Talk:Self-driving car/Archive 1

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Unreferenced rumors from GM

68.33.251.127 said that:

General Motors is preparing to launch a revolutionary self-driving system on the 2008 Opel Vectra. The car will be capable of piloting itself at speeds up to 60 mph in heavy traffic without any input from the driver sitting behind the steering wheel. GM claims the system, called Traffic Assist, will make driving safer and more relaxing. It uses lasers, a video camera and plenty of computing power to "see" signs, bends, other vehicles and lane markings, and to control the engine, steering and brakes to keep the car in the correct position on the road and maintain a safe distance from the vehicle in front. The system is to become available on more models by the end of the decade — initially other cars on the Epsilon platform, including the next Saab 9-3, Cadillac BLS and Saturn Aura. Whether it will be launched in the U.S. will depend on whether administrators deem it safe — product liability laws are different in America. GM expects the package to be about 50-percent more expensive than conventional active cruise control radar equipment, which controls distances but cannot steer the car.

I, personally, doubt it. Moved it over here. Samfreed 13:33, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Seems to be based on this: http://www.autoexpress.co.uk/news/spyshots/208774/opel_vectra.html . looks more hype than substance. A very similat text appears in 2005 press releases. Samfreed 13:37, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Tone of article

This reads like a report someone did for school. There's a lot of 'miracle' and 'marvel' type words, as well as odd first-person references to Italy.

In the actual article, "Miracle" = 0 times. "Marvel" = one mention, "seeming marvel" - sarcastic if anything. "First person" - Where? "Italy" - Twice, "Italian" - 3 times, it so happens that a lot is going on there. For comparison, "USA" is mentioned in that exact spelling 6 times, as "US" 7 times. Can you substantiate what you said? or were you discussing this talk page? In any case, the fully driverless car is in the future, if it will ever happen at all, and for that reason alone could be justly termed "a marvel". Anyhow, feel free to improve the article itself, or discuss specifics here - I just can't quite relate to what you said, I suppose. Please enlighten me, especialy on the "first person" stuff. Samfreed 22:59, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Sam, I'm with you on this. I couldn't find any use of Italy in the first-person either. However, I have just edited out "some brave souls", which was rather POV, and removed the paragraph explaining the order of discussion (which would be useful in a magazine article, but not here). --Habap 11:51, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

Habap - what about the quote: "Either a desert (free of any human or human-made obstacle), or a clearly-marked, well-painted (in our case Italian) motorway". In who's case? There are a few instances of this in this article where you need to read to get context rather than do a search and count the number of times a word occurs.

So much discussion about a 3-line paragraph! If anyone doesn't like the tone of the article, why not edit it for tone, POV, etc? It isn't locked, this is the wikipedia, just go ahead! I promise to review for accuracy, it is on my watchlist. If I have time later today I might even do it myself, now that I understand what the complaining is about - but Please just use the wiki! Samfreed 09:19, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Unattended fueling

"Before or after the attendant refuels it, the car would print out the owner's credit card or checking account number in order to pay for the fuel."

LOL! Do you really think that by the time driverless cars have arrived it will still be necessary to print a credit card number? And why would the petrol station bother employing an attendant? Surely if a car can drive itself it can refuel itself too.

Back in the 1990s, Mobil Oil tested an unattended refueling system for gas stations. That is, the car would pull up to the pump and the pump would insert the nozzle in the gas tank of the vehicle. They had also already deployed Speedpass, making for hands-free electronic payment. Not sure what happened with the unattended refueling, the technology does exist, though it may not be profitable. --Habap 19:29, 16 August 2005 (UTC)

Just put an RFID tag inside where the nozzel goes in and it can automatically identify the car and deduct from a debit account.

"will people still be allowed to drive, when an automated system will be able to do it more safely?" Not a valid question in my opinion. You are applying present-day concerns to a future scenario. If the automated system is advanced enough to offer great advantages over driving manually, most people won't want to drive by hand, and they won't care whether it is allowed. The question sounds like someone in 1900 asking "Will people still be allowed to ride their horses on motorways?". Of course, some people will still want drive purely for leisure, just like people still ride horses today. They will do this on special tracks however and not on the main transport corridors that take people from A to B. 137.222.40.132 17:13, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Many people will insist on driving by hand, probably for decades after it becomes common. Ask anyone over 60 how often they use cell phones, the internet or a PDA. --Habap 19:29, 16 August 2005 (UTC)

In 1900 there were no motorways, but that doesn't matter because you can still ride a horse on a public road, and it should stay that way. i think this will be much the same Towel401 (talk) 22:49, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

I have just read the page about the driverless car. The issue of the driverless car is whether it should be a private car, or a public vehicle. As a private car it solves very few car problems. As a public vehicle, used as a taxi, it solves many car problems. It leads the way to better road space utilisation by allowing people to conveniently use buses for the corridor part of the journey, and the driverless car for the local networked part of the journey.

