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Autonomy: The Quest to Build the Driverless Car―And How It Will Reshape Our World
A deep dive into the race to develop and perfect the driverless car—an innovation that promises to be the most disruptive change to our way of life since the smartphone by a veteran insider of the automotive and tech worlds
In Autonomy, former GM executive and current advisor to the Google Self-Driving Car project Lawrence Burns offers a sweeping history of the race to make the driverless car a reality. In the past decade, titans of the old automobile industry, like General Motors, have been partnering with robust tech startups, such as Tesla and Uber, to revolutionize the way we move around the world. It’s not a question of whether the self-driving car will disrupt the automobile industry; it’s a question of when, how, and who will do it.
With the first driverless car likely to hit markets in less than ten years, Burns also looks toward the future and explains how this new technology will impact our lives—from drastically reducing our carbon footprint and eliminating 90 percent of road fatalities, to automating yet another segment of blue collar industries, putting more workers out of a job.
We are on the brink of a technological revolution that promises to fundamentally change how we interact with our world. A chronicle of the past, diagnosis of the present, and prediction of the future, Autonomy is the ultimate guide to understanding the driverless car and to navigating the revolution it sparks.
In Autonomy, former GM executive and current advisor to the Google Self-Driving Car project Lawrence Burns offers a sweeping history of the race to make the driverless car a reality. In the past decade, titans of the old automobile industry, like General Motors, have been partnering with robust tech startups, such as Tesla and Uber, to revolutionize the way we move around the world. It’s not a question of whether the self-driving car will disrupt the automobile industry; it’s a question of when, how, and who will do it.
With the first driverless car likely to hit markets in less than ten years, Burns also looks toward the future and explains how this new technology will impact our lives—from drastically reducing our carbon footprint and eliminating 90 percent of road fatalities, to automating yet another segment of blue collar industries, putting more workers out of a job.
We are on the brink of a technological revolution that promises to fundamentally change how we interact with our world. A chronicle of the past, diagnosis of the present, and prediction of the future, Autonomy is the ultimate guide to understanding the driverless car and to navigating the revolution it sparks.
345 pages, Hardcover
First published August 28, 2018
214 people are currently reading
1267 people want to read
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March 10, 2019
If you own a car, you know what a headache and huge responsibility (not to mention expense!) they can be. If you rely on public transportation, you know how limiting and unreliable it is (at least in most places in the USA) and how long you often have to wait. It's difficult for most of us to get around without our own vehicle, and yet we have to invest a lot in them. Imagine if you could have all the benefits of owning a car, with none of the responsibilities. Interested? Read on.
Autonomy: The Quest to Build the Driverless Car—And How It Will Reshape Our World is an exciting look at the current developments and trends in autonomous vehicles. We are quickly approaching the day when we no longer will have to make a costly investment to own a vehicle if we want/need to have one that is available for us at any time, to take us anywhere we want to go. We will no longer have to worry about an expensive repair if something goes wrong, not have to bother with cleaning and servicing them (hurray!), not have to stress about commuting in heavy traffic or dealing with irate drivers. Instead, the day is soon coming when vehicles will be completely autonomous and on-demand. Need a ride? Pull out your phone and request one, much the same as you'd request a ride with Uber or Lyft. Within minutes, a small but comfortable vehicle pulls up in front of you and takes you where you want to go. No steering, no sweating, no swearing! (Hmmm... I might miss that part; I do love to partake in a bit of verbal road rage at times. It gets rid of other stress, what can I say?) . You can sit back and enjoy the scenery, or safely(!) text or check your email, or read a book. When you reach your destination, you do not have to worry about finding parking, but are simply deposited right where you need to be; the car then heads off to pick up the next rider or parks itself.
This book was quite interesting, not because I'm crazy about cars -- I'm not -- but because I think artificial intelligence is kick-ass cool and I look forward to the day where I will no longer need to own a vehicle. Lawrence D. Burns provides an in-depth look at the history of and the research into creating autonomous vehicles at Carnegie Mellon and Stanford Universities and within Google (Waymo), Tesla, Uber, GM, and others. It is fascinating what all goes on, how the vehicles are taught and how they learn to operate on their own. I would never have thought about the things that need to be programmed in, such as how to predict what a cyclist might do, how to tell that a person carrying a huge canvas is actually a person and not something else, how to know its own shadow and that it is not something it needs to worry about hitting. The vehicle needs to know not only what things are, but predict how each thing might move. There are thousands of behavioral rules a vehicle must learn, things we who drive are often unaware of even knowing.
