The more robotic cars on the road we have, the less accident there will be. Insurance companies will notice this fast. Once they do, government will as well, and the production of purely manual cars may be forbidden less than 10 years after successful commercialization, so around 2030. (Most police offices in France have pictures of car crashes hanging on their walls, so I expect the government will listen when it's told that robots save lives.)
If all goes well, no one will ever need to drive again in 20 years (at least in rich countries). Given the time it takes to grow up, I think less than half of the children born today will get a manual driving licence.
Discussion article for the meetup : Berkeley: How Robot Cars Are Near
WHEN: 19 December 2012 07:30:00PM (-0500)
WHERE: Berkeley, CA
Location and time for this Wednesday's meetup are confirmed! It will be at 7:30pm (not 7pm) at Zendo. I will not be there, but Michael Keenan will be giving a talk about robot cars.
Michael Keenan is an entrepreneur, activist and futurist who works with The Seasteading Institute and the Center For Applied Rationality. His talk, How Robot Cars Are Near, describes how robot cars will save millions of lives, billions of hours and trillions of dollars.
Michael will also be speaking at the Extreme Futurist Fest on December 22.
For directions to Zendo, see the mailing list:
http://groups.google.com/group/bayarealesswrong
or call me at:
http://i.imgur.com/Vcafy.png
Discussion article for the meetup : Berkeley: How Robot Cars Are Near