[thorrr]

I've been wondering: why don't the self-driving car companies build a system that requires a person to drive it but assures the human can't crash the car? In other words, if the self-driving models predict that the human inputs will result in a crash it forcefully overrides the throttle, brakes, or steering wheel.

The sensation would be like driving one of those tracked cars at an amusement park. Try and slam the wheel hard to the right to steer into a guard rail? Computer would physically block it from turning past the point that you would leave your own lane.

This system would:

  * force human drivers to drive the car 100% of the time
  * allow real world testing and enhancement of self driving capabilities (data gathering, model backtesting, etc.)
  * be strictly better than both fully automated and existing non-automated systems

We have the beginnings of this with the new auto-stop capabilities that are showing up in new cars. Why not build this hybrid system as a stopgap until full level 5 automation is working?

[dTal]

Because now you have the worst of both worlds. The computer still has the final say in what the car does, but now you have a fallible human in the loop at all times as well. If the computer really can predict crashes better than the human, then have the computer drive the car. If it can't, then letting it override the human isn't a good idea.

Example: you slam the wheel to the right to steer into a guard rail. The computer overrides you and you remain in your lane. You flatten the toddler you were trying to avoid, that the computer didn't see.

[marshray]

> requires a person to drive it but assures the human can't crash the car?

Because the 'not crashing' part is the hard part, the rest is just navigation.