Poll: Even If You Could Trust A Self-Driving Car, Would You Ever Want One?
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Somewhere around half of us currently feel uneasy about the prospect of being driven around by a fully-autonomous, self-driving car.
At least, that’s the takeaway from a survey of over 1,500 people in the US and Germany conducted by Gartner, Inc. earlier this year. According to that survey’s findings, 55 percent of people in the two countries would not ride in a self-driving vehicle. Another survey, carried out this year by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, found something similar, with 48 percent of the study’s 3,000 respondents saying they would never purchase a vehicle that drives itself. Still another study, conducted by J.D. Power, showed consumer trust in the technology waning among all generations except Generation Y – the “Millennial” generation.
Respondents in all studies reportedly just didn’t feel confident in the technology’s ability to safely transport them from A to B, citing possibilities like equipment malfunctions, glitches, and security breeches.
For all of society’s concerns, however, fully-autonomous cars could provide transportation far safer than our current human-piloted ones. Machines don’t suffer from head colds or fatigue; they don’t get inebriated or distracted; they’re capable of making highly-precise calculations nearly instantaneously; and, equipped with the right sensors, they can see better in unfavorable conditions like nighttime or thick fog. Assuming issues like security, equipment malfunctions, and software bugs can be put to bed, they ought to prove far more reliable than humans – at least on paper.
But even if all those potential risks can be mitigated, we’d wager there will yet remain a considerable portion of the human population that simply wants nothing to do with self-driving cars. While the three surveys mentioned above address the question of Would you put your life in the hands of an autonomous automobile?, they neglect to address the matter of whether consumers would want to be chauffeured around by a machine, denied the chance to take command of the automobile for themselves.
Given the right set of wheels, driving is immensely pleasurable. Wheelspin can be fun. Oversteer can be fun. Slicing up corners on a curvy mountain road can be fun. It would take a callous person to insist that the 37,000-some traffic fatalities that occurred in the US last year don’t matter, but there are other ways to shrink that number; better driver education, smarter road design, improved crash safety, expanded public transit access, and even active driver assists all come to mind.
That’s not to mention that no fully-autonomous vehicle will ever be totally free of fatalities. It’s a chaotic world.
What those other surveys failed to ask, we are asking you now: Assuming autonomous vehicles could be made considerably safer than human-driven cars on average, would you willingly surrender your keys to be driven to and fro by a robot? Weigh-in using our state-of-the-art poll, and feel free to outline your thinking in the Comments section below.
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I wouldn’t mind a self-driving aid in certain situations (long distance, highway, traffic), but on a twisty backroad I want full control and all the fun!
You have no choices here. You start down this road and at some point the wheel will be removed from the drivers hands.
The question isn’t if I want anything. The question is if future generations would love to walk into a car and have it take off by itself — so that they need not look up from Instagram.
The dirty secret of why phones are devastating laptop sales: typing. To learn how to properly type is frustrating and time consuming. Twitter limits the number of characters for THIS reason.
Self-driving cars eliminate the ‘inconvenience’ of learning how to drive in the first place. Real self driving cars won’t have a steering wheel at all. If your car breaks down another will automatically find you and pick you up.
The problem here is that self driving cars are being pushed upon us by the trucking industry. They’d love to fire all those pricey drivers.
“The dirty secret of why phones are devastating laptop sales: typing. To learn how to properly type is frustrating and time consuming.”
LOL wut?
What phone is supplanting laptops simply because of their means of input? Is a graphic artist going to drop their laptop for a phone? I haven’t seen a university student ever willingly choose to write a paper on their phone, and they certainly don’t have a problem typing with all 10 fingers.
Way to miss the point.
“Is a graphic artist going to drop their laptop for a phone?” “I haven’t seen a university student ever willingly choose to write a paper on their phone.”
Right. People who MUST get a laptop get one. But there’s an entire middle market of people who use their phones because they don’t know how to type and don’t want to learn.
You talk about me missing the point, whereas you bring up computer input methods in a post about autonomous cars.
I’d only want it for the rare occasion I’d go out to dinner and want to have an adult beverage…but overall…the whole thing scares me. I see a downward spiral. At first everyone would have their own nicely maintained personal self-driving vehicle. Slowly car for hire services would become so much less expensive that people would stop buying cars all together. Then everyone would decide it should become the governments job to provide such an inexpensive service for everyone, and owning one yourself gets regulated into near impossibility. Then, as I’m getting into my twilight years I’m forced to ride in a huge dirty crowded self driving bus run by the government that runs over anyone in it’s way just because they don’t know how to follow the rules….and their families get billed for the cleanup.
Just to clarify, I have absolute confidence that the technology can be created to work and work well. I have less confidence farther up the chain.
There are plenty of upsides to self-driving cars, at least in theory. It would allow all sorts of people that currently can’t drive due to physical or health limitations to get around. Self driving cars also don’t get drunk, drowsy, distracted by texting, or enraged by other drivers. Traffic could also be reduced by having the ability to reroute you around slowdowns in real time, for all of the cars to neatly zipper into one lane at a merge point, or all start moving in unison from a stoplight.
