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Comment by mechagodzilla | Hacker News Reader

Many people are charged with crimes related to automotive accidents (DUI, for instance, or laws related to cell phone usage). We require drivers to carry insurance. We are constantly regulating things to reduce deaths and injuries in automotive accidents (seat belts, crumple zones, airbags, forced recalls, etc.) - we constantly think about automotive accidents when a human is behind the wheel. Why should we just shrug when some Tesla mows down a pedestrian while the driver is watching youtube videos?

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Always prosecute the driver. There's no such thing as "the car did it".

And if someone wanted to intentionally murder someone, seems like a perfect excuse "the car did it".

Unless we are going to victim blame.

But the point of the autopilot system is that there doesn't need to be a driver right?

So here you are saying, "Hey, we have this great system that is such a better diver than the human. Here are the statistics that show it." and then turning around and saying "Hey human, why were you not a better driver. You need to be paying attention."

A bit of wanting to have your cake and eat it too, isn't it?

"autopilot" is just a marketing term for the next decade, it's not fully automatic, it's actually "computer aided driving" (where driving is the human) but that description isn't sexy enough to sell

The GGP talks about "something like autopilot" acceptance and the eventual goal of the system is to cut the human driver out.

GP is talking about insurance and how we regulate drivers, stating that we should be looking at the same for autopilot systems.

Parent says "Always prosecute the driver. There's no such thing as "the car did it"."

At what point does the "autopilot" have any skin in the game so to speak? Is it a binary thing, one day we wake up to an update and the cars can drive themselves with no input?

Or will will be forever stuck in a quasi beta test, where the driver is liable for the actions of the system but has no meaningful way for controlling the system(autopilot) or even knowing how the system operates.

You can't have it both ways. Either the system is better than people and is going to take responsibility or it isn't. No one will accept a system they have no control over and do not understand but have to accept liability for.

There may come a day where someone is truly the passenger in the driver's seat in a car, like a person riding a bus.

Today is not that day. Nor is it next year. Or this decade.

A whole lot of people are going to die this decade, both drivers and victims hit, because marketing wants people to believe you don't have to pay attention once you turn it on rather it's an assist, not a replacement, for the driver.

It's not autopilot right now. It's driver assist. As long as the driver exists, the driver is responsible.

In an "old school" car, if an accelerator gets stuck and you mow someone down, then they find spaghetti code in the accelerator or it mechanically got stuck from design failure, you still have liability for killing someone but your prosecution won't be the same as someone who purposely drove over someone they were angry with.

The parent comment didn't mention wanting "autopilot" at all. Actually, as I type this, I'm wondering if your comment was unintentionally posted as a reply to the parent?

GGP talked about autopilot acceptance

GP is talking about holding Tesla responsible the same way we do with drivers ala insurance and regulation

Parent says to only hold driver responsible

So while the parent did not mention autopilot per se, the comment can only be interpreted in the context of talking about autopilot/ like systems. Otherwise, "Always prosecute the driver." does not make sense. That is the only option when you are talking about standard accident investigations(baring manufacturer defects e.g. faulty ignition switch, rollover/tires, sticky/abnormal acceleration pedals), nothing else in a standard car has ahem autonomy.

You are technically correct for tesla vehicles (though there's some grey area around how Tesla markets things - you can't just handwave away legal liability for a death with "but the fine print!"), but not for self-driving vehicles in general. Waymo taxis, for example, explicitly does not have a driver.

And Tesla has explicitly advertised that this Waymo scenario is where they're headed, so it's a question that's definitely worth thinking about now. "Blame the driver" isn't looking like a tenable position long term.

not sure how carrying insurance is related to accident prevention, Its mandatory in both cases.

The amount of cases we charge people for accidents is extremely rare because in most cases its an actual accident. People swerving into oncoming traffic, not checking both sides before making a turn...etc.

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