Software & Cars

If automobile companies started to let software operate automobiles, would you trust the software driving you to work?

Auto-Pilot like system in the cars. Would this really prevent accidents and reduce the risk of collisions?

This system would use cameras + magnets in the road and GPS + other cool things. would you trust it? why or why not?

This is very much like asking people who lived in 1870 if they would trust flying machines.

The actual technology you refer to has not yet appeared, so there is not enough information to make a judgement.

Yes, there are crude prototypes, but the technology is so far from being an everyday usable thing that it's too early to say.

When the technology has matured.

Just watch some of your fellow drivers when you are on the road. No software could perform as badly!

borosen wrote:

When the technology has matured.

Just watch some of your fellow drivers when you are on the road. No software could perform as badly!

Yeah. But people now can drink and drive. Not that I drink.

Software would be more alert. I can call my car to come to me. The car would have a self defense system. It always goes home.


The other thing is the source of fuel. Instead of gasoline, we can make every car to have a nuclear reactor, that takes few amounts of radio active material for energy. Such a car would last a lifetime without needing refueling.

SecretSoftware wrote:


The other thing is the source of fuel. Instead of gasoline, we can make every car to have a nuclear reactor, that takes few amounts of radio active material for energy. Such a car would last a lifetime without needing refueling.

I'm sure the environmentalist groups would love that. And I'm sure consumers would love the multi-million dollar price tag for such a car.

Are you living in la-la land, or something?

I'm not sure that this would ever happen. The technology might get to be good enough, but it would be blamed for too much.

Even if self driving cars cut the number of auto related fatalities to virtually nothing. If there were even a few deaths there would be an outrage from the groups of people who are normally outraged, about how horribly defective the automatic systems are. They wouldn't care about the lives being saved.

I see the same sort of thing in software. There are lots of people who do tons of work by hand and shuffle lots of paper. Because everything is done by hand, stuff gets lost, there are errors, etc. However, if they move to a software system, and there is even the hint of a problem they start blaming the software. It doesn't matter that they are saving thousands of dollars and are doing more faster. People seem to be happier when they can blame their misery on themselves.

troposphere wrote:



SecretSoftware wrote:  The other thing is the source of fuel. Instead of gasoline, we can make every car to have a nuclear reactor, that takes few amounts of radio active material for energy. Such a car would last a lifetime without needing refueling.

I'm sure the environmentalist groups would love that. And I'm sure consumers would love the multi-million dollar price tag for such a car.

Are you living in la-la land, or something?

the price should not matter. Governments can maintain that. I mean governments own these cars, and they let you use them.

SecretSoftware wrote:

This system would use cameras + magnets in the road and GPS + other cool things. would you trust it? why or why not?

4 words:

Blue Windscreen of Death.

That's the easy answer "I'll trust it when it works" when the whole question is more like "how far off is it to working".

It's sort of like flying cars. I would want an overarching networked system with knowledge of every vehicle and constrained freedom within a managed space of paths. In case of network failure I'd want a fallback mechanism and perhaps a managed "proximity network" (peer to peer communication).

I'd also like multiple layers of security, fail-safes and fallbacks. As well as manual override (but still perhaps managed and constrained, to the extent the rest of the system is able to, under fail conditions).

I bet it'll be 2-3 decades before secure systems become real.

In the end, however, I don't think I'll ever completely trust any system. There's not much that can't fail somehow. But it's just a calculated risk one takes. Car accidents happen today. Planes fall out of the sky today. Accidents happen in the home. Natural disasters happen. Nowhere is security absolute.

A nuclear reactor in each car? Eh, what happened to specialization, rationalization and distribution grids?

Overrationalization is bad as well, no doubt, as it creates fewer and shared points of failures and means increased interdependency.

W3bbo wrote:



SecretSoftware wrote: This system would use cameras + magnets in the road and GPS + other cool things. would you trust it? why or why not?

4 words:

Blue Windscreen of Death.

I'd wait for SP2, at least...

SecretSoftware wrote:

If automobile companies started to let software operate automobiles, would you trust the software driving you to work?

Auto-Pilot like system in the cars. Would this really prevent accidents and reduce the risk of collisions?

This system would use cameras + magnets in the road and GPS + other cool things. would you trust it? why or why not?

That depends. If the manufacturers are forced by law to adopt the same quality procedures as the aviation industry when it comes to developing safety critical software, then the systems should be safer than driving the car yourself.

The problem is that developing safety critical systems is hideously expensive (I worked for a company that developed power management systems for aircraft), and I'm sure that the car companies would cut corners at every given opportunity.

Our quality manager told us a great story about a test pilot he used to know. The chap said most modern fighters aircraft are too fast and too complicated to fly by the pilot alone. He reckoned that if all the software systems on his plane failed at once, he would be able to keep it flying for about a third of a second.

