How to police self-driving cars

As you know from a previous post, I am a huge advocate of self-driving or autonomous cars.  In short, they would be exponentially safer than a human driving a car, and would free up time for its human passengers to do other activities.  After the question of safety, which I am not going to debate here, the next question is always around the law: who is accountable should a self-driving car have an accident?  I think the difficulty people are having with answering this question is that it is such a foreign concept to us that we can't wrap our brains around it.  Thus, I was inspired to write this post in order to simplify our thinking and perhaps clear the way for future discussions on this topic.  I'm going to make the case that car manufacturers, or more specifically, the company producing and installing the software into autonomous vehicles, should be held responsible for any accidents caused by vehicles using said software.  

Before you get all defensive on me, hear me out.  If a brand new car, driven off the lot, spontaneously explodes and injures the driver and a person in another car, the car manufacturer is at fault.  I think we can agree on that much.  More broadly, a malfunction of an unmodified vehicle that causes harm to someone (or really, had the potential to harm someone) is a product defect and thus the responsibility falls on the car manufacturer.  Of course, a car owner could void this responsibility by tinkering with the vehicle, in which case the car owner would be responsible if he/she created a defect in an otherwise certified safe car.  If another company did the tinkering that lead to the harm, the vehicle owner would hold that company accountable.  All of this is in practice today, and has been for many years.  

Now, let's apply it to autonomous vehicle features, without going fully self-driving.  New (high end) cars have some of these features already.  Yes, you heard me right: mass-produced cars are already doing some of the thinking for us.  Some drivers are already entrusting their lives into the hands of a car that makes its own decisions; and the rest of us are driving on the same roads as those cars.  The primary example I will focus on is the Volvo that stops itself before impact with a large object.  My brother-in-law was so excited when he test drove the car, bragging about how the salesman encouraged him to drive it directly at a brick wall.  Against all intuition, he successfully approached the brick wall at such a speed as to trigger the car to automatically apply the brakes.  Amazing!  Does this excite you?  Or scare you?  And more importantly, what happens if the car's software has a glitch?  One could imagine how a glitch could trigger the car to randomly apply the brakes on the freeway, causing the car behind it to plow into it.  Who is at fault for the cause of the accident?  Sure, the other driver might get a ticket for driving too close to be unable to stop in time, but I would argue that stopping in the middle of the freeway with no reason could be questioned; and its certainly not the Volvo owner's fault, right?  The test drive showed that no matter what the driver is doing, those brakes are going to be applied if that's what the car has decided to do.  Thus, responsibility must be taken out of the driver's hands.  

 

Now let's take a different angle.  Let's suppose that the Volvo driver is suddenly faced with stopped traffic ahead and an out-of-control runaway semi-truck barreling down a hill at him.  The driver, seeing this, attempts to swerve around the stopped traffic, maybe even attempt to hit the guard rail and plow through it, rather than be squashed between a semi and the car in front of him.  Certainly, if the driver is able to rationally see the guard rail as a favorable collision to being squashed, he should be able to maneuver the car in order to do so, and potentially save his life.  If then the Volvo's autonomous braking feature prevents the driver from driving into the guard rail, and he is instead squashed, would there not be a public outcry and lawsuits against Volvo?  

Parking is another aspect we're seeing early autonomy in.  Some features are just park assist features, like guide lines on the camera.  But some cars are actually controlling and manipulating the steering wheel.  If this doesn't scare the nay-sayers, I don't know what it will take to scare them.  Yet parking is one of the most accident-prone parts of driving, because we are dealing with tighter tolerances.  Tighter tolerances is also a good reason to have the computer take over, too, since computers are more precise and accurate than people are.  Regardless of the rationale, there will still be some damage done by an auto parking car eventually, and I am sure that the car manufacturer will be found at fault for this error that could have been prevented by a human driver.  

I'd be willing to bet that, long before our cars drive themselves completely, we'll see at least one such accident go to court and favor the driver.  That court case is going to be crucial in setting the precedent for future autonomous car accidents.  Car companies installing autonomous features have to be ready for this. 

This, in no way, should deter car manufacturers from adding these features to their cars and moving forward with vehicle autonomy.  Smart features that enhance the safety of a vehicle are going to be primarily selling points.  There will be late adopters who will resist, and that's true of all technologies.  But the majority of the population will gradually become comfortable with these features, and the features will become selling points or requirements in future purchasing decisions.  Instead of car manufacturers shirking away from the technology because of the messy legal fears, they need to embrace the responsibility with the added value that can be derived from the features.  This will serve as motivation to ensure utmost safety of their features - glitch-proof, do-no-harm mentality needs to be instilled, while the return on investment will still be positive.

