Are driverless cars safer than actual drivers?

Sep 9, 2015
2 min read

Google is going above and beyond as a leader in efforts to create driverless cars. However, it’s run into one obvious, yet odd, problem: humans.

This opinion article was originally featured in PantherNOW and questions whether driverless cars are safer than actual drivers behind the wheel.

Check out the article’s excerpt below and click the link if you want to read the full story!

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Maytinee Kramer/Staff Writer

Google is going above and beyond as a leader in efforts to create driverless cars. However, it’s run into one obvious, yet odd, problem: humans. Google’s autonomous test cars are programmed to abide by the rules of the road and though they take the most cautious approach, this can put them out of step with other vehicles.

Just last month, one of Google’s self-driving cars approached a crosswalk and, as it was supposed to do, slowed down to allow a pedestrian to cross, prompting its “safety driver” to apply the brakes. The pedestrian safely crossed the road, but Google’s car wasn’t – a human-driven sedan hit it from behind. Another Google car test in 2009 could not get through a four-way stop because its sensors kept waiting for the other vehicles to come to a complete stop and let it go. The human drivers kept inching forward, looking for an advantage, causing Google’s robot to paralyze.

This is one of the biggest challenges facing automated cars. As humans, we are taught to follow the rules of the road but reality shows that humans don’t actually behave by the book.

“The real problem is that the car is too safe,” Donald Norman, director of the Design Lab at the University of California, San Diego says. “They have to learn to be aggressive in the right amount and the right amount depends on the culture.”