Robocars, just like any car on California roads

[botsapper]

according to your overlord, Google. They trust computers can drive better than humans and it’s working full speed to take over the controls completely, and as soon as possible. Damn the legislation, they will make them. Insurance concerns, they will write it for them. And damn it, consumers will get into them.

Google

[redpoint5]

Originally Posted by botsapper

according to your overlord, Google.

We have much bigger problems than Google. Namely, every politician in office and the corrupt way in which we allow lobbyists to lay in bed with our "representatives" in office.

Fix this problem, and most of the other problems get nipped in the bud.

...now if only we could have our politicians replaced by rational machines...

Anyone ever read The Foundation series by Issac Asimov?

[Mr. Pancake]

Self-Driving Cars: 5 Problems That Need Solutions

Doesn't sound like they will be widespread for quite some time according to this.

[rmay635703]

Originally Posted by redpoint5

Is the million years of research and current drawbacks of living in modern homes worth it when we could just live in caves?

Increasingly, it is being found most of our inorganic building materials are sources of cancer causing agents. So yes building homes of natural materials which includes mortor, wood and other materials is much better than cancer sticks and deadly sheetrock.

Originally Posted by redpoint5

This is clearly false. While your suggestions are good ways to conserve resources and improve safety, they are obviously not the only ways to do so. They might be the best ways to accomplish these goals at the moment, but again they aren't the only way, and necessarily the best way in the future.

The old addage is my grandfather road a horse, I ride in a car, my son will ride an airplain but my grandchildren will ride horses.

Plain and simple we are not developing new "everlasting" forms of energy, the idea of everyone driving everywhere, regardless of the method is short lived. Even solar panels require finite energy resources to create.

It is a fact that even the most optimistic deluded ideots only believe we have about 200 years of energy and fossil fuel based fertalizer left and thats at current levels.(most seem to float around 50 years of reasonably accessable materials) We are going to have a die off if we can't pull our head out of our arse and control our population and find ways of eliminating the current lifestyle and farming methods.

Far more frightening than loosing our transport methods, is loosing food. Which will come first if things start becoming unaffordable, food or fuel?

We can choose to change on our own or live in the moment until we are forced with game over and hard stops to our lifestyle.

The belief that technology can overcome everything is false if lifestyles on a broad scale won't change.

Plain in simple computerized pickup trucks and mid sized sedans moving single persons around is of no significance to our real problem and does not change anything significantly for the better.

Sorry but this is an ignore issue unless it is forced, then it is something to oppose.

[Hersbird]

Originally Posted by Mr. Pancake

Self-Driving Cars: 5 Problems That Need Solutions

Doesn't sound like they will be widespread for quite some time according to this.

They ale a bigger deal then reality out of ost of those problems. The ethical one is the biggest farce. People react irrationally all the time in accidents. Nobody is picking and choosing the best thing to crash into. People swerve and lose control killing somebody in order to miss a squirrel all the time. I'm pretty sure a computer can beat a human in that respect.

Software that doesn't crash just would require some redundancy. One reboots but another is already running and controlling in parallel. Unlikely odds on two at the same time dropping, then a 3rd makes it less probable then a human being incapacitated from a medical condition.

[P-hack]

funny, the solution in search of a problem has problems (most of which are well beyond fanboy level comprehension).

Here's a paradox for the bleeding hearts:

Since you think people are so completely untrainable (despite the results here), we should drop support for public education. It is pointless.

[redpoint5]

Originally Posted by P-hack

Since you think people are so completely untrainable (despite the results here), we should drop support for public education. It is pointless.

I wish I could drop support for public education. I only wonder what knowledge and passion I could have gained if the resources that went to my public education were spent privately instead.

[P-hack]

Originally Posted by redpoint5

I wish I could drop support for public education. I only wonder what knowledge and passion I could have gained if the resources that went to my public education were spent privately instead.

well, I think we have stumbled on to the main problem with this thread, and its totalitarian overtones (humans bad, robots and the people who control them are good). It is a political thread.

[Hersbird]

Originally Posted by P-hack

well, I think we have stumbled on to the main problem with this thread, and its totalitarian overtones (humans bad, robots and the people who control them are good). It is a political thread.

I think that's just your absolute, black and white take on things. I think humans are great but just like so many other things, technology can make our lives better.

I suppose you miss the good old days of traffic cops before automated signals.

[P-hack]

Originally Posted by Hersbird

I suppose you miss the good old days of traffic cops before automated signals.

Actually I was thinking how stupid traffic lights are, and how long they have had to improve, and how this doesn't bode well for a robot driver.

But yah, political, completely. How do you think google got 'em on the road so fast. It wasn't "free market forces"... And they they make up stuff when the things do fail. Pure politics, and the fanboys got techno-boners. Or are just talking crap because of work/investment related conflicts of interest. (or some combination).

Yes, driving wise, a cop watching the streets and controlling the signals would be a HUGE improvement.

Every single "safety" speculation is a step towards totalitarianism. Which is what the invested want.