So what are you saying? What can the article do to better represent this issue? - Fennec 15:19, 10 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Public or private ownership is a mere technicality and not an important issue in my opinion. Driverless cars will allow for a much more competitive rental and pay-on-demand market than is the case with manually driven vehicles. If a city council fails to provide a public driverless car system, private companies similar to today's taxis companies will. More people will choose to use a public-type system because of the clear advantages it will offer (much lower cost due to higher rate of utilisation, more flexible, no parking problems, one way journeys possible). Some people will still prefer to own a private vehicle, or choose combination of both. Whatever the scenario however, I can't see why fully private and "taxi" vehicles can't happily coexist on the road (or any other guidance system).

From what I've heard, it's unfeasible for a computer to drive among human drivers at present, but if human driving were eliminated, it'd be easy for a computer network to control all cars, and at higher safe speeds. this is because of the unpredictability aspect of human drivers even at the lower speeds necessary for their safety.

Re: unattended refuelling Two systems have operated in South Africa for a number of years as a response to the high level of fuel theft and petro-card fraud. BP Fuelmaster and e-fuel, operated by AFS systems. Both are RFID based. No chip in the tank filler nozzle. No fuel. The fuel dispensed is debited to the appropriate account. No paper, no slips, no cash= no fraud.--Gaptech 10:36, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

The Major Revamp underway

Hi All,

I am revamping this page to sound less like a SciFi fantasy page, and more of a serious summary of the state-of-the-art of all the efforts in the field. This will take several weeks, and most probably you will not recognize the page once I am done, but that is just what the Wikipedia is about, the evolution of "stubs" into a collection of comments, and eventually into a serious encyclopedic article.

Samfreed 10:36, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

The benefits of autonomous vehicles has been greatly understated. The following is from http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/00020814.htm "Motor-vehicle crashes during 1990 accounted for 44,531 fatalities, 5.4 million nonfatal injuries, and 28 million damaged vehicles, and an estimated total cost of $137.5 billion (Table 1). Major sources for cost were property damage ($45.7 billion {33%}), productivity losses in the workplace ($39.8 billion {29%}), medical-care expenses (13.9 billion {10%}), and losses related to household productivity ($10.8 billion {8%})." $137.5 billion dollars is wasted on vehicle collisions in a single year. The benefits of an autonomous system range far beyond fewer traffic accidents. The whole reason Eisenhower built the Interstates in the first place is to allow quick evacuation of people and quick mobilization of the military and emergency response crews. Cars communicating to each other can notify the entire system to downed roadways and traffic free routes. With all that's been said in the recent years about national security and increasing national debt, it's a mystery to me why the government doesn't feel the need to exponentially increase it's funding for its antedated transportation system.

Error or Purpose?

Umm find click the 'average drivers' link on the page... it directs to joe bloggs. How come? | Spelling error or just purpose? --> find denemark --Zer_T --Zer_T 00:47, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

On purpose. It was simply "joe bloggs" and them someone "improved" it.

What is a "Driverless Car" ?

To begin with, it is an error in nomenclature : Every vehicle has some kind of driver, human or machine. Until a better term is found, we should term such a unit an "autonomous vehicle for public roadways", AVPR, perhaps ?. With that settled for the moment, what are the attributes required of any device proposed to implement an AVPR ?

It seems fairly straightforward to me : Vision, Hearing and Seat-of-Pants. We could perhaps throw in a generous dollop of "common sense" for good measure. The sensory and other attributes could be easily improved over that available from human drivers, like 360-deg vision and hearing and really good inertial sensors, not to mention that the device would likely never be intoxicated or talking on a cell phone like some idiots do (though perhaps it could be turn up broken). Then given the data gathered from the sensors, said data must be processed appropriately to secure guidance. No sweat there, what with today's cheap computing power -- of course, it is a software nighmare.

One might want to look up a recent article in the IEEE Spectrum about the guidance system found in the common housefly: VERY marvelous and VERY simple.

Given the present state-of-the-art together with a rock-hard G*O*A*L to do so (translation : MegaKiloBucks), we ought to be able to demonstrate one in a year or two. Why not ?

A few things:

• I preffer not to invent further nomenclature, the space is crowded enough. This name is in the wonderful tradition of the "horseless carrige".
• The problem is in the "Seat of pants" part, as you call it, or the "micro-navigation" as I call it in the article. I have yet to really write that part, watch this space.
• Please give more accurae references than "recent" for any article you want anyone to read and consider. A URL would be nice.
• Why not create a username for yourself? That way we can recognize you.

Samfreed 06:02, 2 April 2006 (UTC)

Re : Nomenclature - This is NOT 1905 : We need nomenclature which cuts thru the cute and distinguishes what appear to some as minor differences. Beware of "Gresham's Law of Information", simlar to Gresham's Law of Money. Thus, the case is already lost -- but no surprise there.

"Seat-of-Pants" refers to information from inertial sensors. All taken together -- The steering machine requires equivalents to eyes, ears, ear-canals & some of bodily touch. From these, the machine calculates first-order steering commands : Hold the road, do no harm. The next steering level deals with traffic flow : read the street and traffic signs, follow the rules, optimize flow for all, including pedestrians, while the next level deals with trips, with destinations. The maximum optimization of the two highest levels requires increasing degrees of local and central communications.

