No, I mean it. I guess I'm officially some kind of luddite for this, but a future of Google-type self-driving cars sounds like the most sterile and soulless thing I've ever heard short of Communism. Either that, or it sounds like the revenge of the Parry People Mover. (Note to self: great movie idea right there.)
And yes, I can see some advantages to self-driving cars. People who need to get around, but have a disability that prevents them from operating a conventional vehicle, or an elderly person who may have to give up their license could benefit from such a technological advance. But you will never see me pop into one of these things. I object to the idea from beginning to end.
For starters, just look at this thing.
It looks terrible. It looks absolutely derpy. This is the Nerdmobile 9001, even more so than Rick Moranis' solar powered van from Honey, I Shrunk The Kids. Google has other prototypes based on the Toyota Prius, and Audi and Lexus vehicles as well, but I'm still not impressed. Principally because the goofy thing you see above is supposed to be the production model. The modified vehicles have, so far, been used as system testbeds, rather than representing any self-driving version of their manufacturer's product. Of course, one would wonder why Google hasn't decided to try modding a Tesla electric sports car, or dare to automate a '68 Dodge Charger.
And this brings me to my more important point: there are some of us that just enjoy driving. The Telsa roadster and the '68 Dodge are fun to drive, to operate by hand, to actually control with two hands on the wheel. It's that feeling of control that is going to trip Google up, I think. Sure, there are some people who just view driving as a chore, and would probably be perfectly open to traveling by autonomous vehicle. Maybe they will, in fact, be a majority. But there will always be those of us who prefer to drive ourselves.
Besides, it just might make it harder to take a trip without much of a plan. It certainly seems like the interface is all about plugging in your destination and away you go, end of story. I can't imagine going railfanning in one of these, where the idea is in fact to stop at places along the tracks to watch and take pictures. That's far easier to do manually. A Sunday drive with an impulsive stop at a yard sale or two? Can you just hit a big red button and stop the car? I have my doubts. Try taking a road trip - again, the destination is vague and the itinerary is flexible in the extreme - can the Googmobile handle that? What if Junior has to use the facilities on a longer trip? That's going to be a real problem in more ways than one. The freedom and control of the automobile as we know it even today is a plus, and I worry that autonomous cars will take a big chunk of that away.
Maybe, though, we're safe for the time being. The Atlantic has a story that details the technology and its vast scope, pointing out that it's not yet possible to plop one of these cars down in, say, Pittsburgh, and have it start driving. And when they come to Pittsburgh, I want to watch one of these things try to tackle Penn Hills, or the South Side on a Friday night. Meanwhile, Slate takes a more pessimistic view; hell, their subtitle even says it 'may never actually happen'.
I don't know about you, but I'm perfectly happy to sit behind the wheel for the next fifty years. I guess we'll see if they're still making actual cars then.
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| From Wikipedia |
Sure, why not.
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