Uncle Sam already has determined that corporations, in some instances, can be considered people in the eyes of the law. And now, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, computers in self-driving cars can be, too. (No word on dogs.)
A NHTSA reply to a request from Google’s Self-Driving Car lead engineer Chris Urmson, admits publicly?albeit buried on the agency’s website?that artificial intelligence can be considered the driver under Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards, the regulatory framework which all major automakers must follow as they develop vehicles.
“As a foundational starting point for the interpretations below, NHTSA will interpret ‘driver’ in the context of Google’s described motor-vehicle design as referring to the [self-driving system], and not to any of the vehicle occupants,” the agency wrote in a letter dated February 4. While Google says it wants to sell or license its autonomous-vehicle technology to existing automakers, the search monolith also is trying to fully certify the koala-shaped neighborhood electric vehicles it has trundling around its Mountain View, California, campus. Specifically, it wants NHTSA to grant permission to sell a vehicle without a steering wheel, pedals, mirrors, and many other heretofore required elements of modern automobiles. Google believes its software will be so accurate and adaptive that those archaic controls, even as physical redundancies, won...