What's the acceptable ratio of lives saved to lives lost? Because this will kill at least a few people who are desperately trying to get to a hospital or flee a disaster zone.
Not that I think a kill-switch is a good idea as it's a technological solution to a law enforcement issue - that rarely works out well, especially when the tech is in the hands of the consumer.
Unfortunately, there's a huge public bias towards driving and whenever there's discussion of limiters, people often come out with rare edge cases and ignore the very large numbers of problems that comes with unlimited vehicles. Personally, I think the problems are best solved with standard law enforcement procedures - a cop sees someone speeding, so they pull them over and get them fined.
Why are people okay with computers automatically judging gray area situations?
Because the odds that the impaired or distracted driver has crashed before the officer is anywhere near (if they even respond to the call at all) are significant.
I suspect these kill-switches will need to configure lights, etc. No matter what, you'll end up with a dead car in the middle of a road, potentially right around turns or on the edges of cliffs. I suspect this kill-switch would kill more people than the "suspected drunks" ever will.
In-vehicle breathalysers have existed for decades. They way they work is they give you a warning that the vehicle will shut off in X amount of time. Eg 5 minutes. The car doesn’t just shut off without warning leaving you without boosted brakes or power steering mid-corner.
With modern technology, most cars could also take over control from the driver when they deem safe to do so.
If your car just cuts off after beeping at you for something it has never beeped at you before for, you are likely to just continue straight on ... thus ending up exactly in the situation you say it won't work.
A modern system doesn’t have to beep. It can tell you what it’s doing, in your language, visually on the dash and audibly. Also, there’s no reason a modern vehicle designed for this type of system needs to cut all power immediately. It could cut power or limit speed over a period of time, allowing the driver to safely pull over. And there’s no reason for it to ever cut power to steering or brakes.
I think a lot of people, yourself included, are having a visceral gut reaction instead of looking at this rationally. The people responsible for the safety of vehicles aren’t going to write a law that requires a vehicle to cut its steering and brakes while the driver is cornering, when there are so many alternatives that would be equally effective but safer. You need to take a step back and apply logic and common sense to the situation.
If not, why is 1:1 even remotely acceptable for this?
...and even then, prison time or executions are not the same as vehicle rules.
you are confusing two ratios. the number of fairly executed people and the number of guilty people who are acquitted are obviously totally different.
Personally, I'd say that number is really high, possibly infinite. I'm not inherently opposed to the death penalty, but I can't think of any fair number of actual murderers I'd be willing to execute if it meant the death of somebody who truly didn't deserve it.
The whole point of the "Better 10 guilty men go free..." aphorism is that the two harms are not equal, and that a guilty man going free is less than 10% of the harm of an innocent man imprisoned.
The driving interlock case is just a straight up classic trolley problem.
I suppose have some sympathy with that argument, which is why I said a minimum of 1:1 (a lower bound on the ratio).
Drunk drivers kill innocent people as well of course.
Helicopters are also prohibitively expensive and often not even covered by insurance. People faint over a 1K ambulance ride, but you could be looking at 30K or more for a helicopter ride. Which is really more the point. Some people are poor. At least the hospital will work with you. I remember when I was poor and couldn't afford an ambulance ride but needed it, it was the only thing that couldn't be negotiated down and it was a huge financial burden on a collegr student. All I took away from that experience was that next time I was on the ground bleeding from a head wound, I should call a friend. Which I did later in an emergency that ended with me passed out in my car in a parking lot. My friend took me.
As long as you can be severely financially hurt by taking ambulance people are gonna avoid them if you're not actively dying. And if you take away people's ability to drive people, they'll just not go. This is already happening with normal doctors and is one of the reasons hospitals are overburdened.
2. They may all be busy with other rescue ops.
3. (US-specific) You might wish you'd died after getting the medical bill for being helicoptered to ER.