A pedestrian was pinned under a Cruise robotaxi after another car’s hit-and-run
A pedestrian was pinned under a Cruise robotaxi after another car’s hit-and-run
The woman is reportedly in critical condition.
The car did what it was programmed to do— unfortunately, that’s not what was best for the time. I think some kind of human override is needed for this type of situation.
But this feels more like a general car problem than anything. Car infrastructure is typically not pedestrian friendly :(
No, the car did the right thing.
Removing pressure from her leg could have meant bleeding to death before paramedics could arrive. As horrifying as it is to have a car parked on your leg, she was stable and as safe as she could possibly be. Removing the car from her leg wouldn't have reduced the pain - chances are it would've got a lot worse and I bet emergency services didn't remove the car from her leg as soon as they arrived, they would've done a bunch of prep work first (especially given her drugs for the pain).
When there's a serious accident, you stop what you're doing and wait for help. Only act if you're trained or if it's very clear that something needs to be done right now (e.g. if a car is on fire and someone is inside it).
If the weight of the car stopped her from breathing it would have been a very different thing.
You are adapting your arguments to the situation.
It should be clear that no self-driving car will ever know what “the right thing” is in cases like this and it would require human interaction/intervention to resolve*. This is simply because the car would be unable to gather the necessary information about the situation.
That should not deter us from adopting self-driving, as self-driving vehicles will be the biggest boon to pedestrian safety seen since the advent of urbanization.
* One could obviously imagine a future where other vehicles could contribute information about the situation so that the vehicle in question could take actions and react based on what happens around it and seeing different perspectives than its own. Interactions with robots or drones could potentially also contribute information or actively aid in the situation.
If the vehicle was intelligent enough to converse with other humans or even the human in question, or at least use human voice to gather information to aid its decision making this could also be different. But the vehicle itself will always struggle with the lack of information about what is actually going on in a situation like this.
How topical Some More News' latest video is. My heart goes out to the injured pedestrian and I hope she makes a good, quick recovery.