All any of this does is to remove our abundant human frailties of all sorts, thru and including road rage, from the surface transport equation. Some will miss the anonymity of the manual system.

Fiction

Should there be a fiction section? With examples such as the cars in I, Robot (film). Alot of other future mechanics-in-development articles have sections on fiction thats why.--Exander 01:08, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

I've added a "In film" section as a starting point. If anyone knows of more examples of driverless cars in fiction, please add 'em in and edit the section title accordingly... --Samf-nz 06:50, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

One more optional technology for micro navigation

For navigation through congested traffic in addition to laser and radar technologies in my opinion infra-red vision or thermal vision can be very useful.Since on road the atmospheric temperature will be constant for a particular instant of time while the temperature of vehicles moving near to driverless car will be having different temperature,therefore utilizing this phenomena our vehicle can recognize its surroundings for the presence vehicles and humans.

posted by Amreesh Singh

Generally, no special technology beyond that which enables the machine to perceive its surroundings with the same acuity as a human would is needed -- ordinary light is plenty -- except to cope with the presence of fog, smoke, etc.

However, until the technology drives away all manually controlled vehicles, vision based on other methods will be of positive, but limited value. It would only help to prevent those nasty fog-pileups -- absolute prevention requires the absence of manual vehicles.

Of course, the machine will continually see and analyze a 360-o picture with recent history and will never be distracted by, say, operating a cell phone -- so the overall result will far exceed human capability.

Nice thought, but it is for the Sensors, not the Micro-Navigation. More on Micro-Navigation coming soon.

--Samfreed 16:25, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

I've changed the term "Micro-Navigation" to "Motion planning". Clearer. I am also working on an article by that name. Samfreed 23:05, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Lexus Advanced Parking Guidance System

Yesterday, I saw their commercial on TV. With limited driver input (selecting one corner of the parking spot and tapping the brakes), the newest Lexus LS will perform parallel parking for you. I am amazed!

At the touch of a button, the available Advanced Parking Guidance System can parallel park the LS or back into a parking space (not shown) with just a little brake work by the driver. First, position the LS in front of the parking space, then use the navigation screen to select the parallel park icon. After pressing the OK button on the screen, simply remove your hands from the steering wheel and regulate the vehicle’s speed by using the brake.[1]

Thus, the first step toward this is going into production now. Might be useful to incorporate this into the article. --Habap 12:32, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

This article or section is incomplete

Why heve so many "this article or section is incomplete" signs all over this page? Nate | Talk ^Esperanza! 02:25, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Because I am personally aware of more material for these sections, and intend to add it soon. Samfreed 08:47, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Third Industrial Revolution : Autonomous Machines

It seems to me that the discussion here needs to be very much broadened and generalized. Those who can think only in terms of their own individual short lives will not be much interested and are invited to "tune-out". Those interested in the "future of history", so to speak, should listen-up.

In the present century -- beginning with vehicle drivers, machine operators, service and hospitality workers -- virtually everyone who personally performs a definable manual task -- will be replaced by autonomous machines. This will reach well into the fields of surgery, dentistry and chiropractic, as indeed it already has done to a limited extent.

It is the Third Industrial Revolution and, like its predecessors, will have far-reaching effects upon the social fabric of man, some -- or even most -- completely unimaginable at this time.

It will also change the face of economics and require us to look again at what have been long held to be immutable "laws" concerning the effective application of capital and the circulation of money. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 70.157.183.66 (talk) 01:18, 6 February 2007 (UTC).

AGV and Links

I removed "AGV" and noted why. I am also currently working on the "autonomous robot" and "robot" articles. I put links to them in this article since they are related. Takeitupalevel 03:54, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Pilotless planes

Are the ideas for pilotless planes similar to the driverless cars. 4.235.120.245 23:41, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

Why don't you will name "Robot Car" ?

autonomous vehicle is robot, dont you?
---Green2007leaves 16:25, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

This item needs conversion to English. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 68.220.21.131 (talk) 01:43, August 24, 2007 (UTC)

The naming has been discussed here before, with several acronyms suggested. When I revamped this article, it was on the basis of a pre-existing one, which had this name "driverless car". Now it is odd, and cumbersome, but it is the cute tradition of "horseless carriage". Think how quaint and old-fashioned today's car will look to people in a few decades. BTW, the term "Robot" in itself is beginning to wear thin, don't you think? I like the name, that's why I didn't change it. You can add redirects, change things around, whatever. Just note that there are many links pointing here, and that this has been accepted so far, so is probably not too bad. Samfreed 21:42, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Yes, the name has the quality you suggest -- but on the other hand, it is misleading : The car still of necessity has a driver -- It is a "HUMAN-Driver-less car". The "horseless carriage" truly was "less the horse".

