Autonomous Cars

[Zynerji]

It’s interesting you mention rational, the part of your brain that would make the decision under consideration is not rational. It’s autonomous, basing its decisions on prejudice.

I use prejudice in its pure form. It bases on prior knowledge and experience. Some of that is very prior, coded in DNA and it’s manifestation in the brains structures. Some of it is taught to it by the rational part of the brain by repeated stimulation. This is why some elements of driving are a “skill”. When we first start everything is rational, we have to teach the brain, slowly because rational thought is slow, the movements that result in the car behaviours we want. This is the one of the things the autonomous car is trying to simulate and it is taught to it in a combination of offline training and online refinement, potentially it is better than the average human at this.

Once that skill is in place, further skills can be taught around situational awareness. Only a proportion of these get to the autonomous level, dependant on the focus the rational mind gives to them. This is where AVs are at a disadvantage. Humans can use similar experiences to load up the autonomous part of the brain. So moving about is generic and one can learn from crawling, walking and running. As is understanding an classifying the visual world and the objects in them.

It’s not clear that your rational choice in this scenario could be transferred to your irrational autonomous brain. 2 or 3 instances a month of your muttering under your breath about ill-disciplined children may or may not do it. But of course you may have used other experiences to train your mind so the behaviour you want may come about based on prejudices you’ve inherited or learned about the people about you.

Whatever happens in such a situation, if you survive your rational brain will take plenty of time to fit the behaviour of your autonomous brain to your preferred model.

I don't really see anyone's issue here. I have a responsibility to myself to preserve my life, marriage, and bloodline. I have no concern over other's liberal view that I "should choose" to die to save another's bloodline when they are grossly negligent, because that is idiocy.

I would swerve to avoid catastrophe, but I would not drive off of a cliff to prevent it (an AV might), and I will not apologize for the fact that self preservation is my "prejudice".

Judge me how you will, my responsibilities in life will still be upheld. I already sleep well with 33 confirmed kills from my time serving as a US Marine. My rational brain processes these after effects very simply and efficiently.

What´s the reason you assume an AV might drive you off of a cliff? Solidifying prejudices maybe?

Driving you off of a cliff is killing you, running over someone might be, or might be not, so the scenario is completely different to the previous discusssion. You´re moving the goal posts


Anycase, people do not fall from the sky, you keep assuming scenarios wich are not real (running over someone or drivingg off of a cliff). Speed limits have a reason, and it is to have time to react in case of an emergency. That scenario will only happen if you´re driving way too fast, and AVs will never drive too fast, so your hypotetic scenario is unreal. In that scenario the AVs will make an emergency stop, braking before running over anyone, or in worst case scenario hitting them when the car is slow enough to not kill anyone, and to not drive you off of a cliff

I can see several scenarios where this would happen.

Example:

A 16 year old driving his moms AV with 4 friends in the car. This driver is in human-drive mode, showing off Ludicrous Mode, and speeding. In the oncoming lane about a mile ahead of that driver is a 60 year old person driving alone in AV mode, doing the speed limit. Then 2 children chases a ball into the road, and the 16 year old's car sees it, and the driver reacts by changing lanes and slowing down, while communicating with the 60 year old's oncoming vehicle the state of the car and the pedestrians while calculating as an imminent accident. Computer calculates that losing 1 life of and elderly person is better than killing 6 kids, and makes the decision as to who makes a catastrophic maneuver for the "greater good". In this situation, it is absolutely the 16 year old that is the actual cause of this problem, but a stranger that is following the rules is "mathematically" determined to be the lowest loss of life, regardless of the events leading up to the accident.


I do NOT in any way, shape, or form, believe that an innocent person should pay the ultimate price for another persons' mistake. I don't understand why anyone else believes that they should...

[Zynerji]

You are changing the argument. You said you'd rather run into 3 children than risk driving into a ditch.

The point was to run over children or make a manouver that has a high likelehood of death, like hitting a ditch at speed, or driving off of a cliff.

[Zynerji]

What about my children becoming fatherless? That rational self-interest bothers you so much?

You have had children, and they can go on to have children so you have secured your future. By running over the other children, you have prevented their futures.

Or one could argue that the children in the road are entries for the Darwin Awards...

So, because someone else makes a mistake, I should choose to not become a grandfather? What about the responsibility of the children's' parents'?

To quote George Carlin: "The kid that swallows too many marbles does not grow up to have kids of their own."

