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Ethical concerns with autonomous vehicles
Self - driving cars
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Introduction The next era is here, and everyone is talking about how autonomous cars are going to be the future of this country. In just a few years they will be everywhere on American roadways, but just like any other engineering project this new technology has brought many concerns to the public. Even though people tend to risk their lives everyday behind the wheel, they still do not view the risk equivalent or greater then driverless cars. Not only will the Self-driving cars be safer, but they will be beneficial in plenty of other ways.
Background
A statement was released by General Motors this Thursday, and they stated that they will be ready to launch the fully autonomous electric cars by the end of 2019. This
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Waymo talks about how their driverless cars pull over for emergency vehicles, brake for any animals crossing the street or pedestrian, and it could also read hand signals from the police and any city worker. Mark Fields, CEO of Ford announced that their self-driving vehicle will not have no steering wheel, nor will it have any pedals. Ford expected launch date is 5 years from now, 2021, and they claim that they have been working on this project for 10 years now. Mark Fields, said that Ford invested $150 million with the Baidu project as well. According to USA Today, self-driving vehicles should bring a lot of excitement for many reasons. One reason is that it will make it easier to travel from a destination to another. Second, autonomous cars will make it more convenient to transport seniors and people with physical issues. Last most important reason they mentioned is that it will decrease the deaths on the highway by 35,000 people each year, and a possibility of …show more content…
The public deserves more information from engineers in this matter, not just information on how the self-driving car functions, but information on any risks that it might bring to the public. According to Stephen Zoepf, the executive director of the Center for Automotive Research at Stanford (CARS), and some several of other scholars the most important question to ask is “what is the level of risk society would be willing to incur with self-driving cars on the road.” Another ethical concern according to them is the number of people whom will lose their job due to this technology, and the last concern they mentioned is the need of more transparency and collaboration in the design of the autonomous vehicles. The engineers of the self-driving cars still have plenty of ethical questions to answer from the public, especially before they actually release the autonomous vehicle. For example; how will a driverless car act if an accident was about to take place? Can it avoid the accident? A driver could try and avoid the accident, but can an autonomous car avoid
Because of that, self-driving cars will not be released this year, though it depends on the company. Several different car manufacturers have had multiple release dates. From Waymo, a company working with Google, saying their self-driving car will be released in 2018, to Nissan saying that their self-driving cars will be available by 2020. Tesla’s CEO is now promising by the end of 2017, he will have a Tesla that will be able to drive itself from Los Angeles to New York City, no human assistance needed. Ford is also now saying that its company will have a selection of Self-driving cars by 2021.
According to MakeUseOf (2015), Google’s 7 self-driving cars of Toyota Prius hybrids hit the roadways in 2010, led by Sebastian Thrum. Since hitting the road Google’s cars have over 1.5 million miles under their belt. These cars use data from Google Street View, data from cameras, LIDAR, and radar to place the car’s position on a map. This system has proven to work very well and seems to be the closest thing to a safe, functioning, self-driving car. Google believes that self-driving cars will increase safety, reduce traffic, and be better on the
Although there are issues with implementing self-driving cars on the roads today, self-driving cars can ultimately benefit society. According to public announcements made by companies like Tesla and Nissan, we may start seeing self-driving cars on the roads within the next 3 to 6 years [Ref. 1 and 2].
Google has successfully built a self-driving car, yet “Google insists on developing a car without a steering wheel partly because it contends that people often don’t pay attention while their cars are operating autonomously” (Vock 37). Even though autonomous vehicles drive themselves, passengers are still able to manually control certain features of the car. For example, the person in the vehicle “can manually control the car to go a little bit faster than the car might on its own” (Swant). Google has put much consideration on how the car drives and handles interactions at traffic signals and signs. For example, “Google has begun programming its fleet of self-driving cars to inch forward at for way stops” to make sure there are no cars before proceeding (qtd. In “Making Robot Cars More Human 1). When there are multiple cars traveling together, “computer control enables cars to drive behind one another, so they travel as a virtual unit (Fisher 60). The autonomous Google Car has proven to successfully drive on the roads with other vehicles, but the technology that is in the car is more complicated than it
Self-driving cars are the wave of the future. There is much debate regarding the impact a self-driving car will have on our society and economy. Some experts believe fully autonomous vehicles will be on the road in the next 5-10 years (Anderson). This means a vehicle will be able to drive on the road without a driver or any passengers. Like any groundbreaking technology, there is a fear of the unforeseen problems. Therefore, there will need to be extensive testing before anyone can feel safe with a vehicle of this style on the road. It will also take time for this type of technology to become financially accessible to the masses, but again alike any technology with time it should be possible. Once the safety concern has been fully addressed
Technology is evolving faster than ever these days, however there is one technology that could revolutionize the transportation industry. This technology is called autonomous cars, also known as self-driving cars. Autonomous cars can be defined as a vehicle that is capable of sensing its environment, and navigating without human input. Using different techniques such as GPS and radar, autonomous cars can detect surroundings, thus removing the human element in driving. This would have a positive effect in more ways than we could ever imagine. Research suggests that self-driving cars will become more abundant in the future because they will be more cost-effective, enhance safety, and decrease traffic congestion.