Still, there will be accidents.  Some will be tragedies that would not have happened had a human driver been in control.  And the nay-sayers will point to them being the beginning of the end.  But my bet is that we will see a vast improvement in safety overall: fewer fatal accidents, fewer pedestrian accidents, fewer accidents causing injuries.  Fewer intentional "accidents", too, by the way, caused by road rage and suicidal / homicidal incidents that go unrecorded for lack of evidence.  All across the board, our roads will get safer and safer as more people drive cars with more and more autonomous features.  Autonomous cars are better for the society as a whole, and will greatly reduce the inherent risk of getting into a vehicle.  Let's not forget how fatal driving can be today - we must never forget that.  The most important thing, when there is an accident caused by an autonomous feature, is to collect all the data we can about that accident and prevent it from happening again.  Pioneers of all sorts are often made into sacrifices and martyrs, and I wish just as much as anyone else that this didn't have to be the case with early adopters of the self-driving car, but I know it is bound to happen.  It will happen, we will settle it in court, and we will move on.  

Why Self Driving Cars Are Coming Sooner Than You Think

No futuristic technology excites me more than the self driving car.  This desire to own one is purely selfish: (1) I hate driving, and I feel it is a waste of my time and energy.  It is also exhausting emotionally when some idiot almost hits me.  (2) It makes me nervous to have others drive me, be it taxi drivers or friends.  (3) I love the flexibility and convenience driving affords me, as opposed to public transportation and alternative modes of transportation.  (4) Being in a car in a populated area is the most dangerous thing most people do in their lifetimes, and most people do it every day.  It doesn't matter that I'm a safe driver; some idiot can hit me when I'm stopped with nowhere to go, and damage my personal property.  Even if its repaired, the car loses value.  Thus, I want all other drivers to own one, too.

So you can have your phablet or your 3D television, all I want for Christmas is an autonomous car.  Hell, I'd even give up my smart phone for a car that drives itself.  Maybe I'm one of the few in the early adopter stage; that wouldn't be a surprise to those who know I own the first Chevy Volt in Arizona.  Maybe I'm just lazy and want to make life even easier on me.  Either way, I want it.  But I won't be so naive to think that everyone will jump at the chance of buying one.  In fact, I don't even think the product life cycle of the self driving car is even worth talking about.  When you question whether or not car makers can make it and car buyers will buy it, I think you're missing a lot of the more important aspects of the discussion.   

The legislation that does exist today - primarily requiring an alert, responsible human driver - is ridiculous.  To that end, if that's the legislation that sticks, we will never get mainstream adoption.  The legislation is indicative of caution exerted around the unknown, which is understandable because we don't really have a solid, viable product in the consumer's hands to base it on yet.  I think what needs to happen is we need to flip it around.  Governments are interested in reducing car accidents and drunk driving.  Why not legislate that new cars have to be equipped with at least partially autonomous features?  The more cars that will avoid hitting things on the road, the less accidents we're likely to see, and the less lethal the remaining accidents should be.  To address the drunk driving issue, breathalzers could be installed and programmed to signal the car to take over the driving when the driver is blowing a high BAC.  Governments should be rallying behind the self-driving car, not putting up barriers.  

We know we can't always rely on government to do the right thing, so let's turn to the commercial world.  Taxis, limo services, shuttles and all sorts of transportation providers should be interested in self-driving cars.  The upfront cost may be astronomical to begin with, and some drivers are paid very poorly.  But there has got to be some length of time where the self-driving car makes economical sense over paying hourly wages, and that payback period will drop with large contracts and larger volumes in production.  

Let's not forget individual consumers who are unable to drive.  This can include the legally blind, the physically handicapped and the elderly.  I'm not saying they're going to shell out a bunch of money themselves, but there are probably grants, charitable support or other funding opportunities to help get them in self-driving cars to empower them to live with more freedom and flexibility.  Disabled military veterans, specifically, have several organizations and grants to support them in civilian life.  Even where there are no available government monies or charities, these kinds of a causes could be crowdfunding-worthy.  

Finally, insurance companies will want their drivers in autonomous cars.  There is huge potential for insurers to give discounts or even potentially subsidize the cost of an autonomous car, knowing their risk is much lower and that the more autonomous cars on the road, the less likely others are to have accidents.  They could give insured drivers the option of replacing their totaled cars with less expensive cars equipped with self-driving capabilities.  

The electric car is great, but it is not a good model to compare future demand for self-driving cars to.  The benefits of the electric car are mostly idealized: reducing dependency on gasoline from overseas, reducing pollution, paying less per mile, not having to go to the gas station.  These points are hard to defend, when it takes sometimes dirty energy to create the electricity, same of creating the car itself, and the cost of the cars make them less than economical.  Cool, yes, but economically sound and environmentally neutral, no.  The self-driving car, on the other hand, has much more tangible benefits.  People who can't drive can use them to reap the benefits of driving, the safety of the autonomous car's passengers and drivers around it is increased, and intoxicated drivers can get home safely without requiring a cab, to name a few.  Thus, the only main stakeholders for the growth of electric cars are the consumers, while the adoption of the autonomous car benefits almost everyone on the road, plus insurers, governments and people who are prevented from driving.  This is the angle that should be taken when discussing the feasibility of self-driving cars in the foreseeable future.