Self-driving cars--seriously?

[Wayne Lomman]

This is why I have stopped telling everyone what a good place Tasmania is to live in. It is an island in the Southern Ocean with the cleanest air on earth, it has plenty of fish in the ocean and lakes, you can grow anything bar tropical fruit, half the place is still unexplored, we have few politicians, we have hydro electricity, and I can still freight most things in overnight. I am devastated that gps doesn't work....!

Oh, and a paddock is any area inhabited by livestock. Fences are optional. Persons of debatable intelligence are considered to be a few kangaroos short in the back paddock. I'll stop there. Cheers

[Doug Garson]

The other point is that driver's cars are laughably irrelevant in my rural area. You can't even get to my place with a gps - you get lost in paddocks kilometres away - so how will they guide a driverless car?

Actually that would be very simple and low tech. The same way a taxi driver takes you home if he can't find your address in his GPS. Voice recognition would allow you to direct the car where to turn.

[Chris Parks]

Actually that would be very simple and low tech. The same way a taxi driver takes you home if he can't find your address in his GPS. Voice recognition would allow you to direct the car where to turn.

I don't know if voice recognition works with the Tasmanian language. Seriously, I have never seen or used a voice recognition system that can be said to actually work properly, I suppose I should try the one in my car but I can't be bothered dealing with it.

[Kev Williams]

From very little googling:

A record-high 53.2 million vehicles were recalled in 2016 in the United States, and one in four vehicles on the road has an open recall. You can't assume you're safe if you purchase luxury brands either, as some of the most dangerous recalls have impacted premium car makers such as BMW.

I've known for sometime now from picking stuff up at the back room at Walmart that almost every child car-seat ever made has been recalled, but I didn't realize that every 4th car I see has been recalled. But it doesn't surprise me. And I hardly expect self-driving cars to fare much better...

[Doug Garson]

Chris, if you haven't tried voice recognition lately you're in for a pleasant surprise if my experience is typical. The voice recognition in Google maps is excellent. Last summer we were on a trip in a friends Audi Q5 and he tried unsuccessfully on several occasions to input the address of the cottage we were going to into the cars GPS with no success. Then he tried google maps on his phone, worked every time. If you have a contacts address in your phone you can navigate to their house just by saying their name. Ditto with a restaurant or store, no need to know the address just say the name of the store and it finds it for you. So maybe skip the car GPS and go straight to your phone.

[Chris Parks]

From very little googling:



I've known for sometime now from picking stuff up at the back room at Walmart that almost every child car-seat ever made has been recalled, but I didn't realize that every 4th car I see has been recalled. But it doesn't surprise me. And I hardly expect self-driving cars to fare much better...

I think a large number of these recalls are the world wide air bag problem. A woman was recently critically injured in Oz when one of these faulty air bags was triggered in an accident.

[Larry Edgerton]

I worked as a driver and in the end as a manager in the interstate trucking industry and it is a whole other world. The truck loss rate and driver injuries and fatalities that occur because of scheduling and driving during the periods when the body says it should be asleep are enormous. Autonomous trucks will be the single best thing that can happen for the industry when they arrive. There is a world shortage of drivers for a good reason, the job is simply very unpleasant in most cases.

I would not argue that it will be good for the trucking industry, its the truckers and their families that are my concern.

[Chris Parks]

I would not argue that it will be good for the trucking industry, its the truckers and their families that are my concern.

A dead or injured driver or other road users was always my concern and I did not want to be any part of that. How would I explain to a family that I sent out a driver who should not have been behind the wheel and he won't be coming home? Yes, I get your concern but there is enough work that drivers won't be displaced just moved and it won't happen overnight, it will take decades. The driver shortage is in large part driven by the internet and all the online shopping we do so there will be no unemployment more likely a shortage as there has been.

[Robert Willing]

I don’t mean to be cynical but from your list of automated toys you at least trust something automated, or do you run them manually?

[Chris Parks]

I use them as much as possible especially in traffic. I was in a traffic jam for an hour a while back and besides pressing one button to resume because it times out after the car has been stationery for a time I did not touch any other control besides the steering wheel but the next model will do the steering itself in a traffic jam I am told. It does take a leap of faith especially the braking part but in time you get used to it. This sort of technology is obviously still being refined and has faults but by and large it works pretty well. My car for instance will not stop automatically if it comes up to a car already stationery at an intersection for instance or can lose track of a car ahead around a sharp bend but I have gotten used to that now. It will not self steer as the Tesla does for more than 15 seconds at a time either which bugs me a bit, the Europeans are not willing to go as far as Tesla right now but it can't be far off. When the model 3 Tesla comes out I am going to have a real hard look at that.

[Wayne Lomman]

Does anyone really think that automation is introduced for the benefit of ordinary people? I haven't noticed many charitable organisations investing in these technologies. It is simply a new way to transfer money and power from the working and middle-class to the big end of town. These technologies will cost and we will all have to pay. Cheers
( be grateful I edited out the next 2 paragraphs. Does anyone actually value freedom?)

[Dan Friedrichs]

Does anyone really think that automation is introduced for the benefit of ordinary people?

I see the automation as beneficial. I want a self-driving car. My productivity will go up when I can work or relax instead of drive. I want a self-driving truck - it'll mean I can get stuff, faster. I want production lines automated as much as possible - it'll mean the stuff I can buy is cheaper.

Will all this mean a lot of low- and medium-skilled workers will be in trouble? Probably. Is the solution to eschew progress? Probably not.

[Greg Peterson]

There was time when people couldn't imagine a operatorless elevator.

[Chris Parks]

Does anyone really think that automation is introduced for the benefit of ordinary people? I haven't noticed many charitable organisations investing in these technologies. It is simply a new way to transfer money and power from the working and middle-class to the big end of town. These technologies will cost and we will all have to pay. Cheers
( be grateful I edited out the next 2 paragraphs. Does anyone actually value freedom?)

Tin foil hat working well Wayne. Why do some people see a conspiracy in every single thing?

[Stan Calow]

Whenever I express skepticism about some new technology development, my millennial nephew always reminds me ". . . they aren't trying to sell it to you, old man".