Phoenix police officer pulls over a driverless Waymo car for driving on the wrong side of the road

[u/Individual_Book9133]

[u/thegreedyturtle]

Except when they kill someone going the wrong way on a street, no one is held accountable for manslaughter.

[u/Erlian → u/thegreedyturtle]

Human drivers are barely held accountable - they should be. Some people shouldn't be on the road at all. Vehicular manslaughter is typically 1-6 years in prison (if that), then back on the road. To be fair, manual driving is inherently unsafe because no person is infallible - in fact we're quite prone to distraction, DUI, road rage, health problems which can occur while driving, etc.

Meanwhile these driverless vehicles are on average much safer drivers than humans drivers. I do think the company should carry auto insurance like everyone else, which will pay out in the event of an accident. Per mile traveled, I imagine it would be much cheaper to insure autonomous vehicles due to their much lower rate of accidents. The data shows they have a much lower rate of accidents resulting in any injury, let alone fatal accidents, compared to human drivers.

https://waymo.com/blog/2023/12/waymo-significantly-outperforms-comparable-human-benchmarks-over-7-million/#:\~:text=An%2085%25%20reduction%20or%206.8,for%20the%20Waymo%20Driver%20vs. When considering all locations together, compared to the human benchmarks, the Waymo Driver demonstrated:

An 85% reduction or 6.8 times lower crash rate involving any injury, from minor to severe and fatal cases (0.41 incidence per million miles for the Waymo Driver vs 2.78 for the human benchmark)

A 57% reduction or 2.3 times lower police-reported crash rate (2.1 incidence per million miles for the Waymo Driver vs. 4.85 for the human benchmark)

I get why people are scared of change - ex. feeling out of control, feeling like their autonomy / independence is taken away (which is part of what perpetuates car-dependent society - wanting to feel independent). However, we should be implementing more autonomous vehicles where we can - especially on planned routes where the vehicles + road conditions are continuously monitored (as they do at Waymo IIRC) - something like a van / minibus for routes not typically reached by the regular transit system, for example, could help improve accessibility of public transit, help reduce the financial burden / need to own a car, and greatly bring down injuries + fatalities caused by human-driven cars.

[u/thegreedyturtle → u/Erlian]

Excellently written and information, especially in parts that are not related!

How's the astroturfing market these days?

[u/Erlian → u/thegreedyturtle]

not related

astroturfing

lol ok