Some of the perks of a driverless society are:
•Better for the environment
○Currently, "... only about 5 percent of the gasoline energy translated into motion is used to move the driver, which amounts to just 1.5 percent of the total energy in gasoline." Often there is only the driver in the car, so that's a lot of energy being wasted.
•Less space needed for parking lots and parking garages
○"...we pave over big swathes of valuable real estate in our cities, creating asphalt heat islands that elevate urban temperatures and may contribute to climate change." Because there will be a lot fewer vehicles on the road, and because those vehicles will be smaller, much of the space currently given to parking our vehicles can be transformed into public parks or provide places for new buildings and homes.
•Lower costs
○"...our research suggested that driverless electric vehicles tailor-designed for shared transportation service in U.S. cities could reduce the out-of-pocket and time costs of conventional automobile travel by more than 80 percent (from $1.50 per mile to $0.25 per mile)."
•Improved safety
○There are 1.3 million roadway fatalities that happened around the world each year and the number is rising. That's about 3,000 lives lost a day due to vehicle accidents, 90% of those due to human error. The driverless cars of the future will be much safer. For instance,
"A good human driver has his eyes on the road ahead and conducts checks around the vehicle as often as possible. But the Google car had sensors all around it. It knew what was happening ahead, as well as to the right and the left, and behind—at all times." And it's not distracted by a smartphone notification!
It thrills me to know there are already self-driving-capable cars on the roads, and improvements are being made all the time. We have a way to go, I think, before we can transition to a fully driverless society, but the benefits are many. There is much left to work out, and certainly there will be jobs lost to this transition as well. Mr. Burns briefly addresses this issue in the book as well.
There will be be some who do not welcome this transition because they enjoy driving. Well, "You know what? There were people who liked to ride horses.” . Yet most of us are quite happy to not rely on them for our transportation needs!
I did find parts of this book dull; for me, there were a bit too many details of business deals and the author's history of working with GM. He enjoyed patting himself on the back in the book too, which I found irritating. I think it could have done with a better edit, but for the most part I found the book enlightening and enjoyable. If you're interested in the future of AI, whether or not you're interested in cars, you'll probably find this book interesting.
Autonomy: The Quest to Build the Driverless Car—And How It Will Reshape Our World is an exciting look at the current developments and trends in autonomous vehicles. We are quickly approaching the day when we no longer will have to make a costly investment to own a vehicle if we want/need to have one that is available for us at any time, to take us anywhere we want to go. We will no longer have to worry about an expensive repair if something goes wrong, not have to bother with cleaning and servicing them (hurray!), not have to stress about commuting in heavy traffic or dealing with irate drivers. Instead, the day is soon coming when vehicles will be completely autonomous and on-demand. Need a ride? Pull out your phone and request one, much the same as you'd request a ride with Uber or Lyft. Within minutes, a small but comfortable vehicle pulls up in front of you and takes you where you want to go. No steering, no sweating, no swearing! (Hmmm... I might miss that part; I do love to partake in a bit of verbal road rage at times. It gets rid of other stress, what can I say?) . You can sit back and enjoy the scenery, or safely(!) text or check your email, or read a book. When you reach your destination, you do not have to worry about finding parking, but are simply deposited right where you need to be; the car then heads off to pick up the next rider or parks itself.
This book was quite interesting, not because I'm crazy about cars -- I'm not -- but because I think artificial intelligence is kick-ass cool and I look forward to the day where I will no longer need to own a vehicle. Lawrence D. Burns provides an in-depth look at the history of and the research into creating autonomous vehicles at Carnegie Mellon and Stanford Universities and within Google (Waymo), Tesla, Uber, GM, and others. It is fascinating what all goes on, how the vehicles are taught and how they learn to operate on their own. I would never have thought about the things that need to be programmed in, such as how to predict what a cyclist might do, how to tell that a person carrying a huge canvas is actually a person and not something else, how to know its own shadow and that it is not something it needs to worry about hitting. The vehicle needs to know not only what things are, but predict how each thing might move. There are thousands of behavioral rules a vehicle must learn, things we who drive are often unaware of even knowing.
Some of the perks of a driverless society are:
•Better for the environment
○Currently, "... only about 5 percent of the gasoline energy translated into motion is used to move the driver, which amounts to just 1.5 percent of the total energy in gasoline." Often there is only the driver in the car, so that's a lot of energy being wasted.
