My wife and I spent a long weekend in Austin last fall to celebrate our 30th anniversary.
We stayed in an Airbnb in a sleepy little neighborhood a couple blocks east of the famous Franklins BBQ. We’d walk back from the downtown area each night (not that late because we’re not that young) and see them cruising around. A pack of three. Tightly knit. Just spinning around the empty streets in the neighborhood. Coming back around every few minutes. Dutifully obeying all of the traffic rules like a newbie teenager with the instructor and his clipboard wearing a stern expression in the passenger seat. They never got in our way and even stopped noticeably short when we crossed the street in front of them. But it was disarming to see them.
Driverless cars. Chevy Cruise’s to be exact. Testing. Learning. Figuring it out.
Even if you know nothing of ChatGPT, you probably know about driverless cars. And you probably have an opinion. Most of the loud opinions are negative.
Maybe, “I’d never get in a car without a driver!”
Or, “Nobody’s taking the wheel away from me!”
Or, “Ain’t no way a machine can drive better than me!”
In 2023, fully autonomous, driverless (or, more accurately, AI-driven) cars logged 3.3 million miles in California alone. Waymo, the largest driverless car company, has logged 7.1 million miles since its inception. Over that time, it has recorded three minor incidents. If humans had logged those same miles in the same areas, we would expect around 13 injury crashes.
Testing. Learning. Figuring it out.
Fully autonomous cars driven by AI are coming. It’s not an if. It’s a when. Maybe not in my lifetime, but it’s coming.
For now, AI continues on the path of testing, learning, and figuring it out.
