95 Tesla deaths have involved fires or Autopilot. How the EV maker fares in fatalities per million miles.::Tesla deaths from fires and Autopilot make up 24% of the fatalities in crashes. Learn about the death rates per million miles and vs other cars.
Ah, this one is hard to forget. I remember this one vividly because it sparked all sorts of philosophical discussions around the use of self-driving cars. Hypothetical scenarios like “Between a family of 5 with children, should the car choose to kill the driver to save the family” and the different variations of the trolley problem.
Determining the responsible party was always a puzzle to me. The current state of auto-pilot requires hands-on attention from the driver, so the accountable party is arguably the driver. But with a fully autonomous vehicle, where the steering wheel isn’t installed, is the car manufacturer accountable for deaths and accidents?
Yes
A contrived metaphor: if an unleashed dog bites a person, is the dog owner no longer responsible for the incident?
You could say that it’s up to the car owner to install a steering wheel, like how a dog owner should use a leash. But this would be a gap between when the person receives the car and when they could install the steering wheel (assuming the wheel installation can be performed).
We already have this. Mercedes offers level 3 capability where they take responsibility for any accidents using the system. We’ll know that Tesla has made real progress when they stop blaming drivers for every single accident that happens.