Does this responsibility stay with the driver, despite this clearly being an Uber operation? Aside from the victim, did self-driving tech just get its first, uhm, "marter"?
By law(and please correct me if I'm wrong), the driver of the vehicle is responsible for everything that happens with the vehicle. Why would it matter if the vehicle is owned by UPS, Fedex, PizzaHut or Uber? Is a truck driver not responsible for an accident just because they drive for a larger corporation?
Let me put it this way - my Mercedes has an emergency stop feature when it detects pedestrians in front of the car. If I'm on cruise control and the car hits someone, could I possibly blame it on Mercedes? Of course not. I'm still the driver behind the wheel and those systems are meant to help - not replace my attention.
What we have now in these semi-autonomous vehicles is nothing more than a glorified cruise control - and I don't think the law treats it any differently(at least yet.).
Now, if Uber(or anyone else) builds cars with no driver at all - sure, we can start talking about shifting the responsibility to the corporation. But for now, the driver is behind the wheel for a reason.
The San Francisco Chronicle late Monday reported that Tempe Police Chief Sylvia Moir said that from viewing videos taken from the vehicle “it’s very clear it would have been difficult to avoid this collision in any kind of mode (autonomous or human-driven) based on how she came from the shadows right into the roadway." (bit.ly/2IADRUF)
Moir told the Chronicle, “I suspect preliminarily it appears that the Uber would likely not be at fault in this accident,” but she did not rule out that charges could be filed against the operator in the Uber vehicle, the paper reported.
Let me put it this way - my Mercedes has an emergency stop feature when it detects pedestrians in front of the car. If I'm on cruise control and the car hits someone, could I possibly blame it on Mercedes? Of course not. I'm still the driver behind the wheel and those systems are meant to help - not replace my attention.
What we have now in these semi-autonomous vehicles is nothing more than a glorified cruise control - and I don't think the law treats it any differently(at least yet.).
Now, if Uber(or anyone else) builds cars with no driver at all - sure, we can start talking about shifting the responsibility to the corporation. But for now, the driver is behind the wheel for a reason.