... driverless cars should eventually be
capable of acting as our “wingmen,” proactive
and aware of our faults so they can assist
us in the best possible way.
erless cars will ultimately be extremely boring. When required to
monitor autonomous systems for
long periods of time, human babysitters frequently get distracted
and tune out, which can lead to accidents, slowed reaction times and
delays in recognizing critical issues. In 2009, two pilots operating
a flight to Minneapolis from San
Diego entrusted the autopilot with
control of the plane, and eventually
turned their attention to their laptops. They became so engrossed in
their computer screens that they
failed to realize they’d overshot the
airport by about 110 miles.
In the recent MIT report on
driverless car technology, Missy
Cummings and Jason Ryan of the
school’s Humans and Automation Lab write that drivers in autonomous or highly autonomous
cars failed to react as quickly in
emergency situations. “[A]t precisely the time when the automation needs assistance, the operator could not provide it and may
actually have made the situation
worse,” they concluded.
In time, technology could even
solve that problem, too. Nass,
along with engineers at Toyota,
Ford and Mercedes-Benz, are already looking ahead to creating
cars that monitor both road and
driver, and could behave differently depending on the driver’s
mood or mental state. The latest
Mercedes models claim their “Attention Assist” technology can
detect if a driver is getting drowsy,
though for the time being, its only
recourse is to sound an alert.
In short, the self-driving car
could one day map its drivers as
well as it maps the roads. And
when that happens, it won’t only
drive you around — it’ll also be
your best friend.
“In the same way you become attached to friends, you’ll become attached to your car, though not in an
unhealthy way,” Nass says. “From a
business standpoint, this is
the dream of the century.”
Bianca Bosker is the executive technology editor of The Huffington Post.