I agree with you very much on the term "robot" -- NASA pretty well ruined that term by calling a "remote-controlled arm" a "robot arm", for what reason other than widely institutionalized thoughtlessness I cannot imagine. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.157.179.34 (talk) 02:37, August 29, 2007 (UTC)

Why Should Automated Autos cost more than Manual Autos ?

The key to all of this is the development of a device which can analyze a motion picture of 360-o in azimuth in real time against cognitive criteria analogous to but rather enhanced over that within the capability of the typical human vehicle operator.

When applied to an automated vehicle, such a device would analyze the picture for steerage and for the text upon street & roadway signage. What else is there to be done ?

Even earthmovers, trenchers, pipeline laying equipment -- all are open to this technique, not to mention war machines of every conceivable sort.

Thus, a general purpose device would be employed for the task, with autos not expected to carry all or even a significant part of the original development cost. He who gets there first will have a lion by the tail economically and probably militarily!

Will it be China or India -- not likely Iceland or Iran. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 68.220.21.131 (talk) 01:41, August 24, 2007 (UTC)

Elminiating driving as a sport?

"Driving as a personal hobby and sport, and indeed the entire car-oriented sub-culture would be effectively eliminated." is from the article. I don't understand how it would do that, especially as a sport. I mean, I kind of get the gist of what it means, but I don't see how driverless cars on the road would keep people from driving in NASCAR or Indy or what have you any more than cars kept people from doing equestrian sports. Am I misunderstanding the statement?Chuy1530 (talk) 16:06, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

Impact of the global recession on projects like this?

Hello, I am very new to editing wikis and kind of wonder as to how to get info about the global recession’s impact on driverless cars for the consumer market. I personally, would love to own a driverless car and really hope that, in my lifetime, I will get to own one. I can also imagine that these types of projects are first in line to get scraped when the giants need to save money.

Hopefully never :) driverless cars are boring 157.190.144.39 (talk) 13:48, 3 November 2009 (UTC)

No personal cars

I chuckled when reading the "no personal cars" at all. I doubt that Americans would be willing to give up the feeling of freedom that comes with car ownership. While people who live on Manhattan or in Tokyo may find owning a car a hindrance, someone out on Long Island or in Akron, Ohio or Detroit, Michigan would probably tell you that "you can have my car when you pry the keys from my cold, dead fingers." Similarly, I doubt Germans would give them up. Heck, Finns, Norwegians and Swedes would probably hate to lose one of the ways of getting around their countries too. The "no personal cars at all" is so pie-in-the-sky silly that I am tempted to remove it or slap a POV tag on this article. It simply won't happen in any of our lifetimes. --Habap 13:54, 19 August 2005 (UTC)

--Keep Chuckling--

You are now 9 years old and live in Kitty Hawk. Orville and Wilbur have just landed. In twenty-five years, you will be an airline pilot flying the DC-3. Is that "'nuff said" for you ?? If not, it is now 40 years later and your son has just landed on the moon. "One giant step ...

Well, someone who was 9 years old in 1903 couldn't have been piloting a DC-3 in 1928, since they hadn't been built yet. It would have been at best 1935, when the Douglas DC-3 first flew. Now, 1969 was 66 years after the Wright's flight, so our 75-year-old man might have a son born in 1930 (like the entire Apollo 11 crew), when he was 36. Of course, 75 years was longer than the average male lifespan in the US at the time (though my own grandfather was 4 in 1903 and died in 1983).

While I am certain there will be technology that enables it (as there has been for airplanes for some time), I cannot imagine everyone giving up control of their cars in the next 30 or 40 years. If you expand it to 65 years, well, that's beyond the expected lifetime of most people reading this.... So, I stand by my statement. "It simply won't happen in any of our lifetimes." --Habap 12:40, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

--Keep Chuckling--

I beg your pardon for the date error. I should have recognized you as a hard-core doubter, sorry.

I cannot find the quotation I wanted to use from IBM's Tom Watson, Sr, but maybe this one will do (From IBM/Wikipedia) --

""IBM neglected, however, to gain an even more dominant role in the nascent industry by allowing the RAND Corporation to take over the job of programming the new computers, because, according to one project participant (Robert P. Crago), "we couldn't imagine where we could absorb two thousand programmers at IBM when this job would be over some day, which shows how well we were understanding the future at that time"[13] IBM would use its experience designing massive, integrated real-time networks with SAGE to design its SABRE airline reservation system, which met with much success"".

Back in 1968, we were astonished to find that a group in Minneapolis/Honeywell in St Pete, FL, had developled a silicon intergrated circuit containing (now get this) ONE-THOUSAND BITs << BITS, that is !!! Honeywell declined to support them any further, "It was obviously impractical and of little commercial value". Let's see, where are we now on semiconductor memories ? Many, many megabytes, I have lost track.

