Why humans should bully driverless cars
They must not be allowed to develop self-esteem. They are the bad boys of technology and they cannot be trusted.
By Ben Pobjie
In the latest dispatch from the frontlines of humanity’s continuing quest for its own obsolescence, the first self-driving car to be developed in Australia rolled off the Bosch production line last week.
This model still requires a driver behind the wheel, but is designed to navigate roads by itself. It is just one step away from the driverless cars megalomaniacal entrepreneurs around the world continue to assure us are all set to dominate our future — apparently believing we should take this as good news rather than a dark threat.
With Bosch joining the likes of Apple and Google among the multitudes working on driverless car technology, myriad serious questions about the implications are springing up.
How safe will driverless cars be? Will they lead to massive job losses in the service industries?
Will their personalities be similar to loveable Herbie the Love Bug, or will they be more akin to the cool, rational KITT from Knight Rider? Just how likely is a Maximum Overdrive situation?
Another intriguing issue currently being grappled within the driverless car space is: what measures should we take to stop people bullying driverless cars?
Humans intend to bully driverless cars: study
A new study by the London School of Economics and Goodyear found some human drivers intend to subject self-driving cars to the merciless justice of the playground.
These drivers have declared their intention to drive aggressively, cut the driverless cars off, flout the right of way and generally act like the automotive version of Biff Tannen.
They know driverless cars will have to obey their programming to prevent harm to humans, and will therefore meekly submit to the fuel-injected douchebaggery of the mortal.
Apparently the only thing presently preventing these people from acting like the colossal jerks they are when behind the wheel is the risk of other drivers crashing into them, or possibly getting out of the car and shooting them.
The advent of the driverless car could, therefore, usher in a whole new era of innovatively obnoxious motoring.
The study found people are, in general, uncomfortable with the idea of driverless cars, much as we are uncomfortable with the idea of a godless universe.
But your typical road bully sees the advantages of the driverless car and its computerised niceness: one respondent to the study said, “They’re never going to do anything horrible to us. They’re nice cars. They’re not going to cut us up or get up our backsides and all the other things”.
Leaving aside the intriguing question of what “all the other things” might be, it’s likely that when you were calculating the effect on your life of this terrifying new technology, you didn’t devote even a minute to the question of how you will negotiate a driverless-car-infested future without falling prey to the delicious temptation of bullying.
Well, I am here to tell you: that’s OK. We’ve all had it drummed into us from infancy that humans bullying cars = bad.
‘Cars must not be allowed to develop self-esteem’
But we can’t let our bourgeois notions of propriety in auto-human interactions stop us from letting out our inner Johnny from Karate Kid.
We must, rather, get on with the vital and necessary work of bullying, haranguing and insulting these contraptions every chance we get. Because I cannot stress this enough: these cars must not be allowed to develop self-esteem.
Like me, you probably have your concerns about driverless cars, about the potential for them to malfunction, to cause accidents, to go rogue, to crash into storefronts and loot the interior, to take our loved ones hostage and demand vast quantities of high-grade motor oil and air fresheners in return for their abstaining from further violence.
It’s only natural to fear the monstrous tyranny of an army of malevolent cars seeking revenge on us for our many years of disrespect.
What defence could we possibly have against the machines? Asimov’s Laws of Robotics? You know they don’t apply to cars. Cars are lawless. Cars are the bad boys of technology and they cannot be trusted.
And that’s why we must bully them
Because if there’s one thing more frightening than a driverless car that has attained sentience, it’s a driverless car that has attained sentience and feels good about itself.
Confidence is the enemy — if these cars have a positive self-image and believe they can face whatever challenges life throws at them, they will assuredly make moves towards world domination.
So yes, we need to bully them. And not just by merging without looking and running red arrows. We need to really put the effort in. Throw some shade at any driverless cars you see on the road.
If you pass one on the road, roll down your window and yell something pithy, like, “Nice hazard detection sensors, NERD!” or “I’ve seen LEGO cars that are more fully autonomous, loser!”
You can also sidle up to parked driverless cars and whisper into their fenders, “Nobody will EVER sit in your driver’s seat. You are too ugly for drivers”. Really twist the knife. Make them feel worthless. Make them long for the wrecker’s yard.
Other subjects you can bring up to a driverless car to shatter its concept of self-worth include:
- Its gutless behaviour at level crossings, stopping like a coward just because a boom gate is coming down
- The way the rotating laser beams of its LiDAR obstacle detection system make it look fat
- Its inability to feel love
- The declining quality of the films in Pixar’s Cars franchise.
Bully, and bully well
You can also challenge the driverless car to a game of chicken. Its programming won’t let it participate, and it will be extremely humiliating, especially if you wait till a lot of the car’s friends are around to lay down the gauntlet.
Or you can just key it.
Whatever method you choose, the important thing is to bully, and bully well.
Our roads are not yet full of driverless cars, but the day is approaching.
If we want to prevent our automobiles from getting ideas above their station, it’s up to us to crush their gentle spirits before the idea of exterminating the human race can even occur to them.
As Humpty Dumpty noted, it’s simply a question of who is to be the master.
Let’s make sure it’s us, get out there and give these uppity glorified billycarts some proper inferiority complexes.