•Less space needed for parking lots and parking garages
○"...we pave over big swathes of valuable real estate in our cities, creating asphalt heat islands that elevate urban temperatures and may contribute to climate change." Because there will be a lot fewer vehicles on the road, and because those vehicles will be smaller, much of the space currently given to parking our vehicles can be transformed into public parks or provide places for new buildings and homes.
•Lower costs
○"...our research suggested that driverless electric vehicles tailor-designed for shared transportation service in U.S. cities could reduce the out-of-pocket and time costs of conventional automobile travel by more than 80 percent (from $1.50 per mile to $0.25 per mile)."
•Improved safety
○There are 1.3 million roadway fatalities that happened around the world each year and the number is rising. That's about 3,000 lives lost a day due to vehicle accidents, 90% of those due to human error. The driverless cars of the future will be much safer. For instance,
"A good human driver has his eyes on the road ahead and conducts checks around the vehicle as often as possible. But the Google car had sensors all around it. It knew what was happening ahead, as well as to the right and the left, and behind—at all times." And it's not distracted by a smartphone notification!
It thrills me to know there are already self-driving-capable cars on the roads, and improvements are being made all the time. We have a way to go, I think, before we can transition to a fully driverless society, but the benefits are many. There is much left to work out, and certainly there will be jobs lost to this transition as well. Mr. Burns briefly addresses this issue in the book as well.
There will be be some who do not welcome this transition because they enjoy driving. Well, "You know what? There were people who liked to ride horses.” . Yet most of us are quite happy to not rely on them for our transportation needs!
I did find parts of this book dull; for me, there were a bit too many details of business deals and the author's history of working with GM. He enjoyed patting himself on the back in the book too, which I found irritating. I think it could have done with a better edit, but for the most part I found the book enlightening and enjoyable. If you're interested in the future of AI, whether or not you're interested in cars, you'll probably find this book interesting.
April 2, 2020
Tech history, starting with the DARPA self-driving challenge races in 2004. His info is good; his writing is, well, adequate. But the material pretty much makes up for that. 3.5 stars, rounded down for the fluff and filler. Book needed a more critical final edit, which you, the reader, will have to supply.
For an old GM guy, the author sure is anti-personal car, and anti-gasoline. And he goes on, and on, and on. Big cars! One driver! Unused 95% of the time! Yada, yada.
Early self-driving players included the Carnegie-Mellon robotics lab (Pittsburgh) and later, the Stanford robotics people.
Google’s Chauffeur self-driving project was launched in late 2008, with Sebastian Thrum as CEO and Chris Urmson as chief engineer. Intital goal: drive the toughest roads in California. Street View photos central to project. Lots of interesting info, as this is the project he's been personally involved in.
First trial: the Big Sur highway! This one was pretty easy, except for the software bugs -- and the cliffs! (It’s not the fall, it’s the sudden stop.) Second trial: El Camino Real, from Palo Alto to San Jose airport. 200 traffic lights! Cyclists! Pedestrians! Congestion! Impressive that they could patch code on the fly. This took a month of hard work.
Freeway driving on the Peninsula/South Bay: “The jerk came out of nowhere!” Robot anticipated the sudden cut-off. Better than a human driver! Your reviewer can testify to the jerks, and the PITA driving at rush hour (anytime, really) in the Bay Area. Avoid Rush Hour at all costs! -- if you can...
Their reception in Detroit: “They just kind of laughed and thought it was cute that we were doing this.” A 2011 Chrysler TV commercial:
“ …. An unmanned car driven by a search-engine company. We’ve seen that movie. It ends with robots harvesting our bodies for energy.” And as the muscle car accelerates past the camera, the voice concludes, “This is the all-new 2011 Dodge Charger. Leader of the human resistance.”
Author’s 2011 consulting report to Google (which goes on *forever*):
His guess is, electric self-driving car-on-demand service for 20c./mi. Is this realistic? Who knows? They don’t exist yet (electric self-driving taxis).
Further guesses: they could initially capture 10% of the American market of around 300 billion commuter miles per year.
Potential profit = 10c./mi = $30 billion/yr. Whoa! Competitors?
Again, who knows if this is realizable? But lots of interest, and serious money invested, now including the previously-reluctant car companies. Sensibly, people are building self-driving versions of existing cars. Many of the newer models (Prius, Tesla, Chrysler Pacifica) are "drive by wire," easily converted to computer-control.