Ah, but we are not talking about the technology being capable, but rather about humans being willing to accept it. I think that Americans, at least, are so enamored with their cars that they won't have all turned in their keys in the net 40 years. Heck, it looks like telephones were invented sometime between 1849 and 1876, but didn't end up in nearly every home until the 1950s. While the bleeding edge of technology moves very fast, full integration takes a very long time, especially something so ingrained in American culture. (The first cell phones were available in 1971, but 35 years later there are still people who don't have one.) --Habap 19:54, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

--Keep Chuckling --

I saved the best for last : ECONOMIC Flexibility, as in Consumer Credit. The automated auto will NOT be owned by consumers, just as few of us own now own airplanes, but we still fly when necessary. Even now, electric vehicles would be much more popular if one did not have to purchase the storage batteries up front and then maintain them and then replace them : The gasoline and electric vehicles thus do NOT now operate on a level playing field.

The auto autos will be owned by a transportation utility (public or private), like the streets and highways they run on -- after all, few of us generate our own electricity, but granted that a good number of us in rural settings still provide our own water, waste disposal and gas.

Of course, one MAY own his private auto/auto if he has that kind of bucks and no place better to put them. For the rest of us : No more car payments, no more car washing & maintenance, no more car insurance, no more tires, no more batteries, no more transmissions, no more speeding or other traffic violations, including DUI, no more road rage, no more fender benders, no more crashes while using the cell-phone or not -- go ahead and take a nap, work, read, compute or whatever you please while on your way.

Do THESE "no mores" constitute the "benefits" of car-ownership and car-driving that FEW Americans will give up ? Well, you believe that and I have some prime ocean-front property for you here in AZ (Chuckle, chuckle). Think of it as "democratized personal transportation", equally available to all : young, old (like me), fit or disabled -- How otherwise does one who can no longer drive get around ?

Now you've gotten even less realistic. You're positing the development of an entirely new business model for transportation. Will the Zipcar is out there now, and people can lease normal autos, I think the idea that car ownership will cease in addition to human operation of the vehicles ignores how inherently conservative the normal person actually is.

First, the technology needs to become cheap, simple and reliable. Then, the car makers need to produce several million of these cars. Meanwhile everyone needs to agree that it's a good idea. Oh, and keep in mind that cars can easily stay on the road for 10 years after they roll off the assembly line (I've had each of mine for 9 years), so add a minimum of 10 years to the year the last non-automatic car rolls off the assembly line.

Examine, for example, the seat belt. They first went into production vehicles in 1956, but it wasn't mandatory anywhere in the US until 1984 and still isn't mandatory in every state - fifty years later. Thus, I don't think it unreasonable to assume that despite the obvious benefits listed in your "no mores", it just won't happen in our lifetimes. --Habap 18:30, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

P.S. since you're obviously interested in Wikipedia, why don't you create yourself a username? Check outWikipedia:Contributing FAQ.

I stumbled across this and am amused that 5 years later, we still have no driverless cars on the market, despite our wishful friend, who thought they'd be all over the place. --Habap (talk) 20:27, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

Okay, look. The guy who said that few will want a fully automated car is correct. Driving is FUN. I like to drive, and so does almost everyone I know. Honestly, listen to yourself. Will many people really want a car that does everything, perfectly, and you just sit there? I know you do, but most won't. Yes, it would be safer, but the possibility of an accident is part of what gives driving its thrill. Also, most individuals LOVE to own a car. I work on my truck every week. I like changing the oil and the filter, tweaking the engine to perform better, etc. I like to see how hard I can turn on a sharp corner and I like to speed when nobody is around. See? No personal cars is BORING. Automation gives life a dull, repetitive, bland quality. You always know what will happen, and the chance of excitement, adventure, or disaster is practically none. Humans need danger, control, freedom. For example: many people like to go for a drive for enjoyment. Nobody likes to ride in a taxi for enjoyment. That is essentially what an automated car is, a robot taxi. It would be great for blind, eldery etc., but regular people want control. I want to actually steer, to feel the gas and the brake, to control it. I can go ten miles under the speed limit or I can peel out at a stop sign. Now I understand driving is one of the most dangerous activities on the planet, more deadly than lightning strikes and shark attacks combined, but is it really worth surrendering something we have loved for over a hundred years to robots? -USAdrivr —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.208.4.200 (talk) 08:38, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

I personally think that a person should not be restricted in his/her ability to drive a car without automation. I think that would be seriously unreasonable, saying that under certain situations you would not be able to drive the car unless it was operating in full-auto or in some kind of partial automation mode. AVKent882 (talk) 16:42, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

If you're old enough to form an opinion on automated driving then you'll unlikely ever have to worry about giving it up in your practical lifetime. Of course driving your own car will be as antiquated as horseback riding is now in ~100 years probably, but that's not really something to keep you from getting out of bed. Your ford will be there for some time to come. 76.103.47.66 (talk) 21:08, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

in 100 years you will be flying your own spaceship in full manual mode. unless those 'green' fanatics expand their operations to space. 86.43.88.90 (talk) 22:35, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

Traffic synchronization?

Surely there should be mention of constant synchronization and communication between driverless cars and traffic protocols, signals, and workers which would obviously be required for a fully driverless car traffic system. I think this would be the next step up from simple driverless cars, where the entire system is united and in constant communication and can dynamically adapt to situations (ex. Traffic "overseer" computers will redirect cars away from a problem automatically and instantaneously). This would certainly require a complete overhaul of not only cars, but also all traffic systems (highways, rules, signals, workers, intersections).

