Google’s self driving cars have been involved in two accidents during June of this year – humans were at fault in both of the cases. As we previously discussed earlier this year, the big G set free their self driving cars in Mountain View, California.

Google’s self driving cars are accompanied by two safety drivers on board – ready to jump and take controls if the need arises, but it seems they weren’t quick enough, and two accidents occurred due to human error. Neither of the accidents resulted in injury, they were only minor scrapes.

One of the accidents consists of a Google Lexus stopping at a red light, and the one driving behind bumped into it at 5 miles per hour. There were minor scrapes, and nobody was injured.

The second accident was even more anti-climactic. The Google car was stopped at a red light when the car behind bumped into it at 1 mile per hour – no damage occurred, not even a scrape.

Now, Google is testing their new tech in Austin, Texas. They have take all the safety measures, states a spokesperson. Permits from Texas Governor Greg Abbott, the Texas Department of Transportation, police and other authorities have been acquired by the company, but somehow, they completely forgot to announce this little experiment to the public.

Some say that Google isn’t really acting that legally when it’s about self driving cars – more so, because laws don’t exist for this kind of thing.

But why is Austin the first city where Google has decided to test their new tech? Welp, the reason behind this, according to a Google spokesperson, is that – ” We’ve loved how much Austin embraces innovation.” Or, maybe, how Austin embraces Google spending big bucks on their city.

The June report, according to Google, states that there are 2 Google Lexus self driving cars around the Mountain View area, and other 25 vehicles prepared for internal testings. Of course, we can’ really predict when the big G wants to innovate some more around the world.

Google isn’t the only one developing this kind of technology. Tesla, of course it’s Elon Musk we are talking about, has been developing their self driving cars around the same time that Google has started, but they have a fleet of only 12 autonomous vehicles.

Also, Delpi, the car manufacturer, is developing new tech regarding sensors, and soft-ware based on self-driving systems.

The future seems bright, hopefully Google isn’t going to unleash the A.I. Apocalypse on us – even Elon Musk is afraid of this, and when great minds like him suggest that we shouldn’t dwell that much in A.I. it would be best that we would heed the warning.

What about you? Do you think Google’s self-driving cars aren’t at fault? Or do you think that they are mischievously lying in their monthly reports?

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Remember watching that Will Smith movie I, Robot – that is also based on a story by Asimov; and thinking Huh, wouldn’t it be great if self driving cars were a thing?

Well, they’ve been in tests for a while now thanks to Google, and this Summer self driving cars will make their début on the streets of California, more exactly Mountain View, where the company is based.

In a recent blog post, Google has stated that the car’s maximum speed will be capped at 25 miles, that is 40 kilometers per hour, and they will also be accompanied by safety drivers – just in case they become sentient and destroy the world, right Google?

Project director Chris Urmson says that the prototypes will run the same software as their Lexus RX450h fleet – which logged over a million miles, that is ” about 75 years of typical American adult driving experience.” says Urmson.

“We’re looking forward to learning how the community perceives and interacts with the vehicles, and to uncovering challenges that are unique to a fully self-driving vehicle — e.g. where it should stop if it can’t stop at its exact destination due to construction or congestion. In the coming years, we’d like to run small pilot programs with our prototypes to learn what people would like to do with vehicles like this.” Chris Urmson has been reported saying.

I love the idea of self driving cars – the best way to combat drunk driving, teens, and adults alike, that can’t take their noses out of their smartphones, sudden seizures, falling asleep while driving; basically it will solve a ton of problems for us.

But are they really that safe? A recent report has found that since September Google’s self driving cars have been in 11 accidents.

Google has announced that the accidents were minor incidents, and their cars weren’t at fault. Seven vehicles were rear-ended, two of them were involved in sideswipes, and one car was involved in driving through a red light. How is the last one not your fault Google? Okay, I do understand that people were to blame for rear-ending, and sideswiping your vehicles, but passing a red light?

Pure PR Gold for Google here, because they emphasized two strong points

a) its sensors, and algorithms are far more efficient than a human driver, who is prone to error;

and

b) because the vehicles are surrounded by error prone humans, they are learning, and are far more efficient, and safe on the road. We basically feed their cars with our faults and they somehow make it better.

If we assume that what are they saying is correct, then, sheesh, that’s fantastic. A machine that learns from our errors and fixes our problems for us? Wait, no, that sounds like an introduction to the A.I. Revolution. Shut it down Google, right this minute!

But let’s put our fears and irrational paranoia aside for a moment. If what they are saying is true, then seriously Google deserves a Nobel Prize – make a category up and give it to the whole company.

One thing that the company has stated they are kinda struggling with is if, and when, the car reaches its designated stop location, and that location is blocked by either another car, congestion, or a sudden construction site that meddles with re-routing its path.

 

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