Google’s test of Driver Assist, their earlier version of Tesla’s Autopilot: “what convinced the team to halt testing was the guy who fell asleep, for an astonishing twenty-seven minutes, as he cruised along at 60 mph on the freeway. “
Tesla’s Autopilot was a really bad idea, as it was promoted by Elon Musk: Beta software that has killed (so far) three drivers. Google warned against it: “We understand how hard this is. This will not work.”
Estimated 1.3 million roadway fatalities per year, worldwide. (Many fewer in the developed world. 37,500 in US in 2016.). Humans are TERRIBLE drivers! “… more than ninety percent of accidents are caused by humans.” — Kevin Krafcik, CEO Waymo. So, lots of potential for saving lives with self-driving cars.
Per author, Waymo (Google) is now offering limited fully-autonomous taxi service in Phoenix, as of 2018.
For an old GM guy, the author sure is anti-personal car, and anti-gasoline. And he goes on, and on, and on. Big cars! One driver! Unused 95% of the time! Yada, yada.
Early self-driving players included the Carnegie-Mellon robotics lab (Pittsburgh) and later, the Stanford robotics people.
Google’s Chauffeur self-driving project was launched in late 2008, with Sebastian Thrum as CEO and Chris Urmson as chief engineer. Intital goal: drive the toughest roads in California. Street View photos central to project. Lots of interesting info, as this is the project he's been personally involved in.
First trial: the Big Sur highway! This one was pretty easy, except for the software bugs -- and the cliffs! (It’s not the fall, it’s the sudden stop.) Second trial: El Camino Real, from Palo Alto to San Jose airport. 200 traffic lights! Cyclists! Pedestrians! Congestion! Impressive that they could patch code on the fly. This took a month of hard work.
Freeway driving on the Peninsula/South Bay: “The jerk came out of nowhere!” Robot anticipated the sudden cut-off. Better than a human driver! Your reviewer can testify to the jerks, and the PITA driving at rush hour (anytime, really) in the Bay Area. Avoid Rush Hour at all costs! -- if you can...
Their reception in Detroit: “They just kind of laughed and thought it was cute that we were doing this.” A 2011 Chrysler TV commercial:
“ …. An unmanned car driven by a search-engine company. We’ve seen that movie. It ends with robots harvesting our bodies for energy.” And as the muscle car accelerates past the camera, the voice concludes, “This is the all-new 2011 Dodge Charger. Leader of the human resistance.”
Author’s 2011 consulting report to Google (which goes on *forever*):
His guess is, electric self-driving car-on-demand service for 20c./mi. Is this realistic? Who knows? They don’t exist yet (electric self-driving taxis).
Further guesses: they could initially capture 10% of the American market of around 300 billion commuter miles per year.
Potential profit = 10c./mi = $30 billion/yr. Whoa! Competitors?
Again, who knows if this is realizable? But lots of interest, and serious money invested, now including the previously-reluctant car companies. Sensibly, people are building self-driving versions of existing cars. Many of the newer models (Prius, Tesla, Chrysler Pacifica) are "drive by wire," easily converted to computer-control.
Google’s test of Driver Assist, their earlier version of Tesla’s Autopilot: “what convinced the team to halt testing was the guy who fell asleep, for an astonishing twenty-seven minutes, as he cruised along at 60 mph on the freeway. “
Tesla’s Autopilot was a really bad idea, as it was promoted by Elon Musk: Beta software that has killed (so far) three drivers. Google warned against it: “We understand how hard this is. This will not work.”
Estimated 1.3 million roadway fatalities per year, worldwide. (Many fewer in the developed world. 37,500 in US in 2016.). Humans are TERRIBLE drivers! “… more than ninety percent of accidents are caused by humans.” — Kevin Krafcik, CEO Waymo. So, lots of potential for saving lives with self-driving cars.
Per author, Waymo (Google) is now offering limited fully-autonomous taxi service in Phoenix, as of 2018.
Read
September 29, 2018I was at the Urban Challenge in 2007 (still have the T shirt). It was amazing standing next to the road watching cars and trucks go by with no one in them, including 32,000-pound TerraMax, which had to be deactivated before it took out a building. The MIT entry kept braking for shadows across the road.
One car was confused about something and came to a stop. Another car started going around it, and as soon as it started pulling in front, the stopped car decided to go, and there was a low speed collision. The race was paused and the cars were soon surrounded by an army of engineers who were relieved to find no damage. The cars were separated and allowed to continue.
