Category Archives: T – ethics

If A Driverless Car Crashes, Who’s Liable?

Some number of years from now, the technology may exist for cars to drive themselves. This could save thousands of lives a year (90 percent of fatal car accidents involve human error).

But getting the technology right won’t be enough. Governments and courts will have to figure out lots of new legal and regulatory issues. One key question: If a driverless car crashes, who’s liable?

[…]

One possible solution comes from the vaccine industry.

In the 1980s, the rising threat of liability prompted vaccine manufacturers to pull out of the business. So Congress stepped in and created a new system for people who are injured by vaccines. Cases are handled in special hearings, and victims are paid out of a fund created by a special tax on vaccines.

With the threat of liability reduced, more companies started making vaccines again.

 

Ref: If A Driverless Car Crashes, Who’s Liable? – npr

Unabomber Manifesto & THX-1138

Theodore Kaczynski, also known as the Unabomber, wrote in his manifesto about what he considers the power process and surrogate activities and how technology is a more powerful social force than freedom. In his power process, people need to have some attainable goal they have to work for in order to be fulfilled. Without the need to work to survive, a surrogate activity is needed, one that is determined by others for the good of the society. The Unabomber comes to the conclusion that not only does technology take away man’s ability to control his own power process, but that it further prevents society from shaping itself. This is exactly what happened in THX-1138 where each member of society gave up their individual freedoms to the technological society little by little until there were no individuals left.

 

Ref: THX-1138, A Lost Film – James Glettler