| I agree that it is a psychological difference but our behavior as a society suggests a recognition that the machine and it's makers have a role in whether or not people die in cars.
This is why we demand safer cars and sue car makers when their designs failed or did not meet our expectations in protecting the occupants. I can agree with the notion that the machine killed the person in all cases where the the machine does not include any controls for the person. As a society, we currently recognize that the causes of accidents and the probability of occupant death are dependent on multiple factors, one of which is the car and it's safety features (or lack there of). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traffic_collision#Causes We also already have a significant level of automation in almost all cars, yet we are rarely tempted to say that having cruise-control, automatic transmissions, electronic throttle control, or computer controlled fuel injection means we are not in control and therefore the machine is totally at fault in every accident. Operating a car was much harder to get right before these things existed and the difference can still be observed in comparison to small aircraft operations.
Then and now we still blame some accidents on "driver/pilot error" while others are blamed on "engine failure", "structural failure", or "environmental factors". I think having steering assistance or even true autopilot will not change this. In airplanes, the pilots have to know when and how to use an autopilot if the plane has one.
If the pilot switches on the autopilot and it tries to crash the plane, the pilot is expected to override and re-program it, failure to do so would be considered pilot error.
Similarly, drivers will have to know when and how to use cruse-control/steering-assist and should be expected to override it when it doesn't do the right thing. |