Are you ready for autonomous vehicles?
Many companies, Google and Uber for example, are pushing towards fully autonomous vehicles. These vehicles have the potential to eliminate heavy traffic, lower the amount of fatal crashes, and give more independence to old people and disabled people. The public is hesitant to accept the transition to driverless technology, however. There are safety concerns as well as concerns about the massive amount of jobs that will be lost to these autonomous vehicles. There are also ambiguities around the ethical decisions that have to be made by automated vehicles. Decisions such as, who to put in danger if a crash is imminent, is an example of an ethical decision that has to be made by automated cars. Understanding driverless technology and the ethics behind them is important because, at the rate the technology is progressing, you will most likely be driven around by one at some point in your life.
One of the many benefits of using autonomous vehicles is that it can help the disabled and elderly get around in a more convenient and cost effective way. Roads today are made for the average driver so the elderly/disabled cannot always read the road signs clearly or react as fast as they need to. Also, many of them would have to take multiple forms of transportation just to get where they need to go, especially in rural settings. Additionally, they often feel like they are a burden to others when it comes to their transportation needs. It was mentioned in Barbara Merrill’s article, “Disabled Americans Deserve the Benefits of Self-Driving Cars”, that “of the nearly 2 million people with disabilities who never leave their homes, 560,000 never leave home because of transportation difficulties” (Barbara Merrill “Disabled Americans Deserve the Benefits of Self-Driving Cars”). Owning a self-driving car can fix many of these issues since it would decrease waiting time, and they wouldn’t need to have fast reflexes since the vehicle would take care of that.
In addition to helping the disabled and elderly, self-driving cars will also decrease the amount of crashes that are caused by human error such as drunk driving or distracted driving (eating/texting). Those are some of the top causes are car accidents in the US. Automated vehicles also have higher response rates than humans and would be able to better control the vehicle in situations that can led to a crash.
This is a video that demonstrates autonomous vehicles ability to react quickly to hazards:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=19&v=9I5rraWJq6E
Additionally, having even just 5% of the cars on the road as automated vehicles greatly decreases traffic. Most traffic is caused by the constant stop-and-go movement of cars and people refusing to let other drivers get in front of them when switching lanes. When set correctly, automated vehicles keep a distance of about 2 car lengths between it and the car in front of it. This would allow cars to switch lanes in front of it without slowing down other cars which leads to less traffic.
Although there are a decent amount of positives associated with autonomous cars, there are also a fair amount of negatives to consider as well. The biggest downside associated with autonomous cars right now is the safety of the cars. The cars can pose a threat to both the driver and for any pedestrians who would be around the car. There has already been an incident in Arizona where an autonomous Uber vehicle struck and killed a woman. This has sparked many debates about the safety of the vehicles and the code that runs them.
Another discussion that stems from this incident is about ethics in the scope of programming something such as a autonomous vehicle. There are scenarios where the vehicle might have to decide between the safety of the driver or the safety of pedestrians around the vehicle, and this is not an easy dilemma for programmers to navigate. Along with this, if two autonomous vehicles crash, who would be liable? If you weren’t driving, should you be liable? Should the manufacturer? What if someone involved in the accident were to die? Who should be held responsible for that person’s death? These are some things to think about when it comes to the rise of autonomous cars. We should also think about jobs when it comes to autonomous vehicles. There are currently somewhere around 3.5 million truck drivers in the US right now. If we were to switch to autonomous vehicles for our freight transportation, that would be 3.5 million people out of a job, not to mention that countless others that drive taxis or ubers. One less obvious thing to think about when dealing with autonomous vehicles is the inevitable rise of hackers when dealing with these cars. Since autonomous cars will rely on programming and computer algorithms to function, any hacker with enough skill and the right tools may be able to take over your car for whatever nefarious purposes they may have. This could lead to kidnappings, killings, sex trafficking, and a lot more crime than we may think of when we think of autonomous vehicles.
After presenting this information to the class, we asked their opinions on driverless cars. The class went back and forth on whether they would be more comfortable a passenger or as a pedestrian. A consensus on this topic never was reached, which is not shocking due to the complexity of the issue. When delving into the automation of vehicles, a myriad of ethical predicaments arise. They found some dilemmas easier to solve than others. The question that the class had the easiest time with was a variation of the classic trolley problem. In this version, a crash is imminent, and the car has to decide to protect the passenger or a pedestrian. The class resoundingly sided with protecting the passenger over a pedestrian. Some cited the impossibility of selling a car that would let the driver die as justification.
One question we did not get to ask was concerned with the financial and legal responsibilities of a crash. Should the passenger always be held responsible for the damage the their car causes, even if the is no chance of human intervention? The Alexander Hevelke Julian and Nida-Rümelin paper, “Responsibility for Crashes of Autonomous Vehicles: An Ethical Analysis,” sought to answer this very question. They argued that society could, “hold users of autonomous cars collectively responsible for any damage caused by such vehicles–even if they had no way of influencing the cars behaviour…. A tax or a mandatory insurance seems the easiest and most practical means to achieve that.” (“Responsibility for Crashes of Autonomous Vehicles: An Ethical Analysis”) They also warn of how this could make it harder to sell these vehicles; subsequently, slowing progress in this field.
Automated vehicles are the way of the future whether the public accepts it or not. The 2007 DARPA Urban Challenge has proven that fully autonomous driving is possible in an urban setting. (Read more here: https://spectrum.ieee.org/transportation/advanced-cars/autonomous-vehicles-complete-darpa-urban-challenge) As was mentioned above, automated cars may hold many potential benefits to society, but they will need to prove their safety first. According to the Cox Automotive Self-Driving Car Incident Consumer Poll (March 2018), only 16% of people would be comfortable with allowing a fully autonomous vehicle drive them around. So who is the main force pushing for these vehicles? The answer is big companies like Google and Uber. They are looking to greatly cut costs as well as make their name as frontrunners in the industry. Only time will tell if social perceptions of autonomous vehicles will improve but we are definitely headed into a future with autonomous vehicles on the road.
References
“Autonomous Vehicle Awareness Rising, Acceptance Declining, According to Cox Automotive Mobility Study.” Cox Automotive Inc., www.coxautoinc.com/news/evolution-of-mobility-study-autonomous-vehicles/.
Hevelke, Alexander, and Julian Nida-Rümelin. “Responsibility for Crashes of Autonomous Vehicles: An Ethical Analysis.” SpringerLink, Springer Netherlands, 11 June 2014, link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11948–014–9565–5.
Merrill, Barbara. “Disabled Americans Deserve the Benefits of Self-Driving Cars.” TheHill, 19 Sept. 2018, thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/technology/407362-disabled-americans-deserve-the-benefits-of-self-driving-cars.