[Andres125sx]

I can see several scenarios where this would happen.

Example:

A 16 year old driving his moms AV with 4 friends in the car. This driver is in human-drive mode, showing off Ludicrous Mode, and speeding. In the oncoming lane about a mile ahead of that driver is a 60 year old person driving alone in AV mode, doing the speed limit. Then 2 children chases a ball into the road, and the 16 year old's car sees it, and the driver reacts by changing lanes and slowing down, while communicating with the 60 year old's oncoming vehicle the state of the car and the pedestrians while calculating as an imminent accident. Computer calculates that losing 1 life of and elderly person is better than killing 6 kids, and makes the decision as to who makes a catastrophic maneuver for the "greater good". In this situation, it is absolutely the 16 year old that is the actual cause of this problem, but a stranger that is following the rules is "mathematically" determined to be the lowest loss of life, regardless of the events leading up to the accident.


I do NOT in any way, shape, or form, believe that an innocent person should pay the ultimate price for another persons' mistake. I don't understand why anyone else believes that they should...

Who believe that they should? You keep doing false assumptions
What´s the reason you assume the computer calculates that? Another false assumption

First, AVs don´t know the age and even the number of passengers it´s carrying
Second, that assumption of the computer calculation is not logic. IMO the logic procedure in that scenario for the computer should be: If it´s possible to brake or make an evasive maneouver without killing anyone, obviously that´s what the AV will do (something wich currently do not happen with humans ) If not possible and someone must be hurt, then let´s estimate possible damage on a simple life threatening or not scale. If crashing with the ditch will cause minor damage to the passengers but will save children lifes, then the AV will go into the ditch. If not a ditch but a cliff, then killing someone to avoid killing someone is not logic by any standard.

Or in other words, in my mind main AV order would be, protect the passengers at all costs, with the only exception of causing minor damage if that saves some life. But killing your passengers to avoid killing some others would be absurd, I can´t see any programmer assuming that´s what they must do, can you?

In your example, with my philosophy, the AV will run over the children to dodge the car in front invading his lane, after braking as much as possible, and since it was an AV complying with the speed limits, it will be able to slow down enough to hit the children at a moderate speed, not killing anyone. Nobody dies, and the people hurt is the people who caused the dangerous situation.

Now imagine same scenario without AVs. The eldery person in front won´t react in time, he will crash with the 5 kids in front, and all 5 kids and 1 eldery will die despite neither of them were responsible for the dangerous situation. This happens in the real world more often than you may think, a lot of people die because of some other mistake

What outcome do you prefer, with or without AVs?

[Zynerji]

I can see several scenarios where this would happen.

Example:

A 16 year old driving his moms AV with 4 friends in the car. This driver is in human-drive mode, showing off Ludicrous Mode, and speeding. In the oncoming lane about a mile ahead of that driver is a 60 year old person driving alone in AV mode, doing the speed limit. Then 2 children chases a ball into the road, and the 16 year old's car sees it, and the driver reacts by changing lanes and slowing down, while communicating with the 60 year old's oncoming vehicle the state of the car and the pedestrians while calculating as an imminent accident. Computer calculates that losing 1 life of and elderly person is better than killing 6 kids, and makes the decision as to who makes a catastrophic maneuver for the "greater good". In this situation, it is absolutely the 16 year old that is the actual cause of this problem, but a stranger that is following the rules is "mathematically" determined to be the lowest loss of life, regardless of the events leading up to the accident.


I do NOT in any way, shape, or form, believe that an innocent person should pay the ultimate price for another persons' mistake. I don't understand why anyone else believes that they should...

Who believe that they should? You keep doing false assumptions
What´s the reason you assume the computer calculates that? Another false assumption

In 2016, Rahwan’s team stumbled on an ethical paradox about self-driving cars2: in surveys, people said that they wanted an autonomous vehicle to protect pedestrians even if it meant sacrificing its passengers — but also that they wouldn’t buy self-driving vehicles programmed to act this way. No matter their age, gender or country of residence, most people spared humans over pets, and groups of people over individuals. These responses are in line with rules proposed in what may be the only governmental guidance on self-driving cars: a 2017 report by the German Ethics Commission on Automated and Connected Driving.

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-07135-0


First, AVs don´t know the age and even the number of passengers it´s carrying

It knows its registered owner, and their license info/photo, so, yes it does have this data, as well as the seat-weight data to determine passenger number and expected size (adult/children). This is currently used for air-bag deployment.

