Tag Archives: RAND

The Potential Human Cost of Waiting For Perfect Self-Driving Cars

As companies like Waymo ramp up tests of their self-driving cars in Phoenix, state and federal officials continue to debate when “good” will be “good enough.”

Now, a report from the RAND Corporation says pumping our brakes and holding out for the perfect automated car is a mistake.

Read/listen to my full story at KJZZ’s Arizona Science Desk:
Waiting For Perfect Self-Driving Cars Could Cost Lives

The future ain’t what it used to be

Puzzle pieces
Photo by CrazyPhunk.

As anyone who’s played the ponies, visited Tomorrowland or flipped through an old issue of Popular Mechanics can tell you, predicting the future is no mean feat. Even when we get the broad strokes right, we often misgauge society’s responses. Scientists reveal, inventors dream, engineers build and marketers flog, but human nature has the final say.

Prediction is a sucker’s game, but we have to play: If we don’t predict, we can’t plan. In this article, I look at how the field of futurology developed – and how it works.

How Futurology Works