Driverless cars: Google in the front seat, hanky panky in the back

Canada Free Press ^ | 05/12/16 | Dr. Klaus Kaiser

[Sean_Anthony]

I now Understand...

What’s so enticing about the (just-around-the corner) self-driving cars?

In view of my slightly advanced age, I may be forgiven to be a bit slow in learning—but now I understand: It’s all about what happens in the back seat!

Special: Do You Like Entering Contests & Big Prize Sweepstakes? As the Globe and Mail reports, Kirk, of the Canadian Automated Vehicles Centre of Excellence, told the Canadian Press on Monday that “… once computers are doing the driving, there will be a lot more sex in cars.” Another (biased ?) pundit, Sergio Marchionne, is claimed to have stated that the new system “… will be fundamental to delivering automotive technology solutions that ultimately have far-reaching consumer benefits.”

[Disambiguator]

Where did THAT come from?

[Lazamataz]

You are the king of Normalcy Bias.

[Bratch]

Airplanes have been doing it for decades.

[elcid1970]

Running the surveillance vid backwards & speeded up would be a real hoot. A memorial to two driverless pioneers.

[discostu]

I’m the king of actually bothering to understand what the plan and capabilities of the system are. Also the king of remembering that very similar dire predictions were made about OnStar 20 years ago and so far their accuracy rate is 0.

[AnotherUnixGeek]

No they won’t. Pure paranoid rubbish.

Because government has shown that it will not try to gain back-doors into technology to access and control it, right?

That's not paranoia, that's current reality. Government is about accumulating power and control. It's delusional to believe that law enforcement agencies will not insist on the ability to stop self-driving cars on demand, that government will not force self-driving cars to maintain strict speed limits, that government will not ration driving days along certain routes for environmental or traffic reasons - those things are already happening around the world. It's also delusional to believe that such control will not grow and expand relentlessly - government attempts to control always grow. Self-driving cars will make such efforts exponentially more easy - and our ability to move freely where and when we please will most certainly be diminished.

[Lazamataz]

Also the king of remembering that very similar dire predictions were made about OnStar 20 years ago and so far their accuracy rate is 0.

I'm the king of noting that OnStar predictions were achieved by other means:

License Plate readers at every BART station

Palos Verdes Peninsula cities to install 44 license plate-reading cameras

Many thousands of similar articles.

And you are still the king of Normalcy Bias.

[CrazyIvan]

I remember kidding my grandfather about dating in a horse and buggy when I was little. He smiled and said “The horse knew where to go so you could mind to other business”. I was older before I understood what he meant and what the smile was about.

[ImJustAnotherOkie]

Reminds me of a scene in “The World According to Garp”

[discostu]

No, because nobody is building in centralized controls.

[discostu]

License plate readers don’t even come close to the predictions of OnStar.

[Mr. K]

LOL that is what I thought!
I often work out of town, and it is a 6 or 7 hour drive.

If I could sleep in the car while it drove there I could get 2 more days of work in.

[AnotherUnixGeek]

No, because nobody is building in centralized controls.

They will - it's very early days yet for self-driving technology and government as a whole is barely aware of the technology and it's potential for control. I don't dispute for a second that self-driving cars are an inevitability. I also have no doubt whatsoever that the net result will be significant curtailment of personal mobility.

[CIB-173RDABN]

We are going full circle.

Back before automobiles there were horses and carriages. One of the things about horses is they knew their way home and could get there without any directions from the “driver”.

(No first hand knowledge as I am not THAT old, but read enough where this fact was mentioned to consider it true)

[discostu]

No, they won’t. Too much over head, too many potential problems, no real gain. As I pointed out to others, similar predictions were made with OnStar 20 years ago, and that actually HAS centralized control, and none of those predictions have come to pass.

[Boogieman]

The 70s :)

[AnotherUnixGeek]

No, they won’t. Too much over head, too many potential problems, no real gain. As I pointed out to others, similar predictions were made with OnStar 20 years ago, and that actually HAS centralized control, and none of those predictions have come to pass.

We're talking now about technology which exists for the explicit purpose of controlling every phase of the operation of your car, which was never the case with OnStar. All self-driving cars will need the ability to communicate with each other to coordinate movement safely - it strains credulity to believe that government will not start with the demand that law enforcement be able to use this communication channel to bring self-driving cars to a safe halt to prevent the wild chase scenes which are a regular feature of the news, and we go from there.

[discostu]

Because of how much of the car it controls the amount of data for centralized control goes up drastically. OnStar had the important parts: knowing where you are, knowing where you’re going, ability to figure out your speed, ability to turn your car off. And yet none of the automatic ticket generation and location denial that people predicted then and now came to pass.

Self-driving cars don’t need to communicate with each other to coordinate movement. We don’t and the current systems don’t. Of course in this age of bluetooth they probably will BUT not through centralized control, they’ll actually talk TO each other. They haven’t used OnStar to halt wild chase scenes (and they probably should).

[Disambiguator]

Was it in a movie or something? I guess I missed that one.

[csivils]

The number of car accident related deaths is way to high for the nanny state to ignore.