Argumentative Essay On Self-Driving Technology

Innovation and progress often comes at a cost and involves risk. Companies like Google, Tesla, and Uber are all investing the self-driving car technology, paving the way the way for safer and more luxurious driving experience. This vision has been met with skepticism and questions that call into question the limits of technology and programming. Opponents to driverless cars have just been given justification for their fears as a self-driving Uber killed a pedestrian (Bensinger, 2018). In defense of the technology, Molly Kissler, Alan Levin and Ryan Beene from Bloomberg report that a video captured by the Uber proves the pedestrian stepped in front of the vehicle suddenly. (2018) The local police chief, Sylvia Moir, states, “It is very clear it would have been difficult to avoid this collision in any kind of mode” (Kissler, Levin & Benne, 2018). Uber has suspended testing while authorities …show more content…
Bensinger writes, “Perfecting the technology is essential to Uber, as autonomous vehicles could pare significant costs by replacing some 2.5 million human drivers and give it an edge in the technological race to upend personal and even commercial transportation” (2018). The crisis Uber’s CEO now faces is how to address concerns regarding the safety of driver-less cars and if Uber is at fault in this accident. If Uber has to scrape their research and development in this new technology, their losses would be crippling. Dara Khosrowshahi’s leadership in this situation will be defining and will require great attention to detail. Khosrowshahi must at once be sympathetic to the loss of life, while accepting no responsibility on behalf of their technology. If there is any reason to believe their technology caused this accident, law makers and the public will likely demand all use of autonomous driving vehicles be discontinued. This would be a major setback for not only Uber, but for other developers as