Do I want one? …NO! I enjoy driving (at least most of the time). I’m a car guy, and I feel that most here would feel the same way about it. However, it might be nice to have something along the lines of super cruise to lighten the load of boring long distance highway driving, and I’d love for self-parking to become more widespread so I don’t have to worry so much about other drivers bumping my car where I left it parked. I think that is mostly what we will see in the short term.
The fully self driving car is years away at this point. My car has adaptive cruise control, and it is easily confused by tractor trailers on the highway. When one starts going around a bend in front of me, the car can’t tell that it’s in the other lane and begins to slow me down. Frustrating and dangerous, and there is no way to turn this feature off in my car. I also have the automatic braking, which has panicked and slammed on the brakes more than once now for a vehicle turning in front of me. I can see that it is moving out of the way, and will be clear by the time I get to that spot in the road, but the car doesn’t see that the vehicle is moving out of the way, it sees it as stationary because it isn’t moving forward. There have also been a few times now (once just this past Sunday), where slush or snow has built up on the radar device on the front of the vehicle to cause it to cease functioning and throw up warnings on the display. If a minor slush buildup on the front of the car causes it to be unable to function, what happens when the roads are bad? How will self driving cars function with black ice, or snow build up that obscures the edge of the road or lane markings? Even the self driving Uber’s require driver interaction way more than you might think. The computer doesn’t know what to do with people stopped partially in the lane of travel, or how to merge properly. So many self driving vehicles are involved in crashes because they can’t anticipate what actual human drivers are going to do. They also follow the rules to the point of being dangerous. If you’re the only one following the speed limit, you become the hazard, not everyone else that is going ten over. Unless that changes, I don’t see how self driving vehicles will ever be safer unless everyone has one.
I do want one! I rather let someone else drive for me, as I am tired of driving for others (first for my parents and now for my wife). Personally I walk to most of the places I need so my driving is less than 300 miles a month. An autonomous car can drive for me or my wife when I don’t want to.
I want nothing to do with self driving cars.
First I enjoy driving. Yes it has its bad days but too many good ones behind the wheel make up for it.
Second the time driving gives me a break from doing what I do all day behind a computer all day. Let’s face it most our commutes are 20 mins and you are not going to get much done in that time. Heck many people get motion sick reading or on the computer while moving.
One other great factor that will come into play. You give up control of your vehicle and someone else will tell you when you can go, where you can go and how fast you can go.
They will regulate the highways to control traffic flow. To do this you will get a slot at a specific time in many areas to go. This may mean you will be forced to way 30 mins after work to get in the freeway in some large cities. Self driving may control the spacing of vehicles but not the volume. That will be up to big brother controlling the systems.
What also troubles me is they could at some point cut you off for various reasons. Your choice of movement in this country could be cut off by a government that you oppose. What will you do then?
At first these systems will be part time or assisted but in time they will go full auto mode, at that time you gave away your freedom of choice to someone managing the system. It may be in the future beyond my time but it is coming.
If you want others to drive then Uber or ride the bus.
I really question anyone who calls themselves an auto enthusiast that supports these systems.
Looks you need to find a different car
I am sure it is coming, but hope not before I am done driving (73 years old).
Younger generation will probably accept it wilth little problem.
The real question is do you like Change? People that don’t like change I laugh at them! I laugh because these people end up accepting it, and in most cases end up loving it.
I remember people losing their minds over disc brakes, power steering, antilock brakes, cruise control, and now people complain about start/stop technology, different hybrids, electric vehicles, and now it’s autonomous cars!
Why are people so afraid of technology? So afraid to move forward with progress? These people would still like to drive a car or truck with a 3 on the tree.
As for me I am all for these new types of cars, super cruise I hope will be in my future. And this is coming from a guy who loves to drive, and has a 1970 Chevy truck that I have had for over 40 years. But it’s time to move on, I mean do we still live in houses that have 50s technology? No so why would cars be any different?
Change is always difficult, and I personally still enjoy driving very much, even at age 66. But my 85 year old mother in law took an accidental trip from central NJ to Washington, DC a couple of months ago after not getting off at the exit for a mall where she wanted to go. Yeah- 8 hours, 250 miles out of the way. Although we pried the keys away, finally, perhaps a “self driving” car would have allowed her to reach her destination, or at least get back home.
I sure hope I don’t go down the dementia trail, but I can’t say for certain that I will not. Having the option of mobility if that time arrives would be most welcomed. Or if I’m physically unable to handle driving any longer. Plenty of baby boomers are reaching the point where they will be quite dangerous on the road, for a variety of reasons.
It makes me laugh when people have problems moving forward with progress!
No, i’d prefer to still have the pleasure and experience of driving
I would never want a full self driving car, but something like Supercriuse that could also”self drive” when sitting in traffic would be nice.
What are you so scared of? Why do you live in fear? You do realize that they have self flying airplanes? I am sure you have flown on one in your life. I don’t see people complaining these days like they use to. It’s commonplace now just like cars will be one day
Everyone seems to be excited by this great new technology-imagine, being able to summon a vehicle to take you anywhere without you having to provide any physical input! You could catch up on your emails, look at the scenery or engage in conversation without having to pay attention to the road and other drivers ! Oh, wait, that technology already has existed for over 100 years! Its called take a bus, a taxi or a train-if driving the vehicle you paid for is too much of a chore, or learning to drive safely takes too much effort on your part, then do everyone else a favour and stay the Hell off the road!