With technology rapidly advancing, many new inventions are being created, one of which happens to be the self-driving car. Much research has been done to evaluate these robotic cars to assess their driving capabilities. As a 19 year-old college student, I have a whole life ahead of me, and I am interested in how all the new technological advancements will affect my life in the future. Through my research, I have found that self-driving cars have human-like decision-making processes that will ensure their passengers' safety.

 You may be asking yourself, "why are self-driving cars being created if they need to act like humans? Shouldn't humans be driving then?" According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), "there were 32,675 people killed in motor vehicle crashes on U.S. roadways," and another 2.3 million were sustained injuries due to crashes ("Traffic Safety Facts"). Clearly, humans are not completely safe when they are the ones driving. The National Safety Council states that the odds of dying in a motor vehicle crash are 1:112 (nsc.org). That means that every time you are in a motorized vehicle, there is approximately a 0.9% of you dying.  

Google has been developing a self-driving car, and its designers have stated that this automated technology needs to exhibit human traits before it becomes mainstream. Now you might ask yourself, "Why is Google making their self-driving cars act human if humans are not the safest drivers?" Doug Newcomb states that "autonomous cars can do things that human drivers can't ... Their eyes ... never leave the road to change a radio station or glance over at a passenger" (Newcomb, 1). Despite this progression of technology, researchers are realizing that human drivers have certain advantages over the machines. Humans exhibit personality when they drive; some may drive aggressively, while others may drive defensively. The self-driving car needs to be able to "understand the subtle cues and hints" that other human drivers send to each other (1). Self-driving cars need to display qualities of being both human and machine to be safe.

Self-driving cars are able to make mechanical decisions on the road. Some of those decisions are whether to slow down or speed up, turn or wait to turn, and when to stop at a stop sign. The cars also need to make ethical decisions. Imagine you are driving, and all of a sudden the car in front of you gets hit head-on. You have just enough time to swerve out of the way, but if you do, you will hit an elderly couple on the sidewalk. Would you swerve and hit the couple, or would you stay on the road and smash into the car in front of you, potentially injuring or killing yourself? This is a decision that a self-driving car may need to make. Most humans' "instincts would kick in," and they would swerve into the elderly couple to save their own lives (McCabe, 66). Self-driving cars should be programmed to make the human decision to hit the couple. I know this may seem selfish, but it will actually make society safer. If people find out that self-driving cars are programmed to sacrifice themselves and their passengers if necessary, not many people would buy them. On the other hand, if self-driving cars are programmed to protect the passengers rather than sacrifice them, they will sell well and ultimately lead to safer roadways (67).

The future is slowly creeping up on us with new technological advancements like the self-driving car. We know that programming a self-driving car is no easy task, as the programmers need to incorporate both robotic and human features into the car. An autonomous car offers many solutions to the problems that humans face while driving. These problems include texting and driving, driving under the influence of drugs or alcohol, driving recklessly. Computers, such as the ones in self-driving cars, nevertheless, do not text and drive, get drunk, or drive carelessly. At the same time, self-driving cars need to have some human qualities in order to drive well. They must be capable of understanding signals from other drivers, and they also have to send signals to other drivers. It is clear that a self-driving car with solely machine-like qualities will be of no benefit to safety. Instead, the car must have a human-like decision-making process to ensure its passengers' safety.