I'd have to wait until GPS systems could cope with the trivial job of navigating around the UK flawlessly.

When I've known people be over an hour late to meet up because their GPS took them on 70 mile round trips, it's not likely that I'll be trusting the computers to get me home on time. While mapreading still trumps GPS, then GPS is not going to be something to rely upon.

What's with the atomic cars? Are you stuck in the 60s? Been there, done that... Doesn't work.

Massif wrote:

I'd have to wait until GPS systems could cope with the trivial job of navigating around the UK flawlessly.

When I've known people be over an hour late to meet up because their GPS took them on 70 mile round trips, it's not likely that I'll be trusting the computers to get me home on time. While mapreading still trumps GPS, then GPS is not going to be something to rely upon.

What's with the atomic cars? Are you stuck in the 60s? Been there, done that... Doesn't work.

I've -never- had trouble with GPS navigation. Since I got one, I've never lost my way, and it saved me heaps of time.


Anyway, a step towards fully automated cars could be a car that takes over the details of driving, while you only have to worry about navigating it to the proper exits. So the car would basically take care of the proper speed, distance to other drivers, lane changes, et cetera. Basically what you could do is get in, maybe drive it yourself to the freeway, and then let the autopilot take over. The car warns you when exits come up, and if it's the one you need, you could press some sort of key and instruct the car to take the exit. The car would then adjust speed, switch lanes, and so on. Then when you go off the 'automated road', you take back control and drive to where you need to.

I'm guessing that a system like this could greatly reduce traffic jams, which should make it economically interesting to a lot of people.


A big trouble with stuff like this is that people have a hard time trusting a computer to be better than they are at something. I've seen somthing like this for automated planes, where a test pilot was there to take over if something failed. The computer was apparently going to take a turn that the test pilot 'knew' was impossible, so he tried to fight against the computer by trying to keep the plane level. As a result of which, the plane almost crashed, and the pilot came out claiming that the autopilot didn't work properly.

It later turned out that if he hadn't interfered, the plane would've taken the turn perfectly. Just because the maneuver was next to impossible for a human pilot doesn't mean that the aircraft can't handle it.

I think something similar might happen with automated cars. Also, it's extremely difficult to convince people that sometimes, if you all drive 100 Km/H, you get there quicker than if you all drive 140 Km/H. If people see their car driving at a speed that they think is too slow, they're going to be quick to interfere with the system.

We always seem to have difficulty with people following GPS directions to our house. No-one has ever arrived without being taken on some kind of detour; and our house isn't even anywhere particularly hard to find.

That and some friends of ours being diverted for at least an hour and a half because the GPS decided they wouldn't be able to make a hairpin turn and diverted them away from it. At this point, despite one person in the car with a map going "just carry on, it's straight up this road." They trusted the GPS and did the most incredible detour.

SecretSoftware wrote:

If automobile companies started to let software operate automobiles, would you trust the software driving you to work?

Auto-Pilot like system in the cars. Would this really prevent accidents and reduce the risk of collisions?

This system would use cameras + magnets in the road and GPS + other cool things. would you trust it? why or why not?

I think people would not trust it.

People have different risk standards for things other people do and things they do. Driving is order of magnitudes more dangerous than, say, catching a train, or flying. But if there is a train crash where a ew people die then millions will be spent to prevent a duplication, while the carnage on the orads continues unabated for the most part.
 
The problem is control. If you are responsible for driving there is perception that you are in control theerfore you are safe. So - automatic driving systems would need to be close to faultless. The moment one is involved in an accident (and it WOULD happen) the outcry would be massive, while human-driven cars crashing would just carry on as normal.

What exactly make you think that there's not a huge amount of software running your car already?

I mean, my new car has a software controlled gearbox, wired throttle, self-adjusting headlights, traction control, ABS, cruise control and gobs of sensors for airbags. And all this even before starting to talk about entertainment systems or in-car networking...

This all requires a lot of software...

SecretSoftware wrote:

...The car would have a self defense system...

LOL, reminds me of a Pheonix Nights episode where he fits a new alarm...

"Get back you B@*****!! I'll break your legs!"

PaoloM wrote:

What exactly make you think that there's not a huge amount of software running your car already?

I mean, my new car has a software controlled gearbox, wired throttle, self-adjusting headlights, traction control, ABS, cruise control and gobs of sensors for airbags. And all this even before starting to talk about entertainment systems or in-car networking...

This all requires a lot of software...

Yes, but you still have to drive. I am talking about giving total control to the car systems, and you just do your business.

Like taking a ride in a bus. You don't have to worry about the traffic or watching for drunk drivers etc..


Its like living care free, like in the Lion King. And let the software do the dirty work and sorting things out.

The technology is mature enough to let computers drive for us, and we can think about bigger and better things in life, like space exploration or finding medical cures.

Such a system would reduce injuries and death resulting from car accidents, and hence lower health care spending in the long run.