way.

People are bad drivers, and emotionally unstable people cause a lot of accidents, and they often kill kids and whatnot.

As for the logic you use: it will not be a car you will tinker with, it will be a product that maintains itself, and you just take it to the maintinance guys once a year. It's not a Linux car for enthusiasts.

Apple will make the iCar and make it mainstream and good, calling it  B)

[Xorbot]

Self driving cars are retarded. If you don't want to drive then get on a bus.

 

I disagree.  The reason why I don't drive is simply because I do not have enough faith in the *other* drivers on the road.  You know who *wants* to drive?  Many teenagers.  One thing that is quite possibly worse than drunk drivers is texting drivers.  What demographic texts the most?  Teenagers.  I immediately trust a self-driving car before the average teenager any day of the week.  Are there examples of responsible teenagers? Yes.  Are there examples of idiot teenagers? Very yes.

[Xorbot]

And i bet that would give the sensors a kick in the teeth when the tire blows.

 

How would this be any different than a 16 year old teenage female who experiences a blown tire at 50 mph?  I'd imagine there would be a ton of screaming and a ton of swerving as well.  Once again, I trust the sensors that make calculations and observations in the thousands of time per second.  This is a very stark contrast to "OMG OMG OMG AAAHHHHHHH!" of the inexperienced human in the same situation.

[tharvey]

This will be great for public transit and long haul trucks. 

[techswede]

Buses are so fakkn expensive here in Norway, if i want to travel to school, it takes me 4 minutes by bus, and it costs 10$ each way.

People are bad drivers, and emotionally unstable people cause a lot of accidents, and they often kill kids and whatnot.

As for the logic you use: it will not be a car you will tinker with, it will be a product that maintains itself, and you just take it to the maintinance guys once a year. It's not a Linux car for enthusiasts.

Apple will make the iCar and make it mainstream and good, calling it  B)

Bad drivers are bad drivers. People that care are not.

And oooh a magical car that doesn't break more than one time a year? Google must have beaten murphy's law...

If it takes you 4 minutes to get to school by bus it's walking distance. Get a bicycle or a moped..

 

I disagree.  The reason why I don't drive is simply because I do not have enough faith in the *other* drivers on the road.  You know who *wants* to drive?  Many teenagers.  One thing that is quite possibly worse than drunk drivers is texting drivers.  What demographic texts the most?  Teenagers.  I immediately trust a self-driving car before the average teenager any day of the week.  Are there examples of responsible teenagers? Yes.  Are there examples of idiot teenagers? Very yes.

Most teenagers have just gotten their license.. And yes many are irresponsible in traffic but not all of them.

And i would trust a teenager over a computer any day..

[techswede]

How would this be any different than a 16 year old teenage female who experiences a blown tire at 50 mph?  I'd imagine there would be a ton of screaming and a ton of swerving as well.  Once again, I trust the sensors that make calculations and observations in the thousands of time per second.  This is a very stark contrast to "OMG OMG OMG AAAHHHHHHH!" of the inexperienced human in the same situation.

That's why we don't get to drive until we're 18 here in sweden. And our drivers ed covers what you're supposed to do if the tire blows. 

Show me conclusive proof that the computer can do it. And i'll happily demonstrate that i can do it.

[Guest]

Self driving cars are retarded. If you don't want to drive then get on a bus. If you want to drive then you get a car. 

If you can't drive and still own a car then you should f***ing learn. Or get in the short bus. Because that was a dumb move and you're risking peoples lives.

 

And another thing

What makes google think that a person that can't be arsed to drive his own car will bother to maintain it? 

And the software in these cars will surely need to be updated?. Will the owner bother? Nope. It'll be just like javaupdate.

Can the computer handle a motorway blowout? Hell no. And i bet that would give the sensors a kick in the teeth when the tire blows.

I have never seen public transportation in my life. So I want a self driving car

[mr moose]

I disagree.  The reason why I don't drive is simply because I do not have enough faith in the *other* drivers on the road.  You know who *wants* to drive?  Many teenagers.  One thing that is quite possibly worse than drunk drivers is texting drivers.  What demographic texts the most?  Teenagers.  I immediately trust a self-driving car before the average teenager any day of the week.  Are there examples of responsible teenagers? Yes.  Are there examples of idiot teenagers? Very yes.

 

In Australia people under 25 have the highest crash rate, basically over eager/confident and under experienced.

[theelitegamer]

As long as I have the option to take over, It's cool, I don't want to brag about driving a BMW (this will expand to other car soon) and the ladies tell me to go 100 mph and I'm like, ummmmmm it could hit a prefect turn..

