No Fast Track to Self-Driving Trucks

Self-driving trucks is the topic of this episode of The AI Minute. For more on Artificial Intelligence: https://voicesinai.com https://gigaom.com https://byronreese.com https://ift.tt/31WftGA... Transcript: Many people think that the catalyst to an economic singularity with artificial intelligence is the self-driving truck. The thesis is that there are 3.5 million truck drivers and 6.8 million support jobs that to one degree or another live off the truck driver. So, this is a big part of the economy. But I don’t think this is actually a tipping point. I don't think the changeover to self-driving trucks will happen all that quickly. First, the technology has to be ironed out. Then it has to overcome the regulatory hurdles. Then the lawyers will get involved, for every accident with a driverless car at the helm is an opportunity to sue a multi-billion dollar corporation instead of a middle-income truck driver. Every programming decision—whether the car veers into a tree to avoid a dog in the road or chooses to run off a cliff instead of hitting a pedestrian—will be the subject of legal discovery. Many a programmer will be subpoenaed during this time. Then, of course, there will be the social acceptance of autonomous trucks, and then we have to retrofit existing hardware. All of that will happen, but even then, you still need someone to walk the FedEx box from the truck to the porch. Until you make a robot that can leave an illegibly-scrawled Post-it note on somebody’s front door, you don’t really have an end-to-end solution. All of these steps will happen. You will see all kinds of new jobs created. Additionally, during that time, some truck drivers are going to retire, and other people will think long and hard about entering the truck driving profession. Finally, for what it is worth, the 6.8 million support jobs includes gas stations, and auto repair, and insurance agents, all of which the self-driving trucks will need as well. Like I've said, undoubtedly it’s all going to happen, I just think it’s going to be a bit more gradual. My guess is that you won’t just live to see self-driving cars accepted, you will live to see “natural” driving outlawed. Was it ever a good idea to let a sixteen-year-old propel 4000 pounds of metal down the highway at seventy miles an hour? The truest thing you can say about self-driving cars is that they will eventually save hundreds of thousands of lives every year.