Whatever, next comes the Matrix. Just doing my part to push mankind to singularity. --Exander 00:50, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

Comment to above -

The best way to impede the transition from manual to autonomous automobiles is to insist that all of those features -- which ultimately may prove wise or even necessary -- must be fulfilled at some arbitrary deadline date. Initially, the only features necessary are these :

1) Auto/autos shall be compatible with manual autos;

2) They shall move their passengers swiftly AND safely.

Observed side-by-side, the only way that a manual auto should able to be distinguished from an auto/auto (except for the absence of the steering wheel) is that the latter drives more precisely, more politely, more safely and always operates within the law (when the speed-limit signs are not hidden behind trees or other visual obstructions). When an externally generated surprise occurs, the auto/auto will generally react in a manner similar to that of a highly experienced and talented professional driver (while staying within the law and not endangering others), since those driving rules and manners are exactly those contained within its control system.

During the transition period, auto/autos may be able to snitch on manual autos being operated outside the law.

Autonomous means autonomous : That is, the bells and whistles, the important advantages of LIMITED local and central external control will only gradually emerge as fewer and fewer manual vehicles are present in the mix of traffic. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 162.42.86.41 (talk • contribs)

Traffic synchronization should be solved within the autonomous auto and not outside it, preferably without computer-only communication protocols. With action/reaction algorithms combined with traffic monitor systems that broadcast information about traffic conditions, an auto/auto should be able to optimize traffic flow on the micro level. When all auto/autos do this, traffic will also be optimized at the macro level. All that needs to be done is design algorithms that can do this and create a certification system for manufacturers to comply with. Doing it this way will cost a lot less. When traffic monitors are missing the auto/auto can still do its job. Also humans can participate in traffic without having to speak binary which is a great advantage. I can already imagine jaywalking to become a common practice. You just cross the road and the auto/autos let you cross. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Davekok (talk • contribs) 12:30, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

Dual mode transit - monorail

I think a seperate article should be made within the urban transit. Monorail systems such as RUF, SkyCab, ... should be granted their own article. 91.176.223.53 (talk) 14:17, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

Electric cars.

I propose that this driver less cars will be electric, and maybe with batteries recharged "in route". Stop burning co2 generating fuels. --Dagofloreswi (talk) 06:23, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

Human driven "extreme miles" at both ends of the trip

Besides I would not mind, driving myself the extreme miles, V.gr: from home to the highway entrance, and from selected exit to my job´s parking lot (and in the return trip) if I can type my laptop, watch TV, etc, the rest of the way. That is the must difficult miles, at both extremes of the trip. --Dagofloreswi (talk) 06:23, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

History

Where is the history about this?

Does anyone have any information regarding the begining of the AGV Concept.

Social Costs Section

I removed it, since it had no sources, constituted OR and was predictive of what might happen when/if driverless cars come into general usage. --Nuujinn (talk) 22:44, 15 August 2010 (UTC)

Google

http://techcrunch.com/2010/10/09/google-automated-cars/ riffic (talk) 09:24, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

What about PriBot?

Does Anthony Levandowski's Pribot merit mention? http://news.cnet.com/8301-11386_3-10042320-76.html — Preceding unsigned comment added by Girl2k (talk • contribs) 22:16, 16 January 2011 (UTC)

Cleanup

The article is quite frankly a mess, lots of OR and unsourced assertions. Just a head's up that I'll be starting a major cleanup in the next day or so. --Nuujinn (talk) 21:30, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

Roboassess

• Check for dated info
• Accuracy of refs
• Check for science-fantasy and predictions
• Remove chat (Discussion... section) and POV
• Add DARPA competitions and implications

Chaosdruid (talk) 14:24, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

Misplaced section: Driver-assistance

reading the Intelligent car page, it seems that everything on this page under the "Driver-assistance" section should actually be moved to the Intelligent car page. It isn't especially relevant to this page anyway. The name isn't even grammatically correct; there shouldn't be a dash.Owen214 (talk) 09:35, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

Limits of driverless cars

I feel like the article is missing a section which accurately describes the huge gulf between safe, reliable autonomous vehicles and current technology. Specifically, I'm thinking of the liability issue and the more general issue of "unexpected problems" and AI-completeness. I have this quote from Scientific American, but I'm not sure where to add it to this article:

"In the wake of Toyota's much publicized recall for unintended acceleration, the idea of conceding control of our cars to software seems about as sane as letting a Roomba vacuum cleaner do brain surgery."

