# BMW board member tells why self-driving cars won’t work



## jocker12 (May 11, 2017)

Ian Robertson, a member for BMW's board, told UK publication _AutoCar_ fully autonomous cars should never be allowed to roam the streets without human supervision.

"Imagine a scenario where the car has to decide between hitting one person or the other - to choose whether to cause this death or that death," says Robertson.

"What's it going to do? Access the diary of one and ascertain they are terminally ill and so should be hit? I don't think that situation will ever be allowed."

This ethical dilemma could arise in a countless number of situations - whether a car should plunge off a ravine or swerve into a group of pedestrians, for example.

Robertson says driverless cars could be allowed in certain environments such as motorways where the traffic is more controlled. But he baulked at the idea of a free-for-all on busy urban streets.

However, this has not stopped BMW developing driverless technology.

The Bavarian automaker recently opened its autonomous driving campus in Germany. The campus has been set up to develop high levels of autonomous cars and will eventually employ 1800 people.

While fully autonomous vehicles may be a pipedream, research in the area has already provided some useful driver aids, including autonomous emergency braking - where a car will automatically hit the brakes if it senses a collision - and lane keep assist, which can steer a car back into its lane.

Autonomous cars have already sparked fierce debate in the US, where Tesla's "autopilot" function has come under fire after several deaths in the US.

Tesla's technology maintain lane position and speed and brake if necessary, but still requires human interaction. The deaths were a result of drivers ignoring the autopilot's warnings to take back control and place their hands on the steering wheel.

An autonomous Volvo was also involved in a fatal accident as part of an Uber self-driving car trial. The vehicle hit a pedestrian crossing the road at night. Another trial vehicle has been caught running a red light.

Several states in Australia have commenced driverless car trials which revolve around autonomous shuttle buses ferrying passengers along an allotted route.

https://www.news.com.au/technology/...k/news-story/9e7fc18cdc4115b182cf4ce9bddbf887


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## jocker12 (May 11, 2017)

*BMW Earnings: Profit Falls 6% on Increased Future-Tech Spending** - *The automaker is spending big on self-driving and electric vehicles. As expected, that dented profits.


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## goneubering (Aug 17, 2017)

jocker12 said:


> Ian Robertson, a member for BMW's board, told UK publication _AutoCar_ fully autonomous cars should never be allowed to roam the streets without human supervision.
> 
> "Imagine a scenario where the car has to decide between hitting one person or the other - to choose whether to cause this death or that death," says Robertson.
> 
> ...


1800 people??!! Man oh man this SDC idea sure makes companies do bizarre things.


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## jocker12 (May 11, 2017)

goneubering said:


> 1800 people??!! Man oh man this SDC idea sure makes companies do bizarre things.


They won't even get to the "ethical dilemma", because the software is not as evolved to be able to make such distinction. When the system has a significant error rate in classifying obstacles and another significant error rate in detecting pedestrians, how can one possible think the code could be capable of an ethical or unethical decision making.

There is no decision or choice. It's only instruction based on input data coming from the connected sensors. And as long as the system has errors, the robots could rest in peace in a quiet and beautiful graveyard.


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## iheartuber (Oct 31, 2015)

Do you think BMW cars will inherently drive like a-holes even without a human behind the wheel? #deepthoughts


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## HotUberMess (Feb 25, 2018)

The reason they won’t work is that if you promise people a “safe driverless car”, all it takes is one death and you’ve broken that promise and caused a media uproar. People won’t care that human drivers caused tens of thousands of deaths, they’ll be focused on the robot that caused one.


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## jocker12 (May 11, 2017)

HotUberMess said:


> The reason they won't work is that if you promise people a "safe driverless car", all it takes is one death and you've broken that promise and caused a media uproar. People won't care that human drivers caused tens of thousands of deaths, they'll be focused on the robot that caused one.


I've said this long time ago - In order for the technology to be accepted by the public, it needs to be flawless, and that is simply impossible. On the paper, or in the movies is easy, in reality nobody can write such a software.

Some enthusiasts claimed perfection is not required, as long as the developers can constantly update the program like they do with any software today. Problem is, no software today takes over a 2 ton vehicle, driving real people around, endangering lives and property on its path. Being a PAX inside a self driving car brings the danger so close and makes people feel so insecure (in comparison to a nuclear facility software, which is far from perfection but provides no direct interaction) that makes people simply avoid using and fear self driving cars.

In addition, no insurance company will provide coverage for a self driving car with known faulty software.

The continuously updating software model, doesn't work with self driving cars, because once the software needs updating, automatically implies that software was previously incomplete, or faulty in terms of properly handling the vehicle's movements. Every single person will ask themselves, WHY does the software needs updating? Too many bugs? Not enough features? Not safe enough? What is going on?

And because very slow shuttles around campuses or shuttle food delivery (which are currently tested) is not profitable enough business (and consequently nobody would buy that software), those models will be soon abandoned.

The technology world is moving to fast from an idea to another, from a product to another, to have the patience for 25 mph shuttles to take off in the year 2120.

This is the BlackBerry Storm of transportation. Remember this guy?










Few years from now, people will speak about self driving cars, like they do today about BackBerry Storm. Useless product.


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