Should your self-driving car kill you to save others?

Discussion in 'Intelligence & Machines' started by Plazma Inferno!, Jun 24, 2016.

  1. TheFrogger Banned Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    2,175
    Good question Plasma Inferno. I predict a future where all cars are self-driving, putting an end to speeding etc., except the police force which will still have manually driven automobiles...
     
  2. Google AdSense Guest Advertisement



    to hide all adverts.
  3. Speakpigeon Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    1,123
    I would have thought that pretty obvious... People will always use the cars that would protect their lives first.

    So there would have to be legislation to force the car industry to only produce anything different in this respect.

    Me, I don't see why the car's passengers' lives should come last. Instead, driverless cars should try to save the maximum number of lives, irrespective of where they are.

    But then again, it's passengers who choose to use a car at all and they have to know the inherent risk involved, so they should assume all the risk. So, there would have to be legislation to force the issue. Aren't legislators mostly car users? Good luck.
    EB
     
  4. Google AdSense Guest Advertisement



    to hide all adverts.
  5. TheFrogger Banned Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    2,175
    Soon ALL Formula One cars will be self-driven.
     
  6. Google AdSense Guest Advertisement



    to hide all adverts.
  7. billvon Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    21,635
    Cars will try to avoid accidents, period. There won't be any moral dilemmas.

    When they train ordinary drivers, do they train them to kill pedestrians rather than risk their passengers? Nope. They tell them "don't hit pedestrians."
     
  8. gamelord Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    673
    Famous guy once said, those who prefer safety over security deserve neither.

    Who's to say these driverless cars won't shut off if there is a warrant for your arrest? Or drive and hand you over to the nearest police station. Or drive you off a cliff if "they" deem you to be a target for assassination.

    Before you give me an argument of why we need to bow down to the almighty police state, let me give you a list of things which used to be illegal
    - Saving slaves was illegal.
    - Saving jews was illegal.
    - Wearing women's clothes was illegal.
    - Pot is illegal.

    Who knows what will be illegal next, never give up your rights. Never give power to the police. And surely never give up your rights to a computer. Police are basically walking automatons, obedient to the codes.
     
    RainbowSingularity likes this.
  9. RainbowSingularity Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    7,447
    well thats a relief.
    for a moment there i thought someone was trying to de criminalise recreational drugs.
    instead they are deciding if robots can get licensed to kill humans.

    go back to sleep everyone.
     
  10. Speakpigeon Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    1,123
    Good to know your opinion.
    Me, I don't see why the car's passengers' lives should come last. Instead, driverless cars should try to save the maximum number of lives, irrespective of where they are.
    EB
     
  11. RainbowSingularity Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    7,447
    do you not feel yourself being pulled into the midst of a fools debate about how much profit a corporate can make while not being sueded for a car killing someone ?

    it sounds like a pay per view charity for a dear john letter to the person who just got killed by a corporate vehicle and how their death is in service to the corporations profit margin.

    it really does all sound quite psychopathic

    the vehicles in US culture will not be deemed an emergency services vehicle so will be free from prosecution from not avoiding killing people.
    attempting to program for regulation to present some type of valid working moral value by surveying people who are not having their family run over by driverless cars is not a fair survey.
    more soo since the actual vehicle does not exist as a working model in society.
    they are a vehicle of the elitist rich, whom are currently and quite obviousely attempting to get the working class to make an acceptable loss margin where they can be free from being sued for death and injury.

    any fair minded caring human should avoid the debate & participation completely in my opinion until the vehicles come with a waiver allowing them to be sued for death & injury, just like a driver can and is.
     
  12. billvon Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    21,635
    Driverless cars will try to avoid collisions. Period. They will not be "deciding who can die" or any such nonsense, any more than human drivers do.
     
  13. Speakpigeon Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    1,123
    Sorry but that all sounds irrelevant to me.
    And I still don't see why the car's passengers' lives should come last. Instead, driverless cars should try to save the maximum number of lives, irrespective of where they are.
    It's not a moral question. It's a practical one.
    We can certainly choose to do nothing, for all sorts of reason, but that won't answer my question.
    EB
     
  14. Speakpigeon Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    1,123
    That's obviously a possibility but I don't think you would know in advance what will happen in the end.
    And that's still not answering my question.
    EB
     
  15. DaveC426913 Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    18,935
    The safest place by far in an accident is inside the car. Passengers in an accident are far, far less likely to suffer mortal injuries than those outside the car. Many fatalities occur when passengers inside the car - who would have survived just fine - are killed when ejected.

    An accident violent enough to kill an occupant would pulverise a pedestrian.

    So pedestrians are in far, far more danger than occupants.
     
  16. Speakpigeon Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    1,123
    Yes, I know all this already, thanks. That wasn't the question.
    EB
     
  17. RainbowSingularity Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    7,447
    different countrys have different police.
    mostly the police reflect the society.
    however, to the casual observer the power structure asserted to authority becomes normative to a model of assumed power.
    this assumed power lends to all facits of cultural dogma.

    maybe as an interesting exercise a question could be asked

    "is the public empowered?"

    "how do you express freedom in your day to day life?"

    "what authority figures do you trust the most?"

    "how does your society show care for you on a day to day basis?"
     
  18. akoreamerican Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    605
    It should really fall to the consumer to set the car's safety priorities. I expect car companies will go this route to prevent any accusations against them.
     
  19. gmilam Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    3,522
    I think bill is probably right. There won't be algorithms to determine who will I hit. There will be algorithms to determine how I can avoid an accident.

    Human drivers don't think, "should I swerve into oncoming traffic or should I run over the little old lady on the sidewalk?" We swerve the direction our instincts take us and then say "Oh Shit!". There will probably be standard protocols, IF possible - stop! ELSE swerve in the direction that avoids oncoming traffic. (Left in remnants of the British Empire, right everywhere else in the world.)
     
  20. TheFrogger Banned Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    2,175
    That's correct. We actually stop and say, "Oh sh*t."
     
  21. Speakpigeon Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    1,123
    Why should we limit driverless cars to do the same as human drivers only better? If driverless cars could do things humans couldn't, why not take advantage of that?
    We might even come on day to choose to let some AI smarter than us think over this problem and take responsibility for the decision if we can't make up our minds.
    EB
     
  22. billvon Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    21,635
    No doubt we will, and that will result in cars that are safer than human-driven cars today.

    But they will still not be deciding trolley problems.
     
  23. DaveC426913 Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    18,935
    Perhaps I was interpreting your phrase "come last" incorrectly. (Admittedly, I haven't found the sub-thread that led to that post.)

    I assumed it involved something to the effect of an AI doing everything it can to avoid colliding with a pedestrian, at the expense of doing less to avoid shaking the passenger around.

    But if I were to interpret your question literally, I would envision a scenario posted by you where an AI would happily drive directly into a post, surely killing its occupants, just to avoid a pedestrian.

    My point was simply that "doing less" (for the passengers) does not equate with "coming last". If doing less for the passenger and more for the pedestrian manages to save both lives, then no one has "come last".
     

Share This Page