Using a system called the Generic Obstacle and Lane Detector, or GOLD, these two vans were able to pretty much guide themselves across the two continents. Lasers scanners and video cameras worked together to ensure the vans didn’t cause any accidents (and it is pretty remarkable they made it that far unscathed.) The researchers had to intervene in heavy traffic or at toll booths, but for the most part they did the driving themselves.
Added bonus. The vans are electric.
How many cargo drivers (truckers) are there in the United States? Something like 3.5 million. They need pay, benefits, food, and rest stops. This technology eliminates them.
This is what I was talking about, when I said that corporations aren’t interested in hiring the unemployed, they are interested in investing in technology that creates more unemployed. Reducing the cost of labor — and the power of the workers — is a driving force in our current economy. Through outsourcing, greater efficiency, and technological advancement (whose purpose is to eliminate the human operator), the middle class is being decimated.
What will all the fedex, ups, mail, and freight drivers — most of them men — do, when all the trucks (taxis, buses, trains) can drive themselves? Hell, we don’t care. Canis canem edit.
Hadn’t thought of that. Good point. However the article did point out that the vehicles sometimes need human intervention and millions of unmanned vehicles on the road seems a recipe for disaster.