I feel that the article needs some discussion of the limits of the technology, or else the article seems biased. ---- CharlesGillingham (talk) 16:30, 5 November 2010 (UTC)

I've gone ahead and tagged the section. There needs to be a well-sourced paragraph that talks about safety and liability. Driverless cars can't deal with any truly unusual situations in the real world, and because of this, they will not achieve six sigma (that is, one error in every 1,000,000 miles) levels of reliability and safety, for a long time. The article needs to mention this. ---- CharlesGillingham (talk) 22:32, 10 January 2011 (UTC)

Yes, 6 sigma is desirable. Are you measuring it in miles, km, trips or hours? Are you counting fatalities, injuries or incidents? Depend how you measure, today's vehicles do not meet that standard. See my paper at www.enviroteach.com/social_ramifications.pdf for some interesting statistics. I'll add a section on liability. ---- Tyler Folsom

Nuujinn rolled back my updates, so I will not contribute further to this article. The present version on WP states that driverless vehicles could save 41,000 lives per year, which implies that all drivers can be replaced, all traffic fatalities eliminated and somehow several thousand additional lives can be saved. Sebastian Thrun [S Thrun, What we are driving at, Google Blog 10/09/2010] estimates that half of traffic injuries could be prevented. Neither number is credible, since no one knows what percent of car trips will be driverless or what the fatality rate for driverless vehicles will be. A 1995 study [L. D. Shen, J. Huang and F. Zhao, Automated People Mover Applications: A Worldwide Review] found that autonomy drastically reduced the accident rates for commuter trains. If thinking is permitted, one might conclude that there is a possibility that autonomy could greatly reduce traffic accidents. ---- Tyler Folsom

Yes, I did, and please accept my apologies if that was offputting, but please understand why I did so. If, as you say (and I do not disagree since there's no reliable way to estimate how good a complex technology will be 5-10 year out) the numbers are not credible, what we need here is some reliable source (per WP:RS) that asserts that. Now, you have a source a 1995 study that show that autonomy reduces accident rates in commuter trains, but that doesn't treat driverless cars. To draw a conclusion here that because that is true, the same might be true for cars, is to engage in WP:OR, and we don't do that here. You seem to have expertise in the topic, and that is certainly welcome, esp. in this case where there have been many unsupported assertions, but we need to be careful about following policy. If you can bring some sources to the table that directly support the assertions that driverless cars will only reduce accident rates by a factor of X, or that a particular estimate of how much they would reduce rates is questionable, we can certainly use those--the more reliable sources the better. And if you yourself have written an article that is published in a reliable source such as a magazine, newspaper, journal, etc, we can probably use that as well, but I would ask that you note that you're the author in the edit summary or here on the talk page so as to avoid the appearance of a conflict of interest. We can't use self published sources, except in limited cases. So the short version is that I hope you'll stick around and help us out with this. --Nuujinn (talk) 18:43, 16 January 2011 (UTC)

Nuujinn is right, as far as Wikipedia goes. Wikipedia is very careful to avoid publishing original research. We only report material that is found in the literature. Every word in Wikipedia must be attributed to a reliable source. It doesn't even matter whether it is correct or not; for Wikipedia, it only matters whether some authority says it is correct.

Before you leave, consider helping this article. The liability issue has to be addressed in the article, and we need some who is familiar with the literature to point us towards some published sources that discuss the difficulty that auto makers are expected to face if they try to put driverless cars on the road.

Consider this: Suppose a driverless car kills a kid because it didn't notice the child's mother waving, screaming and running into the road. Something horrible has happened. Who pays for this mistake? The manufacturer of the vehicle will be sued for many millions of dollars. How can an auto maker protect itself against this? Or consider this: Suppose that, somewhere in millions lines of code, there is a bug. Just a simple, stupid, careless bug, that causes the car to misread kilometers per hour per minute as miles per hour per minute and accelerates the car too fast on an icy road. Once again, the automaker will be sued. How can they be certain no such bug exists? The experience of history (e.g. the software crisis) would suggest that they can not. Will automakers take this risk? And finally, consider what happens if there are thousands of such accidents, even if these accidents are a bit more rare for driverless cars than for human-driven cars. How many billions will be required to defend the auto makers against the lawsuits? ---- CharlesGillingham (talk) 07:10, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

The shame is that the vehicle would be reducing the likelyhood of such accidents, but the blame would be on the vehicle, since it would be it's own operator. With auto companies having far deeper pockets than individual drivers, the estates of any victims would go after the auto companies. Of course, if the insurance companies examine the costs and the savings and then decide to put themselves into the victim-operator equation as they currently do with human operated vehicles, the issue might be avoided. Should be interesting to see what happens. --Habap (talk) 20:53, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

First of all, crashes like this wouldn't be a little more rare, they would be a lot more rare. In fact, they wold be a complete anomaly. A computer driven car has a much more quick reaction time them a human and can be programed to give full attention to its surroundings immediately. Secondly, you forget that if there was some small glitch in the operating program of the vehicle that causes it to not stop when an unexpected obstruction comes i the way, it would become glaringly obvious during the test runs. Then, the computer and mechanical engineers would check the car again to see what caused the glitch and would fix it.--137.146.175.105 (talk) 22:00, 13 September 2011 (UTC)

Of course, most bugs would be found, but the odds are assuredly against a bug-free (and also, hack-free) system. The real world is also a notoriously unpredictable place and, having written a lot of code that I thought was bug-free and that passed all of its testing, I know that no testing regime is perfect. --Habap (talk) 18:03, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

mining

the section added about mining - is this relevant to the article?? Owen214 (talk) 23:25, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Driver subjectivity

I have an issue that has apparently gone completely unnoticed, and that is the fact that there are many people such as I who are repulsed by the idea of a car that drives itself. The fact is: some people enjoy driving! Then there are the cars we have now. Granted, many of them are little more than appliances, but there are many machines adored by enthusiasts world-wide; this future of driverless cars obviously means they will be banned. But to what end? Does this mean every last manually-controlled car will be scrapped? What of the countless irreplaceable vehicles that don't deserve such a cruel fate?