I saw the cars handle four-way stops, driving in traffic with human drivers and parking in a lot. First and second place went to expected leaders Carnegie Mellon and Stanford, but third place went to Virginia Tech. Later I learned that elsewhere in the crowd were Larry Page and Sergey Brin, who soon started the Google self-driving car project.
One car was confused about something and came to a stop. Another car started going around it, and as soon as it started pulling in front, the stopped car decided to go, and there was a low speed collision. The race was paused and the cars were soon surrounded by an army of engineers who were relieved to find no damage. The cars were separated and allowed to continue.
I saw the cars handle four-way stops, driving in traffic with human drivers and parking in a lot. First and second place went to expected leaders Carnegie Mellon and Stanford, but third place went to Virginia Tech. Later I learned that elsewhere in the crowd were Larry Page and Sergey Brin, who soon started the Google self-driving car project.
January 20, 2022
Well documented, well written and very relevant. Recommended.
November 28, 2018
Want to understand autonomous cars? Start here
No, seriously. This book goes all the way back to concept cars like Sandstorm and Autonomy to today's developers like Tesla, Uber and Waymo. Complete with the office politics, the engineering and the political problems.
I also recommend reading "The Upstarts" as a companion to this book. Helps when I read that one first.
However, this book never really addresses the issue of what will happen to public transit. Food for thought left to your imagination, but understand this: Autonomous electric cars will make personal transportation much, much more cheaper.
No, seriously. This book goes all the way back to concept cars like Sandstorm and Autonomy to today's developers like Tesla, Uber and Waymo. Complete with the office politics, the engineering and the political problems.
I also recommend reading "The Upstarts" as a companion to this book. Helps when I read that one first.
However, this book never really addresses the issue of what will happen to public transit. Food for thought left to your imagination, but understand this: Autonomous electric cars will make personal transportation much, much more cheaper.
September 4, 2018
A beautifully written view into the past, present and future of mobility. I hugely enjoyed the fluent storytelling and balanced handling of the topics covered, respecting the accomplishents of both Detroit and Silicon Valley.
I don’t always rate my books ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ but when I do, they deserve it. This story changed my perception for good, even if I admit being looking for such perspective update.
I don’t always rate my books ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ but when I do, they deserve it. This story changed my perception for good, even if I admit being looking for such perspective update.
March 5, 2019
The book focuses too much on the author's personal experience working with the Google team and downplays or glosses over almost all others' contributions.
June 15, 2023
Volvemos a las lecturas intercaladas que hago, sin ningún tipo de orden, entre géneros. En este caso, algo que me provoca tanto interés como la ebullición del sistema de transporte del futuro y el coche autónomo.
Hoy en día hay prácticamente una industria periodística completa dedicada a seguir noticias sobre este fenómeno. Muchos los tildamos de plumillas, unos cacareadores y repetidores de noticias de las oficinas de comunicación de las distintas empresas tecnológicas. Haberme leído este libro ha hecho que por lo menos yo me sienta un poco menos culpable de ser llamado plumilla, y me ha liberado un poco de mi síndrome del impostor.
"Autonomy" es una obra en la que se cuenta la investigación y el surgimiento de los coches autónomos desde la década de los 90, principio de los 2000. Prácticamente todo comenzó como un proyecto militar. DARPA no conseguía resultados en sus vehículos autónomos y decidió crear una competición entre universidades para que ellas le iluminasen un poco el camino. Y todo eso que comenzó por ingenieros avezados, con la imaginación y la técnica un paso por encima del resto, y cientos de horas de sueño por detrás del resto, fueron ganando protagonismo en el liderazgo de estos equipos.
La carrera por el coche autónomo comenzó con equipos de universidades, que posteriormente pasó a la búsqueda de patrocinadores, y donde comenzaron a intervenir las grandes empresas que todos conocemos hoy en día (Google, GM, Toyota...). Era una apuesta arriesgada. Nadie se atrevía a apostar por una locura de un concurso de frikis. Nadie se atrevía a dar el primer paso en creer que el modelo del automóvil tal y como estaba concebido hasta entonces, tenía caducidad. Fueron personas, que a medias marcadas por casualidades, y a medias, por su talento, tuvieron el arrojo de ir proponiendo diferentes modelos de negocios, o dar lugar a Uber, o hablar de taxis autónomos.
En 2016 había titulares que decían que en 2020 habría un millón de coches autónomos en las autopistas de EEUU. Muchos se han reído de esos titulares fallidos, pero una vez leído el libro, me he dado cuenta del contexto y lo difícil que hubiera sido criticar esa premonición en 2016.
