Toyota's new accident avoidance system will take control of the car.

prizrak

Forum Addict
Joined
Apr 2, 2007
Messages
21,574
Location
No, sleep, till, BROOKLYN
Car(s)
11 Xterra Pro-4x, 12 'stang GT
AP said:
SUSONO, Japan ? Toyota is developing a safety technology that takes control of the steering so the vehicle can veer away when it isn't able to stop before impact.
Toyota Motor Corp. showed some of its up and coming safety innovations in a demonstration to reporters Thursday at its facility in this town, west of Tokyo, near Mount Fuji.
All the world's automakers are working on special safety technology in an effort to woo customers, as competition intensifies among manufacturers already neck-and-neck in delivering the regular features for their products.
Cars that stop or slow down automatically before an object or person in anticipation of a possible crash are not new. But Toyota's latest pre-collision system adds a steering-control feature.
In the new system, Toyota uses cameras and a super sensitive radar called "millimeter-wave," both installed in the front of the vehicle, to detect possible crashes such as a pedestrian crossing the road.
The vehicle calculates how braking and steering must be applied to avoid a crash, said chief safety technology officer Moritaka Yoshida.
"We must learn from accidents and keep making improvements in safety features," he said.
The Japanese automaker declined to say when the feature may be offered on a commercial model, or in which markets, but officials hinted it was ready to be offered soon.
Toyota said it was aiming for zero fatalities and injuries, although it did not say when that goal would be achieved.
Fatalities have been declining in auto accidents, because of better safety features, but deaths among pedestrians in traffic accidents have not gone down in Japan.
Protecting pedestrians is increasingly key, according to Toyota, which makes the Prius hybrid and Lexus luxury models.
Toyota showed what is called a pop-up hood, which rises slightly in a crash, to mitigate the impact of a pedestrian getting hit by a car, similar to features offered by European makers.
It also showed how parts of the rays from high-beam headlights could be blocked so that drivers could still see clearly what was ahead while headlights would appear to be on low beam to the driver in a car coming from the other direction.
Toyota also showed a steering wheel in development that measures the heartbeat of the driver to prevent crashes that can happen when drivers suffer heart attacks.
Source

Fuck that!
 
So it veers away... into another possible accident? All of that crap is creepy as hell.
 
If (and that's a big if) they manage to make this system work as it should, I would trust it more than 90% of the people I see on the road to make a decission in an emergency situation.
 
I'd rather trust a team of students to build an accident avoidance system than a major car manufacturer, to be honest.

Obviously, the solution to our problems then is to have MIT become a car manufacturer.
 
Why don't you just put a really big and soft cushion in front of a car? That will help to avoid from accidents all the time.
Why not just ban cars alltogether and use computer controlled mass transit systems...
 
The motoring world should leave the accident avoidance stuff to Volvo and Mercedes. Or better yet, leave it to the drivers of the car... -.-
 
[...]Fuck that!
Peronally, I think there is more than one way you can look at cars. One is the transportation view and in that a system like Toyota wants to introduce might make perfect sense. To take this thought some years down the line - yes, I would have my Autopilot drive me to work ... no problem there.
Another view is of course to see the car as a recreational device, a toy if you will. A Computer taking control away from the driver makes no sense in that aspect.
I think I would like to have the choice between both. Take the car for a manual spin if I feel like it, or hand over control to a computer while I post on faceoogle what massive a jerk I am ...
 
I think the issue here is "take control of the car" in event of possible accident, as in it does it against your will, not in a set on autopilot way. That is less of a convenience and more a "you are too stupid to know what is best we will do it for you" thing instead.
 
[...]That is less of a convenience and more a "you are too stupid to know what is best we will do it for you" thing instead.
Quick poll: what percentage of motorists do you recon would need a device to "know what?s best for them in a critical situation"?

I recon, quite a lot ... somewhere above 70% ... and why not let them have it if they want it?
 
The brighter side - if you survive a massive accident, you can go straight to the court and sue Toyota for enabling autopilot against your will and get the big munneh. In America that definitely will work.
 
The kind of person who likes this technology and buys a car because of it shouldn't even be allowed to drive in the first place!
 
Top