Rise of the Machine

RISE OF THE MACHINE

UP FRONT

EDITOR'S LETTER

AUTONOMOUS CARS VERSUS MOTORCYCLES

There are many times on my daily commute or way out on the road that the flaws of human-piloted cars are plain. On one hand, like the interwebs say, humans are awesome. We do cover a lot of miles with relatively low fatality rates, but the day-to-day distractions and ability to isolate oneself inside a car have made it more difficult and dangerous to be a motorcyclist.

For the past several years, news of the semi-autonomous and fully autonomous vehicle comes in a never-ending stream. The fatal accident involving Tesla Model S running on autopilot in Florida got everybody up in arms about self-driving cars. And certainly there is room for concern.

I’d say, though, that the function and ability for a computer to operate a vehicle in an undistracted manner is superior to the ability of humans. Certainly a computer doesn’t (currently) have the human intelligence that is (sometimes) found in humans that allows for complex predictive situational awareness. That is, if you are riding/driving and see a fast-moving car on an on-ramp or interchange in your peripheral vision, you, the highly aware motorcycle rider (who is also a better driver due to your riding survival skills), would be able to note and predict the level of threat that vehicle may pose in the near future by analyzing its velocity and behavior in a way autonomous cars currently don’t. You can also read the driver’s face. Will your car?

Kevin Cameron has used the example of a ball bouncing out from between two cars. Would a computer wonder if a child is then next to pop out in pursuit of the ball?

Retired auto engineer/executive Bob Lutz recently said in Car and Driver magazine: “Once we have transport modules, you order off the phone and brands won’t matter anymore. When brands don’t matter, the auto industry ends. It’s got another 20 years.”

Lutz is an intelligent, 84-year-old man who made his living in the auto industry and has

a massive catalog of observation. Also muchbetter-than-artificial-intelligence predictive capacity. He’s probably right.

The question that raises, of course, is where motorcycles will fit in. A selfbalancing narrow-track enclosed autonomous vehicle could be built now using existing technology. But what's the point? Why “ride” a motorcycle if you aren’t giving it inputs? Just go self-driving car, right?

Mixing of autonomous and humanoperated vehicles is a curious notion. If I am operating a motorcycle among self-driving cars, I like the idea that the autonomous car would not be distracted and should be completely predictable, exceptionally safe and.. .easy to pass. No matter what happens, it seems like we’ll have a fight on our hands since the size of the new car industry is about 17 million units per year versus 600,000 or so for motorcycles. I plan to keep riding and voice my opinion to agencies, the industry, and lobbyists in favor of human-operated motorcycles when the time comes. Join me. Keep transportation fun!

Shifting gears: A previous column I wrote called Ride and Prejudice (February 2015) described how Hagerty insurance had told me, when I wanted to insure my vintage cars and bikes, that my 2013 Yamaha WR250R wasn’t a “regular-use vehicle” and that I needed to own a car that was less than 20 years old. At that time, I chose a different company. To Hagerty’s credit, I was contacted directly after the story was published and the phone message stated that its policy on regular-use vehicles had been changed to include motorcycles. I waited more than a year and cold-called to try again; there were no issues becoming insured with Hagerty while using the WR250R as a regular-use vehicle. As a result of its intelligent change in policy, my vintage gear is now insured with Hagerty.

MARK HOYER

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

THIS

MONTH'S

STATS

1

BEDROLLS DEPLOYED IN THE NAME OF FUN

zero

COLLARBONES BROKEN HAVING FUN IN SUPERMOTO

4.7

SECONDS FROM OVERALL PIKES PEAK WIN FOR DON CANET