En resumen, un libro técnico, empresarial, de personajes y del futuro, que le recomiendo a todo el mundo con un interés especial en rastrear los pasos de los coches autónomos y su origen.
Hoy en día hay prácticamente una industria periodística completa dedicada a seguir noticias sobre este fenómeno. Muchos los tildamos de plumillas, unos cacareadores y repetidores de noticias de las oficinas de comunicación de las distintas empresas tecnológicas. Haberme leído este libro ha hecho que por lo menos yo me sienta un poco menos culpable de ser llamado plumilla, y me ha liberado un poco de mi síndrome del impostor.
"Autonomy" es una obra en la que se cuenta la investigación y el surgimiento de los coches autónomos desde la década de los 90, principio de los 2000. Prácticamente todo comenzó como un proyecto militar. DARPA no conseguía resultados en sus vehículos autónomos y decidió crear una competición entre universidades para que ellas le iluminasen un poco el camino. Y todo eso que comenzó por ingenieros avezados, con la imaginación y la técnica un paso por encima del resto, y cientos de horas de sueño por detrás del resto, fueron ganando protagonismo en el liderazgo de estos equipos.
La carrera por el coche autónomo comenzó con equipos de universidades, que posteriormente pasó a la búsqueda de patrocinadores, y donde comenzaron a intervenir las grandes empresas que todos conocemos hoy en día (Google, GM, Toyota...). Era una apuesta arriesgada. Nadie se atrevía a apostar por una locura de un concurso de frikis. Nadie se atrevía a dar el primer paso en creer que el modelo del automóvil tal y como estaba concebido hasta entonces, tenía caducidad. Fueron personas, que a medias marcadas por casualidades, y a medias, por su talento, tuvieron el arrojo de ir proponiendo diferentes modelos de negocios, o dar lugar a Uber, o hablar de taxis autónomos.
En 2016 había titulares que decían que en 2020 habría un millón de coches autónomos en las autopistas de EEUU. Muchos se han reído de esos titulares fallidos, pero una vez leído el libro, me he dado cuenta del contexto y lo difícil que hubiera sido criticar esa premonición en 2016.
En resumen, un libro técnico, empresarial, de personajes y del futuro, que le recomiendo a todo el mundo con un interés especial en rastrear los pasos de los coches autónomos y su origen.
December 6, 2019
Insider look at the self driving car industry for nerds who are into that.
October 20, 2020
The author focuses a lot on (unnecessary?) details and personal stories. It is less about the technology and more about the people behind it, which is unfortunately not what I was hoping for.
March 31, 2021
A great look at the start of the autonomous vehicle revolution with a focus on Waymo.
March 8, 2020
This is a brilliant account of the past, present and future of Autonomous Vehicles and the transport system.
The author makes the point that the auto industry has largely remained unchanged in its 130 year history. Current vehicles are still ape-driven, addicted to oil, unnecessarily bulky, sit idle 90% of the time and devilishly expensive to own and maintain. They are not ideal for city transportation factoring their size and dangerous speeds. Everything about them screams waste.
The auto industry has reached an inflection point. We have to severe the relationship between transportation and vehicle ownership. The future of transportation will very likely be:
1. Autonomous - AI driven vehicles. These has the potential to eliminate about 90% of the annual 1.3 million deaths on the road. Hardware and software is several orders of magnitude more reliable than apes.
2. Electric - or fuel cells?. Will curtail the rate at which we are pumping carbon into the atmosphere and simplifies vehicle architecture(No engine, transmission, exhaust systems etc).
3. Shared - It will be bad economics to own a personal car, given how cheap(on cost per mile basis) autonomous electric vehicles would be. E.g 70%-90% of an Uber trip goes to the driver. This cost is simply deleted for a completely autonomous vehicle.
Highly recommended - It may prove though to be a difficult read if hardware and software is not your cup of tea.
The author makes the point that the auto industry has largely remained unchanged in its 130 year history. Current vehicles are still ape-driven, addicted to oil, unnecessarily bulky, sit idle 90% of the time and devilishly expensive to own and maintain. They are not ideal for city transportation factoring their size and dangerous speeds. Everything about them screams waste.
The auto industry has reached an inflection point. We have to severe the relationship between transportation and vehicle ownership. The future of transportation will very likely be:
1. Autonomous - AI driven vehicles. These has the potential to eliminate about 90% of the annual 1.3 million deaths on the road. Hardware and software is several orders of magnitude more reliable than apes.
