US probes Tesla's Full Self-Driving software after fatal crash

It's clear that having half the casualty rate per distance traveled of the median human driver isn't acceptable. How about a quarter? Or a tenth? Accidents caused by human drivers are one of the largest causes of injury and death, but they're not newsworthy the way an accident involving automated driving is. It's all too easy to see a potential future where many people die needlessly because technology that could save lives is regulated into a greatly reduced role.

It's pretty simple: as good as it can be given available technologies and techniques, without sacrificing safety for cost or style.

With AVs, function and safety should obviate concerns of style, cost, and marketing. If that doesn't work with your business model, well tough luck.

Airplanes are far safer than cars yet we subject their manufacturers to rigorous standards, or seemingly did until recently, as the 737 max saga has revealed. Even still the rigor is very high compared to road vehicles.

And AVs do have to be way better than people at driving because they are machines that have no sense of human judgement, though they operate in a human physical context.

Machines run by corporations are less accountable than human drivers, not at the least because of the wealth and legal armies of those corporations who may have interests other than making the safest possible AV.