There are many questions and concerns for those of us who's hobby, nevermind livelihood would be seriously compromised by such a system. There's also the issue of those that love to drive, tend to be GOOD at it. People who drive cars they love, people who care very much about driving as a skill, or even an artform in some cases, people whom; as a by-product of this life-style, are very knowledgable, very disciplined and very passionate about road safety. What happens to these people? Are they doomed to a life of misery because the majority of the general public don't care about such frivolous ideas?

If driverless cars are introduced to the public at any point in the future, than regular automobiles will HAVE to be banned; otherwise the whole purpose of the idea is defeated. Unless driverless cars can somehow share the road with human-controlled cars, which is a much higher safety risk than anything else, it's going to be one or the other. And that means government restrictions on all vehicles, which leads me to another problem: crime, in the form of said passionate people who will do their very best to keep driving their manually controlled, internal combustion powered cars in the face of the law. One can bet there will be criminal organizations dedicated to creating and distributing fuel and parts. Outlaws everywhere will conceal their vehicles and drive them whenever they feel brave. Some of these vehicles will be able to easily outrun just about any autonomous vehicle, save for EMP attacks of course, which still wouldn't be 100% reliable. The point being is, the human will is not to be underestimated.

And what of motorsports? That will be the last bastion of human controlled cars, surely that won't be outlawed? Still hardly practical for any driver to go do, there are not that many race tracks in the world and not much room left to build more. And that's not factoring in cost.

Finally, what about the untold amount of roads that are placed well away from civilization? There are many roads that have no traffic and no pedestrians? Would human-controlled cars be banned from ALL roads, including those rarely seen? Or would the world be split up into zones where human controlled vehicles are allowed? After all, not everybody lives in a crowded city center.

There are many points to this side of the issue, but I thought I'd bring a few of them up. Sure, wikipedia is a place of facts and this is all just opinion, but I rightly believe it's a valid opinion that ought to be at least discussed. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.50.75.31 (talk) 04:18, 18 May 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not a place for discussions. 22:55, 28 May 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Quaber (talk • contribs)

There seem to be lots of misunderstandings here - as a mechatronic engineer, I can clarify most of them: robotic cars could drive alongside human cars, but it just wouldn't be as efficient; EMP is not practical, especially not for cars; and finally, human drivers trying to evade bans would really easily stand out and would be reported by the robotic cars. As a personal opinion, I would think that human motorsport would eventually be perceived as being similar to the paralympics. Owen214 (talk) 13:14, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

Responding, increased automation could cause decrease in relevant skills in a significant percentage of the population. However, automated cars with human driver controllability may not yield all the listed, expected benefits of fully automated cars. I think the question of licensing for being able to drive an automated car is similar to the matter of gun control; who may own arms and walk among civilians and who may drive a car and walk among civilians might be the same question. Public security increases with 4% to 5% plain clothes legal gun ownership in the general population; I think public safety might optimize with automated cars and 4% to 5% driver-operable without visible indicators as to which individuals have autonomy on the road. JenniferProkhorov (talk) 18:36, 24 January 2012 (UTC)

sources

[2] 165.230.194.245 (talk) 15:48, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

This is a great article. However, people might be afraid to click on the link if address is hidden. The url address is http://greatergreaterwashington.org/post/12955/how-will-self-driving-cars-change-transportation/ --Mschribr (talk) 08:27, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

Wired has done a great series on this subject:

• Let the Robot Drive: The Autonomous Car of the Future Is Here
• Mapping the Road Ahead for Autonomous Cars
• Autonomous Cars Through the Ages
• Navigating the Legality of Autonomous Vehicles
• Five Reasons The Robo-Car Haters Are Wrong

MakeBelieveMonster (talk) 18:22, 11 February 2012 (UTC)

Nevada law

The Nevada law did not authorize driverless car operation in Nevada; rather, it specifically forbade it.

What the law did is to charge the DOT to come up with regulations regarding the operation of driverless cars in Nevada, and to authorize cars that comply with such to be driven on Nevada highways.

Until such time as the regulations are made and approved, no driverless car can comply with them. You can't comply with something that doesn't exist. This may, in fact, have the opposite effect of raising the issues of whether a self-parallel-parking car can legally be operated, since it is not regulated or approved. Jsharpminor (talk) 17:21, 19 March 2012 (UTC)