2. Electric - or fuel cells?. Will curtail the rate at which we are pumping carbon into the atmosphere and simplifies vehicle architecture(No engine, transmission, exhaust systems etc).
3. Shared - It will be bad economics to own a personal car, given how cheap(on cost per mile basis) autonomous electric vehicles would be. E.g 70%-90% of an Uber trip goes to the driver. This cost is simply deleted for a completely autonomous vehicle.
Highly recommended - It may prove though to be a difficult read if hardware and software is not your cup of tea.
May 10, 2019
Thoroughly enjoyed this book. I saw Lawrence Burns speak on the concept of autonomy (the confluence of electric vehicles, self-driving technology, and transportation-as-a-service) and was intrigued enough to pick up the book.
Overall, it's an animated and engaging narrative of the major players who developed the world's first autonomous vehicles. I loved his stories about the DARPA 2004 challenge to build a vehicle that could cross the Mojave Desert without a human driver. He made a great point: that moment was a perfect example of how public funding can spur massive technological innovation, which ultimately led to private sector adoption and spurred economic growth.
All in all, recommended reading. And I'm looking forward to the near future where I can hop into my quiet, safe, autonomously driven vehicle. The future of transportation is looking bright, folks.
Overall, it's an animated and engaging narrative of the major players who developed the world's first autonomous vehicles. I loved his stories about the DARPA 2004 challenge to build a vehicle that could cross the Mojave Desert without a human driver. He made a great point: that moment was a perfect example of how public funding can spur massive technological innovation, which ultimately led to private sector adoption and spurred economic growth.
All in all, recommended reading. And I'm looking forward to the near future where I can hop into my quiet, safe, autonomously driven vehicle. The future of transportation is looking bright, folks.
January 9, 2022
A very engaging and interesting read about the history of self-driving cars, from the DARPA challenge post 9/11, to the Google Chauffeur project which later became Waymo, Tesla's assisted highway driving, and the many new endeavors in the field. There is a good deal of engineering details involved, which I enjoyed, but wish there were more! There is some fluff about the interpersonal dramas between the Chauffeur leads that felt a little extra.
Overall this book is a really comprehensive overview of self driving cars and our endeavors towards a more autonomous, shared, electric and tailored future of transportation.
Overall this book is a really comprehensive overview of self driving cars and our endeavors towards a more autonomous, shared, electric and tailored future of transportation.
November 28, 2018
Interesting history of the development of self-driving vehicles from the beginning of the idea around 2000 up to the beginning of 2018 by one of the key engineer executives working on the designs.
I wish there were a good deal more about the actual technology, rather than just the companies and people involved.
I wish there were a good deal more about the actual technology, rather than just the companies and people involved.
January 3, 2019
If you're interested in autonomous vehicles and the future of automobiles then this is a great read. Found it engaging and enlightening.
October 27, 2019
Larry Burns, an industry insider obsessed with reinventing the automotive industry, serves as a great narrator.
The story shifts between his personal accounts and introductions to the major players in the AV field.
Also provides a decent overview of the main technical and ethical considerations when designing autonomous vehicles.
The story shifts between his personal accounts and introductions to the major players in the AV field.
Also provides a decent overview of the main technical and ethical considerations when designing autonomous vehicles.
February 6, 2022
I enjoyed reading a book on technology that I am very much interested in. If you want to learn about the history of autonomous cars and learn about the vision of future transportation, Autonomy delivers deep insights into where the technology stands, the roller coaster ride to date, and how the future of car transportation may unfold. Recommended!
September 26, 2018
Overall a good read on the history and major players in the AV space. My major complaint is that the author only acknowledges the positive AV scenario, but doesn’t consider things such as more vehicle miles traveled due to the fact that the car is driving for you, or potentially worse congestion depending on how ownership plays out. Google “heaven or hell autonomous vehicles” for a more balanced perspective.
September 27, 2018
One of the best books I’ve read about emerging technologies and the impact they will have. Highly recommended.
September 7, 2018
Autonomy : The Quest to Build the Driverless Car - And How It Will Reshape Our World (2018) by Lawrence D Burns and Christopher Shulgan is the first insider account of efforts by big companies to create self-driving vehicles.
Burns worked for decades for General Motors and was a Vice President there and he has a PhD so he knows GM and Detroit intimately. He also points the billions of dollars that Detroit has poured into research for fuel cells and other technology.
