A judge has found “reasonable evidence” that Elon Musk and other executives at Tesla knew that the company’s self-driving technology was defective but still allowed the cars to be driven in an unsafe manner anyway, according to a recent ruling issued in Florida.
Palm Beach county circuit court judge Reid Scott said he had found evidence that Tesla “engaged in a marketing strategy that painted the products as autonomous” and that Musk’s public statements about the technology “had a significant effect on the belief about the capabilities of the products”.
The ruling, reported by Reuters on Wednesday, clears the way for a lawsuit over a fatal crash in 2019 north of Miami involving a Tesla Model 3. The vehicle crashed into an 18-wheeler truck that had turned on to the road into the path of driver Stephen Banner, shearing off the Tesla’s roof and killing Banner.
I get it there’s inevitable interference of interest here but we can’t really tell other people to not do things we don’t like in a free country
Edit: this is clearly being misinterpreted. I am NOT talking about the Tesla. I’m saying a hypothetical, well-regulated self-driving car can be fielded without the permission of every other motorist that thinks they’re icky.
Yes, we can tell people they can’t do things. Welcome to society we’ve all been talking and decided on a bunch of things people can’t do in a free country. It’s public roads, it’s entirely reasonable to have restrictions on self driving cars, just like you can’t ride a tandem bicycle in the HOV lane.
I am referring to America which prides itself on freedom (and not enough on equality and collectivism) . I’m just saying it makes legal sense that you don’t need the consent of every other motorist to operate a self-driving car (if it passes safety regulations and assuming no problems of regulatory capture). Both of those assumptions are not applicable here
How can you take pride in freedom while simultaneously having the most non violent offenders of any state to ever exist, in terms of raw numbers and per capita?
People get fined for having unsafe vehicles on public roads all the time. All that’s needed here is a regulatory body to decide self-driving cars are unsafe enough to revoke approval.
Oh hell yeah if it’s unsafe. I’m making the finer point that saying “you don’t have the right to drive that car next to me cuz it makes me feel weird” is overstepping
I’m pretty sure the actual concern has less to do with “feeling weird” and more “because it and/or its inattentive driver may suddenly kill me” because of a dysfunctional self-driving system whose capabilities has been fraudulently marketed and has, in reality, repeatedly, killed people.
truth in advertising laws exist for a reason
also the people who frequently talk about a “free country” are often the same ones that want more police so they can do taliban style gender policing so it (the expression) seems deeply inauthentic at this point.
