Karl Iagnemma

It's funny how life works. You end up sometimes back where you started.

Even if trolley problems were a realistic concern for AVs, it is not clear what, if anything, regulators or companies developing AVs should do about them. The trolley problem is an intensely debated thought experiment precisely because there isn't a consensus on what should be done.

I love driving through Western Massachusetts, out through the Berkshires, when the road is empty and it's a nice day. I don't like driving home on Memorial Drive at 5:45 or 6:45 at night when it's crowded and stressful. I think that's true of most people, and the goal of automated driving is to take the stressful part of driving out of the task.

If you're a large organization, you may welcome a bit of regulation to keep the small guys out.

There's a lot of knowledge in civil engineering about how soils will react when subjected to heavy loads. When you take lightweight vehicles and granular soils of varying composition, it's a very complex modeling process.

The fundamental problem here is that humans and automation approach the driving task differently.

It's important for automated cars to be able to drive in a human-like fashion - and that does mean adapting to the driving patterns around you.

It's challenging to drive in a way that's human-like.

Conflating thought experiments with reality could slow the deployment of AVs that are reliably safer than human drivers.

It's a cultural question. Will people want to share cars?

When a driverless car looks out on the world, it's not able to distinguish the age of a pedestrian or the number of occupants in a car.

For self-driving cars in particular, there are lots of dimensions of this technology beyond just impact on labour. There is a massive potential improvement in public health.