this post was submitted on 22 Sep 2025
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Hmm. That makes me wonder.
Like, it's hard for me or for Joe Blow to evaluate how effective a car company's self-driving functionality is. Requires expertise, and it's constantly changing. And ideally, I shouldn't be the one to bear cost, if I can't evaluate risk, because then I'm taking on some unknown cost when purchasing the car.
And the car manufacturer isn't in a position to be objective.
But an insurer can do that.
Like, I wonder if it'd be possible to have insurers offer packages that cover cost of accidents that occur while the car is in self-driving mode. That'd make it possible to put a price tag on accidents from self-driving systems.
Yes, if and only if the car manufacturer is the one paying for it. Otherwise the buyer is still taking on an unknown cost when buying the car in the form of an unknown number of insurance premiums.
The odds of this happening are of course zero.
Wouldn''t that be a warranty issue? The car is sold with self-driving, if self-driving caused an accident that is because the product sold didn't behave in the manner expected. This is of course only valid really for vehicles sold as fully self driving and not as an addition.
Though this really only applies in places with strong consumer protection laws lol.
Warranty is provided for a limited time only, though. Would you be comfortable riding a self-driving car past that warranty, when the self-driving software is no longer receiving updates and you'll be the one who has to pay for any damage it causes?
Yes? People use driver aids today without warranty and many cars are on the road past their warranty.
Perhaps there could be a high insurance premium if the system seems insufficient, yet that might not stop people either. People are lazy and not very logical.
Thr cars that are on the road today past their warranty aren't likely to decide to cause an accident. Mechanical failures leading to accidents are very rare. Self-driving technology has more examples of accidents caused than accidents prevented. I don't think the same reasoning applies.
I agree to that extent, but I don't think people will be deterred by it unless it's not allowed by law.
A car from the early '90s is still driven unless it becomes too expensive for the comfort it provides but safety does not seem to be a consideration for many at this price-point (and I guess at other price points too). Modern regular cars are far more safe than what was typical in the '90s and trucks are far less safe than regular modern cars, yet they're on the road.
As such, I think people people will keep using it, downplaying the risk involved. Many don't treat cars as a boring means of transportation but rather as a desirable object. Us humans don't act very logical when we want something.
There's no arguing with that.