Atonomous cars

"Drove" one yesterday on a track at GM's proving grounds near Detroit. It was rather creepy, yet at the same time, compelling. While I generally despise a lot of gadgetry – I do see the benefit of this technology in that it may help to protect those of us who actually still like to drive... from those multi-tasking, mobile-office commuters.

It was interesting. Could feel my hands twitching, really wanted to grab the wheel. Fascinating to see how well it worked though, at a speed of 60 mph the car stayed within its own lane, slowed down when it came upon another vehicle and moved out of the way of one that crossed into its lane. Nudging the seat's side bolsters moved the car in degrees to the right or the left within its lane. It was easy to take back control though, and the vibrating seat bottom (left, right or both cheeks) alerted the driver to any obstacles in the car's path.

Was this a fully self-driving autonomous car or a car with automatic lane-holding?

It was "semi-autonomous", or what GM is calling "super-cruise". Here's some more info from a colleague (who is much quicker at publishing than I!) http://life.nationalpost.com/2012/03/28/cadillac-systems-take-safety-interaction-to-a-new-level/

With super-cruise employed, the car pretty much drives itself on the circuit. They claim it will be available this decade – though I can't see it being used much outside of major roadways – for example one lane roads or gravel that hasn't any boundary line paint. Who knows? Maybe there will be sensors embedded in major roadways by that time.

My dream: Get up, get ready for work, get into the car, say "Work", then go back to sleep for the next hour or so. It would be the next best thing to a Star Trek transporter. I love driving, but as I get older, I'm really starting to hate commuting.

In reply to Ian F:

+1

I do love driving, but I have come to hate commuting. I agree the extra hour of sleep would be great!

Also I like the idea of not needing a designated driver any more.

Still I have a hard time imagining self driving cars out on the roadway. I think safety is their Achilles heel. That is not to say that I don't thing a safe system could be devised I am sure, a system could be devised that would be 10 times safer than a human driven car.

But since all people overestimate their driving skills, they will not willingly hand over control over the car until the self driving cars are 10,000 times safer than a human driven one. Even then I think people will get all hysterical over "safety" and would prefer to drive themselves even though they are FAR more likely to screw it up than a computer controlled system.

I think they are a great idea. I do think the acclimation process is going to be a bumpy ride.

Very cool....until the day the GPS runs your sleeping ass off of a Pier.

OnStar* " Sir, are you garblegarbleblubblubblub...."

EDIT*...I am curious about the 'seat of the pants' driving thing...

I don't even like automatic climate control.

I love the automation of modern cars. It makes the daily grind not so bad. I do want to be able to turn all nannies off, though.

I know it seems most here would be opposed to autonomous driving, but when it comes to the daily commute or trying to figure out who has to not drink for an evening of partying and driving drunk people home, it'd be genius. Autonomous cars aren't going to take away your days at the track, but imagine being able to fix last minute details in the trailer as your tow vehicle autonomously drives you to the track...

I, 100%, hate the idea. I won't ever go to it.

I see HUGE potential for nanny type laws if it Autonomous cars work out, but in a perfect world I think they could be great.

All I can think of is the 4 times per year trip from Daytona Beach to Allentown PA would have been so much better with that. On the other hand I do like driving quite a bit on back roads so I'd still want something fun to drive. Long highway trips bore me.

So.... Super cruise on a MS3?

MrJoshua wrote: I see HUGE potential for nanny type laws if it Autonomous cars work out, but in a perfect world I think they could be great.

That is the problem.. in a perfect world, they would be great... except the world ain't perfect...

To really work effectively, they would need a dedicated road and/or HOV-type lane network that would only be for cars so equiped with little to no risk of human interference. In theory, the cars would be able to operate more efficiently, cruising along at highway speeds tightly packed together. Yeah... it would take some getting used to.

No more DWI ?

I'd prefer some sort of mechanical safety net thrown in, just in case the puter scrambles it's brain.

I used to drive from Chicago to Denver on a regular basis. During the long (incredibly boring) slog across Nebraska I always wished for a slot-car like prong I could lower into a groove in the road and sleep my way through the flatlands. This seems like a similar idea only completely electronic.

Although many municipalities would lose tons of $$$ if there were no more DUI arrests.

No occifer, I swearz I wuzn't driving! (hic) My car must've been confused and missed dat red light. I blamez the city planners fo not installin proper sensors!

Mmm... Lesley's cheeks vibrating...

I guess I'm a Luddite. I do not trust this type of technology, I see far too many potential problems. All it would take is a power outage and suddenly all the obliviots would be back in 'control'. That scars the poopie out of me; most people just do not have the presence of mind to react quickly in such a situation. 60 MPH is 88 feet per second, a GOOD reaction time is 3/4 second, then the corrective response... figure on covering at least 350-400 feet before being back in 'control'. I do not like those odds.

Yeah, I know aircraft have autopilots etc but the meat intelligence backup is trained on quick response in the event of failure. Not to mention that pilots would generally have a longer time to respond, since they are not 10 inches from the car in front/behind at 70 MPH. If the autopilot poops out at, say, 18,000 feet then the 'glide time' could be as much as a minute.

MrJoshua wrote: I see HUGE potential for nanny type laws if it Autonomous cars work out, but in a perfect world I think they could be great.

I know, there will be all kinds of crap like mandatory airbags, mandatory tire pressure monitoring, mandatory ABS, mandatory traction/stability control, mandatory... ohhh, wait.

Curmudgeon wrote: Yeah, I know aircraft have autopilots etc but the meat intelligence backup is trained on quick response in the event of failure. Not to mention that pilots would generally have a longer time to respond, since they are not 10 inches from the car in front/behind at 70 MPH. If the autopilot poops out at, say, 18,000 feet then the 'glide time' could be as much as a minute.

I have had an autopilot fail several times. If the disconnect bell is weak or broken you may not know it failed for several minutes if the airplane is trimmed properly.

I'm all for the vibe seats (passengers too), will skip the rest...

In reply to pilotbraden:

That's what I mean. Stuff fails. As a pilot, you have time to do something. If the same thing happened at 60 MPH and you were 10 inches from the car in front of you, which has had the SAME THING happen... I'd rather the drivers have to at least pretend to pay attention.

Now that I think about it, this isn't really all that new. Mercedes (and IIRC VW) demonstrated a 'smart road' prototype several years ago. Yeah, that's what I want; engineers who can't make a freakin' bulb socket that lasts designing a electronic system that puts driverless cars a foot apart at highway speeds.

I used to be opposed to this sort of thing, because it's run by a computer, and they break. Often. I don't want a 6000 lb. computerized SUV coming at my side door as I drive through an intersection because the damned thing runs Windows and it decided to freeze.

But now I'm thinking this will allow the people on the road who couldn't follow traffic laws if their lives depended on it to not annoy the people who actually like driving. They could read their newspapers and eat their breakfast and put their makeup on in total ignorance of the things around them, like they normally do, only they won't be piloting a gigantic hunk of steel. I also imagine road rage wouldn't be much of an issue, because computers would be doing the driving, so why get mad at another motorist?

Just as long as they don't make "old-fashioned" drive-it-yourself cars illegal

Exactly.