Waymo – Avoiding a Falling Skateboarder
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For a truly superhuman performance, it might even register the brick and anticipate the scooter's accident.
I'm curious how no-win scenarios are programmed into it and decided.
I'll admit I have not done any research into this and I am sure I could.
I hope the pedestrians always have the highest priority, but then what if there are two of them... Soon they'll use bluetooth to pull your net worth from your apple watch and steer towards the smallest number.
An adult running onto the highway is very different than a young kid doing the same.
All else equal, I would not preserve the adult's life over that of drivers. I would preserve the kid's life over that of drivers.
Why? The adult is presumed to be responsible for the repercussions of its actions. The drivers did not create the problem. The family of the drivers could hold others accountable for any unreasonable systemic danger leading to the death of the drivers.
But unavoidable no-win scenarios exist on the road. "What does the vehicle do?" is a reasonable question to ask.
In the case of bike lane traffic or heavy pedestrians, if no avoidance options are available, your suggestion could easily restrict traffic to sub 10 mph. (E.g., to be able to stop with minimum impact if a pedestrian suddenly darted into the street.)
(I am glad to see that in this video, the Waymo crosses a double-yellow, using a dead zone between the two sides of the road to avoid the collision, thus bending the rules to avoid the hit, which is great.)
That might mean limiting speed to 30mph or lower in residential area. That is fine.
Just like airplanes and surgery and almost every other dangerous activity, it should be impossible to have a road fatality with only a single failure. Only multi-systems failure should result in a fatality from any form of technology.
I wouldn't expect you'ld be able to push the other car over enough to avoid the scooter rider.
In that situation, full brake application is probably all you can do.
There might be a time when it's socially acceptable for self-driving vehicles to have [air bag-like?] cattle pusher fronts to mitigate unavoidable contacts.
In reality no-win scenarios are avoided by having so many cameras and such an overwhelming amount of data that Waymo would win in court instead.
This is good for all as the incentive for maximum data collection as CYA also means maximum velocity of product improvement.
PS: it's an rental e-scooter, not a skateboard, another product of our piss poor infrastructure