For your reference, records indicate that
Jeff Liebermann wrote:

I think there has been sufficient experience to consider a self
driving train to be safe. Probably same for an elevator.

It’s not even a question of experience, but of environment. Elevators
operate in a very controlled space. It should come as no surprise
that they were easy to automate a long time ago, and that people are
comfortable with their automation.

Trains also operate in a fairly restricted space. Being on rails,
they’re essentially a low-hanging-fruit version of an autonomous
vehicle. If they aren’t the *first* vehicles being universally
controlled by computers, that technology is not road worthy.

Airplanes
have been able to takeoff, fly, and land without a pilot for many
years.

Air travel is “easy” because there’s very little in the way of physical restrictions on the vehicle.

So, are you ready and willing to have your bicycle do many of the same
things?

Cars, motorcycles, and (lastly) bikes are used in *very* different
conditions from those other vehicles. The driving environment is
inherently messy, and the smaller the vehicle is the less equipment you
can put on it to process that data. It doesn’t help that smaller
vehicles will also be able to travel into places that a larger vehicle
cannot. So, no, I wouldn’t want my bike to always operate like a car,
just like I’m sure most people don’t want a car that operates like a
train.

Or, put another way, why would I go biking if the only thing I’m acting
as is a weak engine? Just slap an electric motor on it at that point
and make it like every other autonomous vehicle on the road.

--
"Also . . . I can kill you with my brain."
River Tam, Trash, Firefly