Benjamin Baker

I have a guest essay in @nytimes today about autonomous vehicle safety. I wrote it because I’m tired of seeing children die. Done right, we can eliminate car crashes as a leading cause of death in the United States @Waymo recently released data covering nearly 100 million driverless miles. I spent weeks analyzing it because the results seemed too good to be true. 91% fewer serious-injury crashes. 92% less pedestrians hit. 96% fewer injury crashes at intersections. The list goes on. 39,000 Americans died in crashes last year. More than homicide, plane crashes, and natural disasters combined. The #2 killer of children and young adults. The #1 cause of spinal cord injury. We’ve accepted this as the price of mobility. We don’t have to. In medicine, when a treatment shows this level of benefit, we stop the trial early. Continuing to give patients the placebo becomes unethical. When an intervention works this clearly, you change what you do. In driving, we’re all the control group. Cities like DC and Boston are blocking deployment. And cities are not the only forces mobilizing to slow this progress. It’s time we stop treating this like a tech moonshot and start treating it like a public health intervention that will save lives. Link to article below. 👀 this video of Waymo cars evading crashes with people and vehicles. I especially note the ones that require it having a 360° view. My sincere thanks to Alex Ellerbeck and @acsifferlin for their wisdom and sure hand in editing this piece.