Writing for Forbes, research engineer Bryan Reimer examines how success can be measured as automated vehicles are introduced to our transportation system. “While automation may be the future,” writes Reimer, “the enabling technologies we are seeing today are pieces of a complex puzzle being assembled to build a picture of how automation will change the future of how we live and move.”
Writing for the Financial Times, research scientist Ashley Nunes explores the cost of providing support and safety personnel for Waymo’s driverless taxi service. “Technology does not purge the need for human labour but rather changes the type of labour required,” writes Nunes. “Put another way, unless something changes, driverless will not mean humanless.”
This Quartz video highlights how MIT researchers are developing a self-driving boat system that can navigate waterways and can transform into different structures to move cargo, trash or build a temporary bridge. “The boats find the best path between preprogrammed locations, while using GPS, laser sensors, and cameras to avoid hitting anything,” explains Michael Tabb.
Boston Herald reporter Jordan Graham writes that MIT researchers have developed an autonomous system that allows fleets of drones to navigate without GPS and could be used to help find missing hikers. “What we’re trying to do is automate the search part of the search-and-rescue problem with a fleet of drones,” explains graduate student Yulun Tian.
In an article for Forbes, research engineer Bryan Reimer ponders how the integration of self-driving vehicles into our transportation system will evolve. “As we strive to automate, risks must be appropriately balanced with the benefits, much like how they are when it comes to the use of lifesaving drugs with known side effects,” concludes Reimer.
In an article for Wired, research scientist Ashley Nunes writes about the need for legislation that regulates the use of human teleoperators that can assist robotaxis in emergency situations when human judgement is needed. “Self-driving technology can deliver considerable benefits to society, but realizing those benefits will require that safety and profitability go hand-in-hand,” writes Nunes.
Katharine Schwab of Fast Company writes about the Media Lab’s Moral Machine project, which surveyed people about their feelings on the ethical dilemmas posed by driverless vehicles. Because the results vary based on region and economic inequality, the researchers believe “self-driving car makers and politicians will need to take all of these variations into account when formulating decision-making systems and building regulations,” Schwab notes.
Lucas Laursen writes for Fortune that a global survey created by MIT researchers uncovered different regional attitudes about how autonomous vehicles should handle unavoidable collisions. Global carmakers, Laursen writes, “will need to use the findings at the very least to adapt how they sell their increasingly autonomous cars, if not how the cars actually operate.”
MIT researchers created an online game to determine how people around the world think autonomous vehicles should handle moral dilemmas, reports Laurel Wamsley for NPR. “Before we allow our cars to make ethical decisions, we need to have a global conversation to express our preferences to the companies that will design moral algorithms,” the researchers explain, “and to the policymakers that will regulate them.”
BBC News reporter Chris Fox writes that MIT researchers surveyed people about how an autonomous vehicle should operate when presented with different ethical dilemmas. Fox explains that the researchers hope their findings will “spark a ‘global conversation’ about the moral decisions self-driving vehicles will have to make.”
MIT researchers conducted a global survey to determine how people felt about the ethical dilemmas presented by autonomous vehicles, The Economist reports. Prof. Iyad Rahwan explains that he and his colleagues thought it was important to survey people from around the world as “nobody was really investigating what regular people thought about this topic.”
Popular Mechanics reporter Dave Grossman writes that MIT researchers surveyed more than 2 million people to gauge people’s opinions on the ethics of autonomous vehicles. Grossman explains that the researchers believe their findings demonstrate how “people across the globe are eager to participate in the debate around self-driving cars and want to see algorithms that reflect their personal beliefs.”
The results of the Media Lab’s “Moral Machine” survey provides a glimpse into how people will respond to the ethical dilemmas surrounding autonomous vehicle accidents. “The point here, the researchers say, is to initiate a conversation about ethics in technology, and to guide those who will eventually make the big decisions about AV morality,” writes Wired’s Aarian Marshall.
Using an online platform known as the “Moral Machine,” researchers at the Media Lab have surveyed more than two million people from 233 countries about how an autonomous vehicle should respond in a crash. “The Moral Machine game is similar to the infamous trolley problem,” writes Tracey Lindeman for Motherboard, “but calibrated for the autonomous car.”
A new study from Media Lab researchers highlights the result of an online survey that asked volunteers how a self-driving vehicle should respond to a variety of potential accidents. “Moral responses to unavoidable damage vary greatly around the world in a way that poses a big challenge for companies planning to build driverless cars,” writes Alex Hern in The Guardian.