Sonafrank

Grant Sonafrank

Professor Malcolm Campbell

UWRT 1104

2/13/2019

Topic proposal: are autonomous vehicles safe and ethical?

Introduction/overview

I will be researching and discovering why there is a dilemma over introducing

autonomous (self-driving) cars onto the existing roadways. The controversy of introducing self-

driving cars for consumers is simple because the question is will this save lives or cause

unnecessary deaths. The people to whom this information pertains to is everyone because ten

years down the road the laws and regulations might become juristically different compared to

how they are now. This topic may be a simple debate over saving lives and reducing vehicular

injuries but there are many different talking points on how a computer system can or cannot

make moral and ethical decisions while traveling at high speeds. The idea of self-driving cars

might change how global transportation acts in terms of safety, cost to transport, and speed of

travel. Autonomous vehicles are a genius idea, but the execution of how they are made, and act

will have a tremendous effect on their production and implementation.

There is an ethical side to autonomous vehicles as well because there are situations

where a crash or injury is inevitable but what decision is the self-driving car programmed to

make. Janet Fleetwood, PhD, MPH writer for the American journal of public health, elaborates
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on how “forced-choice algorithms” don’t always make the correct choice. These algorithms are

programmed to decide based on inputs from the sensors on the cars, but these sensors are

unable find ethical problems in dangerous situations. In Fleetwood’s article she describes the

runaway trolley scenario which simply stated is if you had a choice between killing one person

or five people and no other options what would your choice be? This dilemma may sound

simple, but the issue is that the five people might be all Nazis and the one person is nurse. This

is where the problem is because the forced choice algorithms don’t have any ethics, they only

have software programing. Another problem with self-driving cars is there is a chance that they

cause accidents on their own when a person behind the wheel would be able to make many

swift turns as where the programming cant react. In the article published by IEEE technology

and society magazine they state the statistic that ninety four percent of car crashes can be

linked to human choice or human error. So here lies the argument for the implementation of

autonomous vehicles because the theoretical numbers will save lives no matter who they are.

This idea is very important because ultimately safety is the main point behind these vehicles.

During the research phase of this assignment the lecture session with the librarian

helped because he showed his techniques of how to narrow down the results of my searching.

The data bases on the library’s website proved to be the best resource for finding out new

information on these topics. The data bases were a good resource because of the ability to

enter in multiple keywords, relevance by date, and the ability to have keywords eliminated

from my searches. I did not seek a librarian’s help after I started serious research because the

strategies that were shared during the presentation as well as the ones in class worked well for

me in finding many sources for this project, although I now have a good knowledge about this
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controversy I still think I need to find out more about the technology behind these autonomous

vehicles.

The idea of self-driving cars being introduced is a current topic that is being fought over

because many companies are working on it, and tesla has already produced a few semi-

autonomous cars that will drive themselves on a highway but not in congested city streets. The

position for the self-driving cars has two argument as to why they should be developed, the

first being that when they are perfected they will reduce the rate of car crashes and make the

roads safer. The other argument for the creation of these cars is that they are convenient,

people who are busy all the time and people who are intoxicated could benefit from this

because they don’t have to drive the car. Also, the introduction of self-driving cars might

eliminate the need for people to go through the hassle of getting their driver’s license and

renewing them. On the opposite side of the self-driving car debate are those who have the

ethical problems with these cars not being able to make decisions that vary depending on the

person or difficult to make no matter who the person is, as previously explained these cars are

programmed and can’t always make rational decisions. The owner of tesla cars, Elon musk, is

doing a good job of convincing the public that these cars will be safer for the future than

normal car will be. Another company that is trying to perfect the driverless car is google, they

have not yet released a vehicle for consumer purchase but have been seen working on

prototypes.

Initial inquiry questions

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Are driverless cars safe? Are driverless cars ethical? Will autonomous cars be the only vehicles

on the roads in the future? Is developing autonomous vehicles important?

My interest in the topic

I am interested in autonomous vehicle because I am always interested in new

technology as well as car and this is the combination of the two. I am interested on how this

technology works as well as what other functions of a car can stem from this technology of a

car being aware of its surroundings. This topic interest me because of the technological aspect

also, I enjoy learning about new technology in both terms of how it works and what it does.

Learning how things work interest me because it brings new ideas of innovations using the

already existing parts. What I already know about self-driving cars is that they have many

sensors around the vehicle that will detect surrounding objects and avoid them accordingly. I

also know that there are some semi-autonomous cars already available for consumer purchase.

I want to find out what the limitations are for the sensors in term of range, the size of what

they can detect, and what all of the reactions are to the detected inputs. I also want to know

what the reasoning is for why fully autonomous cars are not available yet, like whether if the

holdup Is due to government regulation or technological advancements are not up to par yet. I

also want to know what regulations are already in place for these cars as well as what laws are

being worked on. Lastly, I am curious as to when these cars are made available to the common

person how long will it take for people to stop learning how to drive and when the roadways

are expected to have most of the cars.

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Next steps

The majority of my research I expect to use the UNCC library resource page because it

has proved to be worth while on previous assignment in college. This website gives easy access

to many data bases, news articles, and magazines that will pertain to my topic. I have also

noticed that the library page has access to some legal documents pertaining to autonomous car

and this will be beneficial to understanding what the causes of concern are for the

development of self-driving cars. A good place to find ideas for this research might be found on

company websites such as tesla or google, to find their motives (aside from making money)

behind creating these new technologies. After going through the library’s resources if I am still

having trouble finding information a great way to discover more information is to simply ask

the librarian for any suggestions because it is their job to aid in research so if anybody can help

it will be a librarian.