Quote:
Originally Posted by Efthreeoh
In the April issue of Automobile Magazine Jamie Kitman wrote on the topic of the future when cars have become autonomous and there are no longer drivers, just passengers. He sees it, I think correctly, where the Telecom companies will see to it that they take the act of driving out of the automobile for the purposes of increasing their data-use/data mining market (i.e. redirect the time used to focus on driving to Googling). And what company is leading the trend on the driverless car? Google of course.
Kitman says the Taxpayer funded automation of the roads and cars will be justified by the Government on safety, efficiency, and environment preservation, which again he is right; money Kitman thinks should be used to solve global warming  and feeding the hungry.
The liberal crap aside, I got to thinking what enthusiasts thought about the autonomous future. Is it really possible from an engineering standpoint? Is it really fundable with Taxpayer dollars? How do you feel about it? When do you think it will happen? Etc.
It is an interesting topic to think about |
I see this tech as an autopilot in airplanes with a manual override. Since the real driving schools are not mandatory to get your license, most drivers have no clue how to drive. Now add cell phones and food in the mix and you get traffic patterns and behaviors as we see on roads today. The autopilot would be a nice option in some cases for folks that should not drive, mainly teens and elderly. It is just a tool for certain applications but it will need to have a robust failure prevention. I see planes being fully automated before cars. Now think about how long it took FAA and airplane manufacturers to develop current systems and procedures, and the GPS tracking is still not implemented on transcontinental flights but it is present in every smart phone. It will be a long time until road traffic is fully automated. Potentially larger cities with dense infrastructure are main targets. I can't see it being implemented across US in the next 30 yrs mainly due to laws and non-existent procedures.