[The_Evenger]

I disagree.  The reason why I don't drive is simply because I do not have enough faith in the *other* drivers on the road.  You know who *wants* to drive?  Many teenagers.  One thing that is quite possibly worse than drunk drivers is texting drivers.  What demographic texts the most?  Teenagers.  I immediately trust a self-driving car before the average teenager any day of the week.  Are there examples of responsible teenagers? Yes.  Are there examples of idiot teenagers? Very yes.

i definitely see what you're saying, as most of the teens that drive in my town are extremely irresponsible and careless, but i just want to say, i have been driving for more than a year, never pulled over once, never got in a collision once, the only collision my car ever got was when it was in a parking lot and someone backed into it the second day of having it 

 

-and i drove 17.2 miles to work and back every day of summer

[Beskamir]

Computers can be confused quite easily but I doubt the conditions for their confusion would occur very often therefore I would still trust these. Also this is why I've been really procrastinating on getting a driver's licence. I don't want to waste time getting something that will be useless in about 2 years so hopefully we won't need driver licences for self driving cars.

[zanduh]

Driving is an activity people pride themselves in thinking they are good at. You're never going to convince most that in fact their response times and driving habits aren't great and that a computer can do better. 

Then comes the "robots can't replace human intuition" argument. Yeah you have your intuition. A computer only has no blind spots, much quicker reactions, the ability to calculate velocities, acceleration, and movement on the fly, and the ability to factor in all of this data simultaneously without emotion getting in the way. 

[Scheer]

I'll bet there is no way to drive over the speed limit...

 

How many of you still want one? 

[Misanthrope]

I for one would definitely want a self driving car, mainly to enable far more irresponsible bar hopping binge drinking sessions.

[ivhyn]

There are too many collisions caused by drunk drivers or ones that text while driving or fall asleep because they're tired, selfdriving cars surely would help reducing the number of injured and killed people.

Interestingly, if all cars on a highway would be selfdriving and could communicate with eachother trafic could move at much greater velocity, trafic jams would also be reduced significantly.

[ToxicFire]

Number of google car related incidents since google cars were on the roads in the US (since 2011) 2, one where the car was actually in manual drive mode, and the second getting rear ended at a traffic light. the US there were 5.4 million traffic crashes in 2010 (suprisingly hard to find stats for post 2010 census year).

 

People will always be nervy about tech taking control... but tbh, every time you go on a plane most of the flying is done by a computer.

 

The one draw back to self driving cars to be really effective, is that unless there all replaced at once you'd still get a significant number of accidents from how people react to self driven cars on the road, some from been too weary of them, some from rubber necking, some from simply not getting the reaction they expect. Eg if someone see's an aggressive driver off in the distance and people getting out of the way, i doubt a self driven car is going to have the capability to recognise the senario and err on the side of caution. Tbh i'd like to see how it would cope with traffic on the freeway when its travelling in the wrong direction.

 

Another pro, after the initial caution by insurance companies, those using self driving cars will probably end up with cheaper insurance (though i would expect it would require the reporting of how much driving the human did and how much driving the car did to decide on the actual policy cost).

 

Also how long before we see a media story about little timmy who got into mommy's self driving car to goto the store to buy candy. Would be an interesting one for the cops, driving without a licence?

[lachyman]

I will stick with normal cars, this is just for people who can't drive for shit and think buses are for underdogs. I find driving a car a pleasure.

[ToxicFire]

I will stick with normal cars, this is just for people who can't drive for shit and think buses are for underdogs. I find driving a car a pleasure.

 

So, The elderly, the infirm, the disabled?

 

Go for a year without using a car or depending on your mates for lifts and using public transport then you'll really think driving a car is a pleasure, that can not run on time, simply not be there without warning, be awkward to deal with if u have 2 screaming kids and a weeks worth of groceries to carry.

[techswede]

Another problem with self driving cars is that some of the people that go on busses right now will get a self driving car.

That will mean more cars on the road, More cars on the road means more traffic. More traffic means more congestion. 

And before you start pulling the "But if there was only self driving cars on the road traffic would flow more easily" card

Sure the traffic could flow better. But you are not taking the pedestrians into concideration.

It only takes a few jaywalkers to make one or two cars slow down. The cars behind them slow down.

And before long you've got a ripple effect resulting in gridlock.

Not to mention the shortage of parking spaces...

 

And the self driving car won't be able to detect anything behind a wall anymore than you can.

So a child can still run out in front of it and get run over. Only difference is that you would probably be reading the paper while it happens.

 

And i saw someone in this thread say that he hopes you won't need a license to drive one of these. 

I shure hope that will never be the case. If you want to have a car. You get a drivers license. Because if something goes wrong with the computer. (Car.exe has crashed)

Then i fully expect the driver to handle it.

 

And finally there is the issue with how the car will have to be built.

If the car is supposed to be able to steer,brake and accelerate. everything would need to be "Drive by wire" Which means the steering,brakes and accelerator will be controlled digitally.

So in the case of a complete failure of the electronics at highway speeds you will essentially be locked in a rolling Silver,White,Gray or Black coffin (I specified the colours because that's all people get nowadays)

 

 

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