"The trolley problem, of course, isn't really about trolleys; it's about the ethical question at the heart of (frankly too many of) our policy choices, particularly those that govern our transportation policy: how do we decide whose death is acceptable? And more important: why are we willing to pull that proverbial lever to save someone's life, even if it means simultaneously ending some else's, instead of just creating a future where no one dies at all?"
"In a recent interview at TechCrunch's Disrupt Summit, Waymo co-CEO Tekedra Mawakana made it all too clear that she is more than prepared to pull that theoretical lever, when she was asked, "Will society accept a death potentially caused by a robot?" Mawakana replied: "I think that society will ... We don't say 'whether' [our vehicles will be involved in fatal crashes]; We say 'when.' And we plan for them.""
The trolley problem poses a moral dilemma about sacrificing one life to save multiple others and serves as a lens for transportation policy decisions. The core question asks whose death is considered acceptable and why societies might accept tradeoffs rather than eliminate all deaths. Some autonomous vehicle companies acknowledge that crashes involving their systems are inevitable and prepare operational responses for such incidents. Planned responses include temporarily removing vehicles from service and conducting retests after incidents. Slow, deliberate urban rollouts are used to reduce risk and refine safety measures before wider deployment. Policy choices must balance public acceptance, regulation, and technological pace.
Read at Streetsblog
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