Second, that assumption of the computer calculation is not logic. IMO the logic procedure in that scenario for the computer should be: If it´s possible to brake or make an evasive maneouver without killing anyone, obviously that´s what the AV will do (something wich currently do not happen with humans ) If not possible and someone must be hurt, then let´s estimate possible damage on a simple life threatening or not scale. If crashing with the ditch will cause minor damage to the passengers but will save children lifes, then the AV will go into the ditch. If not a ditch but a cliff, then killing someone to avoid killing someone is not logic by any standard.

Read the quoted article, you are incorrect.

Or in other words, in my mind main AV order would be, protect the passengers at all costs, with the only exception of causing minor damage if that saves some life. But killing your passengers to avoid killing some others would be absurd, I can´t see any programmer assuming that´s what they must do, can you?

They are doing just this, you should read more articles about the AV ethics.

In your example, with my philosophy, the AV will run over the children to dodge the car in front, after braking as much as possible, and since it was an AV complying with the speed limits, it will be able to slow down enough to not kill any child. Nobody dies, and the people hurt is the people who caused the dangerous situation.

In my example, the car endangering the children directly is a self-driven vehicle. The scenario plays out that there is only one vehicle that the Automation can control, so it imposes action on what it can.

Now imagine same scenario without AVs. The eldery person in front won´t react in time, he will crash with the 5 kids in front, and all 5 kids and 1 eldery will die despite neither of them were responsible for the dangerous situation.

Now be sincere with yourself, what outcome do you prefer, with or without AVs?

I will take the chance of chaos over being forced into sure death.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-018-0637-6



Very few want to spare the lawful, that is my largest concern in all of this. Innocents will pay for the transgressions of the other groups.

[Andres125sx]

I´ve just deleted a very long reply because these sort of debate searching for a fifth cat leg bore me to death.

I think any vehicle moving within the speed limits, constant 360º monitoring with no dead angles, and almost instant reaction time will never be on a situation where it has to choose who will die, both if the driver is a human or a computer. Computers can guarantee this, humans can´t. To me it is this simple.

That hypotetic scenario is possible, but I think we will only see it in the news as some odd accident while deaths on roads and streets decrease dramatically because now drivers are, all of them, focused on the road and driving properly... because they´re computers

Disclaimer: I´ll hate that moment, I love driving more than any of you will believe, both cars and bikes, but I think that´s what future will bring us

[hollus]

Pushing the hypothetical scenario to the extreme, I guess one might have to choose between certain deaths, without brakes, between a wall and a cliff. One wonders how the astray kids got there though.
Of course it is much more likely that one (person or AI) might have to chose between a maybe and another different maybe. IMO.

Derailing that subject slightly, I think I picked up an unspoken idea in the conversation. In 2 steps:

a) An AV, while maybe, in the extreme, deciding to sacrifice its own vehicle (can one say itself without shuddering?), can still do choose where and how to do it. That wall might look less terrifying at only 30 mph and at an angle of 25 degrees whit the most deformable zone hitting it first. I guess the cliff won't

More interesting, IMO:

b) The AV would know, with certainty, in advance (say 20 ms?) that it would crash, what it would crash into, how fast and how. Doesn't this change the whole concept of in-car protection?

The current system first waits for the crash, then it triggers the airbags, which, because the crash has already happened, have to become potentially deadly walls themselves just to have a chance to cushion the worst part of the deceleration on the body, which has already covered part of the distance to the nearest solid edge of the vehicle.
An alternative airbag system could, given the 20ms advance warning, deploy more, larger, cushier bags everywhere. These bags wouldn't hit you like the bomb they are now, they would have a lot of extra distance to stop the body smoothly, and, for example, they could be multi-layer bags, with a soft outer shell followed by a harder inner shell.
While we are at it, what about outside-the-car air bags? If you know for certain, in advance, that you will crash, why not?

AVs, the mature ones, maybe not the very first generation, will be a paradigm change. The current rules on traffic, service, price, ownership, and safety, need not apply. Much the same way as the rules of horse riding do not apply in a slightly modified way to our current car based transport.

Wanna think? Think BIG.

IMO.

[Just_a_fan]

AVs, the mature ones, maybe not the very first generation, will be a paradigm change. The current rules on traffic, service, price, ownership, and safety, need not apply. Much the same way as the rules of horse riding do not apply in a slightly modified way to our current car based transport.

Exactly. Some seem to think of AVs as just being today's cars driving themselves but they'll be much different from that.

