What's Hot: Total Wine Coming To Friendship Heights | 256-Unit Project Proposed to Replace Rosslyn Buildings Moves Forward
MIT Applies the Trolley Problem to Driverless Cars
✉️ Want to forward this article? Click here.
As the prospect of sharing the road with self-driving vehicles becomes increasingly real, it also presents the opportunity to gauge the moral compass of various cultures worldwide.
Towards that end, MIT Media Lab researchers developed a "game" where users logged 40 million answers to variations of the classic "trolley problem": If a trolley is speeding down a track and will hit five people, or could be diverted to just hit one person, do you divert it to spare the many?
In this modern iteration, the Moral Machine asked nine versions of this question using an autonomous vehicle (AV) as the mode of transportation in question, pitting the many vs. the few, the elderly vs. the young, women vs. men, humans vs. pets, the fit vs. the feeble, the law-abiding vs. the law-bending, high-status vs. low-status, passengers vs. pedestrians, and asking whether it is better to swerve away or stay the course.
story continues below
loading...story continues above
The results, as analyzed by Nature and summarized in the MIT Technology Review this week, show that most peoples' moral compasses are correlated with the overall culture and economics of their society. Countries like the U.S. tended to favor the young over the old, those in crosswalks over jay-walkers, and, where applicable, the many over the few. Respondents in the U.S. also tended to slightly favor sparing passengers in a vehicle over pedestrians.
Although the results of this crowd-sourced study are far from prescriptive, DC and other local governments either have faced or will have to grapple with these and many other moral and ethical dilemmas surrounding the gradual and largely-unregulated integration of AVs on our streets.
See other articles related to: autonomous vehicles, self-driving cars, technology
This article originally published at https://dc.urbanturf.com/articles/blog/mit-applies-the-trolley-problem-to-driverless-cars/14621.
Most Popular... This Week • Last 30 Days • Ever
One of the critical factors in determining whether refinancing is a wise decision is ... read »
The one-of-a-kind residence was built out of two expansive classrooms, an office, two... read »
As the redevelopment of the Mazza Gallerie mall in Friendship Heights heads towards c... read »
As we head towards the end of the year, UrbanTurf is wrapping up its coverage of larg... read »
Designed by visionary Travis Price Architects, 3623 R Street NW is a light-filled mas... read »
- What Is The Best Spread To Refinance Your Mortgage?
- 13 Foot Ceilings, 5,800 Square Feet in a Historic Schoolhouse: A Rare DC Loft Hits the Market
- Total Wine Coming To Friendship Heights
- The 6 Large Developments on the Boards From Anacostia to the Bridge District
- A Rare & Striking Modern Home in the Heart of Georgetown Hits the Market
DC Real Estate Guides
Short guides to navigating the DC-area real estate market
We've collected all our helpful guides for buying, selling and renting in and around Washington, DC in one place. Start browsing below!
First-Timer Primers
Intro guides for first-time home buyers
Unique Spaces
Awesome and unusual real estate from across the DC Metro