California’s Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) recently issued its first self-driving car permits. Three companies applied: Google, Audi and Daimler AG Mercedes-Benz. Google bagged 25 test permits, the others getting two each. Safety advocates applauded the move. Google’s self-driving prototypes have done 1.1 million kilometres with only one accident. The age of the self-driving car has officially begun.
What does it all mean? No one is entirely sure but one thing is certain – those self-driving cars didn’t go to the DMV to wait in line for hours to get their permits. Nor did they navigate page after page of impenetrable bureaucratic websites. A human did that. Perhaps that’s our first clue. In the age of the “self-driving” car, all that may be left for us meat puppets is the paperwork.
To some, the self-driving automobile is a leap forward. Current vehicles already have a lot of self-driving elements. Operating a self-driving car will be more like flying an airplane. The advanced technology will take care of much of the tasks, leaving us to worry about big-picture issues and handling the high-skill tasks.