Ownership, for example, will likely not sit with the punters.

[AJI]

...
Ownership, for example, will likely not sit with the punters.

I think this is the thing that scares some the most, but it's all in the sales pitch.
Just change the narrative from, 'You'll never be able to own a car again! ', to, 'Never own a car again! '

[Zynerji]

I´ve just deleted a very long reply because these sort of debate searching for a fifth cat leg bore me to death.

I think any vehicle moving within the speed limits, constant 360º monitoring with no dead angles, and almost instant reaction time will never be on a situation where it has to choose who will die, both if the driver is a human or a computer. Computers can guarantee this, humans can´t. To me it is this simple.

That hypotetic scenario is possible, but I think we will only see it in the news as some odd accident while deaths on roads and streets decrease dramatically because now drivers are, all of them, focused on the road and driving properly... because they´re computers

Disclaimer: I´ll hate that moment, I love driving more than any of you will believe, both cars and bikes, but I think that´s what future will bring us

Why would Germany already be setting rules about it if it weren't a realistic problem to overcome?

5th cat leg...

I guess as long as they are not 737 flight computers, they should be perfect...

[Zynerji]

...
Ownership, for example, will likely not sit with the punters.

I think this is the thing that scares some the most, but it's all in the sales pitch.
Just change the narrative from, 'You'll never be able to own a car again! ', to, 'Never own a car again! '

Cell phones are already moving to a lease- only system (Sprint USA). Maybe cars will be next?

[AJI]

...
Ownership, for example, will likely not sit with the punters.

I think this is the thing that scares some the most, but it's all in the sales pitch.
Just change the narrative from, 'You'll never be able to own a car again! ', to, 'Never own a car again! '

Cell phones are already moving to a lease- only system (Sprint USA). Maybe cars will be next?

The harder sell is, 'Never have to drive a car again! ', (because you'll never be allowed to drive a car again, and they don't have steering wheels anyway). There will certainly be some resistance to that... Fortunately, driving is not a right, as has been pointed out previously.

[Zynerji]

I think this is the thing that scares some the most, but it's all in the sales pitch.
Just change the narrative from, 'You'll never be able to own a car again! ', to, 'Never own a car again! '

Cell phones are already moving to a lease- only system (Sprint USA). Maybe cars will be next?

The harder sell is, 'Never have to drive a car again! ', (because you'll never be allowed to drive a car again, and they don't have steering wheels anyway). There will certainly be some resistance to that... Fortunately, driving is not a right, as has been pointed out previously.

I dislike driving, personally. Unless it's rFactor2...

[Andres125sx]

I´ve just deleted a very long reply because these sort of debate searching for a fifth cat leg bore me to death.

I think any vehicle moving within the speed limits, constant 360º monitoring with no dead angles, and almost instant reaction time will never be on a situation where it has to choose who will die, both if the driver is a human or a computer. Computers can guarantee this, humans can´t. To me it is this simple.

That hypotetic scenario is possible, but I think we will only see it in the news as some odd accident while deaths on roads and streets decrease dramatically because now drivers are, all of them, focused on the road and driving properly... because they´re computers

Disclaimer: I´ll hate that moment, I love driving more than any of you will believe, both cars and bikes, but I think that´s what future will bring us

Why would Germany already be setting rules about it if it weren't a realistic problem to overcome?

5th cat leg...

I guess as long as they are not 737 flight computers, they should be perfect...

Because as I´ve stated that situation might be possible, so the programation must be taken into account. But that does not mean the situation will be usual, I´m sure 99% of people will never live that, period, but for any newspaper that debate is gold and will provide some thousands clicks

Do you really think a car moving within the speed limits, with 360º monitoring and instant time reaction will be on a situation where it must choose who will die Zynerji? Be serious considering the question please

[henry]

If you live and move about in a large conurbation ownership will probably go away, it’s already diminishing. Outside that you’ll still drive because there won’t be enough money in it got the corporations and/or society to invest in the vehicles, infrastructure and information base needed for full autonomy. Major trunk roads will be a crossover, at conurbation boundaries I would expect park and ride.

When considering personal risk you have to look at the probability rate of scenarios you invent and compare them to those for other scenarios. So you have to weigh the, probably unlikely, case where you’d not drove off the cliff against the, more likely, where another human driver might collide with you because they’re distracted, confused, DUI, risk taking, etc. We humans are pretty poor at doing these calculations preferring narrative stories to numbers.