Self-Driving Cars Are On the Way

Here’s a terrific video on the pros and cons of self-driving cars.   Astonishingly, it looks like we are indeed headed in that direction.

To me, this is an example of a sad fact about our civilization and our modes of technological innovation.  Our motivation behind the development of new ideas is really about selling more stuff, rather than making real improvements to our lives, and this is a classic case.  If you were really trying to improve transportation, would you keep a big, expensive, planet-busting gasoline drinker — and get rid of the driver?  What’s the matter with getting rid of the car itself — or at least the internal combustion engine with it’s 20-25% efficiencies, its carbon outputs, and its cause of world hostility?  The world of transportation needs to rethink itself from the ground up, incorporating things like enhanced mass transit, car-sharing, ride-sharing, and small urban commuting vehicles, as well as redesigning our cities to facilitate bicycling and walking.

In essence: We don’t need driverless cars, but we’re going to get them anyway.