Strongly disagree.<p>&gt; <i>A human can make judgement calls in unexpected situations.</i><p>A properly programmed machine can behave smarter <i>and</i> faster <i>and</i> it also knows its limitations, so it can account for them. &quot;Judgement calls&quot; is something not needed because the machine always keeps good judgement.<p>&gt; <i>Objectively, a human is more likely to see falling debris and react to it than a self-driving car (of course depending on the programming and sensors).</i><p>Very much depending on programming and sensors, but from some point on, I&#x27;ll always be betting on programming and sensors.<p>&gt; <i>Or when the road is slick and you are doing 5 under, and you see someone pass you doing 5 over, with a car following too closely to it... you have a better understanding that there&#x27;s likely to be an accident ahead... (I&#x27;ve seen this happen several times). A computer wouldn&#x27;t predict that most likely.</i><p>The computer will track all vehicles, their velocities, past observed movement history, perceive road conditions that you can&#x27;t due to limitations of Mark I Eyeballs, and will push all that data through an inference system that is capable to stay rational all the time, without being affected by &quot;stress&quot; or &quot;surprise&quot;. Solutions will be computed literally faster than the blink of an eye. The machine will see the phase space of the road-cars system and be able to navigate it to safety.<p>&gt; <i>Unless ALL cars are automated, it is a must that a driver be able to take over quickly.</i><p>The driver needs to <i>never</i> take over. A dog should be placed, trained to bite the driver if he tries to touch the controls. Better yet, remove the controls.<p>The machine knows its limitations. The right way to avoid an accident is not to perform stunts based on intuition, it&#x27;s to keep the entire system (of cars and the road) in a stable and known state, and navigate that state to safety.<p>People seem to get machines really wrong. Machines today are limited in their <i>creativity</i>. But they are orders of magnitude better than humans in <i>getting things right</i>. On the road, we need more of the latter than the former.