Selectable Ethics For Robotic Cars and the Possibility of a Robot Car Bomb 239
Rick Zeman writes Wired has an interesting article on the possibility of selectable ethical choices in robotic autonomous cars. From the article: "The way this would work is one customer may set the car (which he paid for) to jealously value his life over all others; another user may prefer that the car values all lives the same and minimizes harm overall; yet another may want to minimize legal liability and costs for herself; and other settings are possible. Philosophically, this opens up an interesting debate about the oft-clashing ideas of morality vs. liability." Meanwhile, others are thinking about the potential large scale damage a robot car could do.
Lasrick writes Patrick Lin writes about a recent FBI report that warns of the use of robot cars as terrorist and criminal threats, calling the use of weaponized robot cars "game changing." Lin explores the many ways in which robot cars could be exploited for nefarious purposes, including the fear that they could help terrorist organizations based in the Middle East carry out attacks on US soil. "And earlier this year, jihadists were calling for more car bombs in America. Thus, popular concerns about car bombs seem all too real." But Lin isn't too worried about these threats, and points out that there are far easier ways for terrorists to wreak havoc in the US.
Lasrick writes Patrick Lin writes about a recent FBI report that warns of the use of robot cars as terrorist and criminal threats, calling the use of weaponized robot cars "game changing." Lin explores the many ways in which robot cars could be exploited for nefarious purposes, including the fear that they could help terrorist organizations based in the Middle East carry out attacks on US soil. "And earlier this year, jihadists were calling for more car bombs in America. Thus, popular concerns about car bombs seem all too real." But Lin isn't too worried about these threats, and points out that there are far easier ways for terrorists to wreak havoc in the US.
Insurance rates (Score:3, Interesting)
MUCH easier. (Score:4, Interesting)
From TFA:
WTF?!? That makes no sense.
Again, WTF?!? Who would design a machine that would take control away from a person TO HIT AN OBSTACLE? That's a mess of legal responsibility.
No. No they are not. The only "many folks" who are talking about it are people who have no concept of what it takes to program a car.
Or legal liability.
No, it is not "plausible". Not at all. You are speculating on a system that would be able to correctly identify ALL THE OBJECTS IN THE AREA and that is never going to happen.
Wired is being stupid in TFA.
Re:"Philosophically, this opens up an interesting (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Insurance rates (Score:5, Interesting)
More likely that your insurance company would enforce the settings on your car and require that you pay them extra if you'd like the car to value your life over other lives.
With fast networks it's even possible that the insurance companies could bid on outcomes as the accident was happening. Theoretically my insurer could throw my car into a ditch to avoid damage to a bmw coming the other way.