Posted on 10/01/2017 8:16:27 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
The Senate has agreed to pass legislation lifting regulations on manufacturers of self-driving cars. Full details will be announced the first week of October, but it's expected the bill will cover safety and manufacturing regulations as well as driver protection.
Paving the Way
United States roadways are one step closer to being traversed by driverless cars: on September 30, the Senate announced that it had reached an agreement to lift some of the regulations on manufacturers that made it harder to get self-driving cars on the road.
“While this Senate self-driving vehicle legislation still has room for further changes, it is a product of bipartisan cooperation we both stand behind,” said Senate Commerce Committee Chairman John Thune (R-S.D.) and Sen. Gary Peters (D-Mich.), who introduced the legislation, in a joint statement.
The original bill that Peters and Thune took to the Senate, known as the American Vision for Safer Transportation through Advancement of Revolutionary Technologies (AV START) Act, was broad-reaching. In addition to removing barriers to manufacture, the bill proposed enhanced safety oversight of manufacturers, as well as guidance for state and local research on traffic safety and law enforcement challenges. It proposed to strengthen cyber-security policies to protect the information and safety of drivers. The bill also included measures on automated trucking, consumer education, and protections for drivers with disabilities.
On October 5, the Senate will announce which provisions were retained in the approved legislation.
The bill is expected to utilize some provisions from a similar bill that was passed in the House of Representatives earlier in September. That bill allowed manufacturers to produce an initial load of 25,000 cars in the first year. After three years, if they can prove that AI vehicles are at least as safe as human-directed cars, that will increase to 100,000 annually.
Jobs and More
American policymakers and manufacturers alike have been hurrying to get aboard the self-driving train—so to speak. Around the country and the world, self-driving cars are rapidly multiplying. The UK will be testing “platoons” of driverless semi trucks by the end of next year. Uber already uses them to pick up passengers in Pittsburgh and Arizona, Lyft is introducing them in San Francisco, and the city of Sacramento is seeking to make their city a driverless car testing ground. Tesla CEO Elon Musk even believes that most cars in production will be autonomous within ten years.
Yet the legal framework still isn’t in place for this transportation revolution.
“Self-driving vehicles will completely revolutionize the way we get around in the future, and it is vital that public policy keep pace with these rapidly developing lifesaving technologies that will be on our roads in a matter of years,” said Senator Peters, in his statement on the original bill. He emphasized that the industry has the potential to create thousands of new jobs.
Given that approximately 93% of all accidents have been attributed to human error, the senators and others have emphasized that self-driving cars aren’t just a job creator or a cool way to get around—they could save millions of lives.
35,092 vehicle accident deaths occurred in 2015.
How long will it take to save millions of lives ?
There were 1.25 million road traffic deaths in 2013.
http://www.who.int/gho/road_safety/mortality/traffic_deaths_number/en/
Your answer, given the claimed 93% human error rate, is about two years.
In other words, this Senate action is another example of the already unconstitutionally big federal government unconstitutionally expanding its powers even more.
Thomas Jefferson and James Madison had warned patriots to be on their guard against the feds unconstitutionally expanding their powers.
”I believe there are more instances of the abridgement of freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments by those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations.” —James Madison, Speech at the Virginia Convention to ratify the Federal Constitution (1788-06-06)
”To take a single step beyond the boundaries thus specially drawn around the powers of Congress, is to take possession of a boundless field of power, no longer susceptible of any definition.” —Thomas Jefferson, Jefferson's Opinion on the Constitutionality of a National Bank : 1791
”The system of the General Government is to seize all doubtful ground. We must join in the scramble, or get nothing. Where first occupancy is to give right, he who lies still loses all.” —Thomas Jefferson to James Monroe, 1797.
Patriots need to pink-slip as many career lawmakers as they can in the 2018 elections, replacing them with state sovereignty-respecting patriots who aren’t scared to petition the states for new constitutional powers as lawmakers should be doing on many issues, including healthcare.
In the meanwhile, patriots need to make sure that there are plenty of Trump-supporting patriot candidates on the primary ballots.
Just like cell phones and everything connected to the Internet so to self-driving cars will be Internet connected (all the traffic systems traffic data) and hackers WILL learn how to crack and access the operating systems of the self-driving cars and insert bugs and malicious viruses into them.
At some point there will be busy stretch of highway with thousands of cars on it and suddenly hundreds of them will go wildly out or control, at the same time, due to some bug, creating multiple chain reaction accidents involving hundreds of cars - just as malicious bus HAVE DONE in computer systems across the globe.
Insurance companies will suddenly have ample reason for massive insurance premium increases on all self-driving cars, because though the rate of such occurrences will remain unknown, the damages relative to them will be huge.
The “safety” of them long term DEPENDS on every spec of driver and road data available be deposited in databases to “control” traffic, avoid bottlenecks and hazards and IT WILL include your identity and every detail of where you are with your car. You will not be able to turn it all off without turning of the “self-driving” function.
As far as I am concerned, that data collection is its real purpose, and selling it as “safer” is an excuse for adopting another “we don’t need the humans” tool of the arrogant technologists.
Just like cell phones and everything connected to the Internet so to self-driving cars will be Internet connected (all the traffic systems traffic data) and hackers WILL learn how to crack and access the operating systems of the self-driving cars and insert bugs and malicious viruses into them.
They need to be autonomous (that means not required to be connected to anything). GPS is passive, not active. It does not require connection to a network.
All the original work on autonomous vehicles required no connection that could be hacked.
Things can change. But most likely, connecting to a network will be an option, not a necessity.
Hold my Beer! What could go wrong?
this legislation should be called the “Lawyer Full Employment Act” since autos are so safe now from a design and manufacturing perspective that the only reasonably possible lawsuit is against driver error.
With so-called “driverless” cars the only possible target for a lawsuit is the manufacturer in the event of any kind of accident.
leaving aside the miryad frightening technical issues, when the “self-”driving car takes you somewhere or someway you don’t want to go, will it obey your command to stop?
and if you take it somewhere it doesn’t want to go, what will the powers in authority (i.e., the senate) do about that?
and if it doesn’t work out, who is going to be banned from driving the road, the self-driving cars or self-conscious, sentient beings?
these people need to be reminded of kubrick’s 2001 A Space Odyssey. this senate is both anti-goodwill and anti-freewill to man, but what else is new. uniparty leftists run amok.
“They need to be autonomous.”
If that is truly a current legal requirement it will be one of the shortest lived pieces of law.
I have read the treatises of the self-driving car gurus, and all their plans expect nationwide data systems connecting all the cars and all the traffic systems in the country, so that higher order traffic decision making can be communicated to, and in some cases even control, the on board systems.
Everyone is being duped, as usual, when it comes to the long term plans of the arrogant technologists.
Hackable. Will be a nightmare.
Great way to get rid of humans.
Doncha just love “Central Planning “?
Hey when corporate lobbyists and money are involved, these guys can move their asses.
Yet another shining example of corporate America, writing the rules.
With so-called “driverless” cars the only possible target for a lawsuit is the manufacturer in the event of any kind of accident.
Thank God! I was really concerned that this Congress was not getting anything accomplished!
Central Planning sucks, but it does seem as if the US Congress is doing something very similar, doesn’t it?
There is no such thing as the “driverless car”. Someone will be driving, it just won’t be YOU! Everyone just think about that for a minute and see if you get the warm fuzzy feeling of freedom or....
Ef em....where’s our wall..tax cut and bozocare repeal?
So far I've not heard the answer to the primary question: "if the self driving car is the cause of the accident then who pays?"
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