Although auto cars offer many advantages, there are arguments against the use of these vehicles. First stands the possibility of conflicting ethical issues. If a self driving
The engineering that goes into a driverless car covers all areas of mechanics, computing software and so on which still tends to frighten some drivers of its monstrosity on the inside. In the article “Google Cars Becoming Safer: Let the Robots Drive” it states that, “The economic lift from ridding the roads of human-driven vehicles would be over $190 billion per year. That would primarily come from reducing property damage caused by low-speed collisions”(Salkever). The point is that when driverless cars hit the road the cost of low-speed collision and save consumers money will be reduced. In the article “ Google Driverless Cars Run Into Problem: Cars With Drivers” Slakever states that “One Google car, in a test in 2009, couldn’t get through a four-way stop because its sensors kept waiting for other (human) drivers to stop completely and let it go. The human drivers kept inching forward, looking for the advantage — paralyzing Google’s robot”(Bosker). Current drivers have never followed the rule of the road, which have made the road more prone to any accident. Drivers have found the upper hand on not following traffic laws that makes manufacturing driverless car more meticulous to decrease accidents and breaking traffic laws. The fact that driverless car sensors can detect the errors of other human driven car is extraordinary. Human driven cars are trying to stick to the status quo of the roads when in reality human driven cars are breaking valuable innovation that will make the roads safe for generations to
They also through those technicalities address an ethical perspective. They approach their article through the use of questioning how an automated car will deal with moral decisions when there is an inevitable, no-win situation where an accident is unavoidable. The article questions if a self-driving car would choose between sparing the lives of its passengers vs. others or if it would pursue an option that opted for the least harm done such as calculating “the oncoming vehicles to assess the number of passengers at risk…” and then maneuvering to protect the majority of passengers (“Self-Driving Cars: An Ethical Perspective” 1). Therefore, the automated vehicle, not the passengers inside, would be to blame for any harm done to other vehicles or people inside or the passengers it was carrying. The article also questions who would be financially responsible for the harm done. The article then states different cars would be programmed with different moral algorithms to address case by case biases such as protecting the lives of children first, the majority of people, etc. The article states that autonomous cars will bring about many political and ethical decisions and issues. The journal also continues to assess whether autonomous cars will be socially
Technology has advanced so much over the years and it is impressive about how the automobile industry has played such a huge role in the development of technology over the years. One of the most amazing things is the autonomous car, which is important in the safety of people who are driving. The autonomous car is a car that is automatic when it is driving. This does not just mean that it has an automatic transmission. It also means that the car is actually driving itself. That means that it is actually steering the wheel in the directions that it needs to go. That is important because the car would need to know where to turn if it is going to get to where it needs to go and if it is going to be a car that is driving itself. Not only is that
Benefits of autonomous cars include providing quick and easy transportation, increasing safety, and advancing complex technology. However, setbacks of autonomous technology include no perfect programs, examples of failure, humans dependence on technology, government regulation, and other issues. In order to decide if we should accept autonomous vehicles we must look at benefits, risks, and potential technology improvements. Autonomous vehicles provide quick and easy transportation. Keating writes in her article how autonomous vehicles cut down the
For example, if someone inside the vehicle is suffering from an illness, and is unable to drive, all they have to do is to tell the automated vehicles that they want their next destination to be the emergency. Next, regarding the environment and urban planning there seems to be more advantages than disadvantages. One of the advantages, is the impact automated vehicles will have on the environment, as they are expected to “yield significant benefits for the environment through greater efficiency and fuel savings” (Zon & Ditta, 2016, p. 12). Another positive impact that automated vehicles will have on the environment is the recovery and planning of parks and forestry due to major changes in transportation planning and the reduction for parking developments as automated vehicles will most likely drop-off passengers to destination and leave. Lastly, automated vehicles that run on electricity could decrease greenhouse gas emissions by a whopping 90 percent (Zon & Ditta, 2016).
Today’s cars can already come with several self driving features. Automated features in cars are becoming quite normal, some of which features include automatic opening trunk with sensoring technology, lane centering, self parking, and blind spot detection. The technology enables a car to be safer because the car can “see” it’s surroundings (Shelley, 2013). These features have been installed in cars for about a decade now and the costs of the features are decreasing every year. Self driving cars are circulating all over the world, Tesla for example has been on the rise in 2017 because they have become more affordable.
This is the future. Self-driving cars are coming, and there is nothing we can do about it. Whether we support them or not, we will eventually be seeing them on the road right next to us. According to Sebastian Thrun, “I don’t think the self-driving car train can be stopped” (Hamers). In conclusion, producing fully autonomous vehicles is the right move.
How long until they are out of our control and put into an ongoing chain of broken realities. Since the electric-cars are also starting to be safer than most cars. These cars, specifically from Tesla, have no gasoline(a petroleum based compound) in them that will make them go. They don’t need any carbon based chemical, if they can function on an all electricity based system. Which means they don't have a internal combustion chamber, exhaust pipe, or any of an spill of excess fuel.