> Another example are airplanes, which are driven almost automatically these days, where the pilot is only really required for landing and, again, for safety in unexpected situations.
Actually now pilots usually don't land manually unless for training (and so on commercial flights usually only in perfect weather conditions) or when there is some serious problem (like engine not working).
BTW, very big part of recent plane crashes was related to human errors in cases which could be handled by autopilot.
Good point. However, I don't think that transportation systems without a human at some point will be accepted by society in the next decade, unless they operate on separate traffic systems (e.g. extra streets, or strictly separated parts of the streets). This may be irrational, but that's another problem.
Yes, this isn't going to happen at once. At first there will be cars still needing some driver control (like planes with autopilot), but as most drivers aren't professional I think laziness will gradually win over fear as people will get used to not having to control car.
The Air France crash happened when the autopilot bailed out on facing a situation it couldn't handle. (And while you can design an autopilot to handle the specific case of the pitot tubes freezing up, there's no better course of action for the general case of "sensor inputs that make no sense according to the autopilot design"). If you automate more that's going to make pilots worse not better at handling the rare situations the autopilot can't handle.
The pitot tubes unfroze after a few seconds, so the autopilot was perfectly capable of working again, but the pilots didn't re-engage it and kept trying manually, causing the end result...
My one question is "Who the hell decided that averaging stick inputs is a good idea??
Actually now pilots usually don't land manually unless for training (and so on commercial flights usually only in perfect weather conditions) or when there is some serious problem (like engine not working).
BTW, very big part of recent plane crashes was related to human errors in cases which could be handled by autopilot.