Are We Moving Too Fast With Self-Driving Cars?

Recently, Arizona had 12 self-driving cars on their roads.  One of them was involved in what was called a "high speed" crash with the car landing on its side.  On a percentage basis, one accident out of 12 cars is not very good.  Because of that accident, Uber has now been forced to shut down its Arizona program of self-driving cars until further notice.

Yet, researchers, as reported by the "Atlantic" in 2015 (see below), said this:

"Researchers estimate that driverless cars could, by midcentury, reduce traffic fatalities by up to 90 percent. Which means that, using the number of fatalities in 2013 as a baseline, self-driving cars could save 29,447 lives a year. In the United States alone, that's nearly 300,000 fatalities prevented over the course of a decade, and 1.5 million lives saved in a half-century."

Of course, that assumes that the technology is sound.  In fact, in late 2015, "USAToday" ran a story that stated:  "self-driving test cars are involved in crashes at five times the rate of conventional cars."

Google and other companies such as Ford are pushing to put unmanned vehicles on the roads right-now, I personally think the states should slow down a bit and let the technology prove itself with lower accident rates.   As reported by the U.K. Daily Mail, a "leaked" internal report from Uber said that a self-driving Uber vehicles can't drive a mile without human intervention.  Doesn't sound like the technology is quite there, yet! 

References:

Self-driving Uber SUV crashes and flips onto its side after 'high impact' accident in Arizona: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4348742/Self-driving-Uber-crashes-Arizona.html

Uber crash raises question: How do self-driving cars deal with the other guys on the road: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/innovations/wp/2017/03/25/uber-accident-raises-question-how-do-self-driving-cars-deal-with-the-other-guys-on-the-road/?utm_term=.d8bcd79f0add

Self-Driving Cars Could Save 300,000 Lives Per Decade in America: https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/09/self-driving-cars-could-save-300000-lives-per-decade-in-america/407956/

Study: Self-driving cars have higher accident rate: http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/cars/2015/10/31/study-self-driving-cars-accidents/74946614/

Uber's self-driving cars get into another crash | TechRadar: http://www.techradar.com/news/ubers-self-driving-cars-get-into-another-crash

Uber Halts Self-Driving Car Fleet After Crash In Arizona: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/uber-self-driving-cars-suspended_us_58d70639e4b03692bea698ee
 
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