This book looks at the way the self-driving car was developed from the 2006 Darpa Challenge onwards. The earlier work at Carnegie Mellon and by Mercedes is not mentioned. Nor, unfortunately are the role that Neural Networks have played.
The book concentrates on the people who entered the 2006 Darpa challenge, in particular Red Whittaker and Chris Urmson. There drive and the Stanford team lead by Sebastian Thrun are also profiled. It's a pretty enjoyable read. The challenges of getting equipment that works and writing the software is brought to life.
The book then shifts to Google's Chauffeur project that would eventually become Waymo. Here the drive and targets and challenges of the effort are well portrayed and Burns also joins the team.
The book concludes in the present (mid to late 2018) with Waymo on the cusp of launching their first autonomous taxi service. The fatalities caused by Tesla and Waymo are also gone into in some depth.
For anyone who is interested in self-driving cars and the future of mobility the book is well worth a read. Burns is a smart insider who has a great deal of interesting material to work with. He also provides a really interesting perspective of the different cultures of Detroit and Silicon and how they are now interacting. The only downside of the book is that there is little real insight into how remarkable the technology is. No doubt other books will follow that examine the remarkable developments of Lidar, neural networks and big data that are enabling autonomous vehicles.
Burns worked for decades for General Motors and was a Vice President there and he has a PhD so he knows GM and Detroit intimately. He also points the billions of dollars that Detroit has poured into research for fuel cells and other technology.
This book looks at the way the self-driving car was developed from the 2006 Darpa Challenge onwards. The earlier work at Carnegie Mellon and by Mercedes is not mentioned. Nor, unfortunately are the role that Neural Networks have played.
The book concentrates on the people who entered the 2006 Darpa challenge, in particular Red Whittaker and Chris Urmson. There drive and the Stanford team lead by Sebastian Thrun are also profiled. It's a pretty enjoyable read. The challenges of getting equipment that works and writing the software is brought to life.
The book then shifts to Google's Chauffeur project that would eventually become Waymo. Here the drive and targets and challenges of the effort are well portrayed and Burns also joins the team.
The book concludes in the present (mid to late 2018) with Waymo on the cusp of launching their first autonomous taxi service. The fatalities caused by Tesla and Waymo are also gone into in some depth.
For anyone who is interested in self-driving cars and the future of mobility the book is well worth a read. Burns is a smart insider who has a great deal of interesting material to work with. He also provides a really interesting perspective of the different cultures of Detroit and Silicon and how they are now interacting. The only downside of the book is that there is little real insight into how remarkable the technology is. No doubt other books will follow that examine the remarkable developments of Lidar, neural networks and big data that are enabling autonomous vehicles.
September 22, 2018
Autonomy
The book is full of great stories and Burns’s first-person account of what happened in the development of autonomous and non-gas vehicles. It also tells stories about some of the key contributors to the technology--Chris Urmson, Red Whittaker, Sebastian Thrun, Anthony Levandowski, and others. The book combines these anecdotes with reflections on technical and economic changes affecting the automobile industry.
Burns is an advisor to Waymo, Alphabet’s self-driving car subsidiary. He worked at GM for 40 years, eventually serving as corporate vice president for research and development reporting to the CEO. He was unusual--as Detroit car executive who cared deeply about sustainability. He sponsored projects like hydrogen fuel cell propulsion systems and a collaboration with Segway that built a two-wheeled, two-person electric vehicle that looks a little like an auto rickshaw without a driver.
Burns sees three trends coming together that will transform the automotive industry:
Driverless technology
Electric vehicles
Transportation as a service
The first two are technical changes. The third is a new business model.
The book begins with a narrative about the DARPA autonomous vehicle challenges, particularly the CMU team that was funded by GM. The Stanford team enters the story, and it continues when a set of them wind up working on Google’s Chauffeur project.
The story mixes in more background about engineering these systems. Burns did some modeling work around 2010-2011 to see how transport-as-a-service would work. He found a surprisingly small fleet could serve a city like Ann Arbor, Mich.
He also looked at total costs of our current cars-- $4.5 trillion/year to operate. If we make a large-scale transition to autonomous, electric vehicles, it will represent a tremendous economic improvement. Transportation should cost 10x less per mile, bring the benefits of on-demand cars to many more people. These savings mean less money flowing to established economic players. Auto manufacturing would employ many fewer people, which will be a burden for people employed by the industry today.
Oil companies probably get the majority of this $4.5 trillion. We need to shift away from fossil fuels, but oil companies are going to fight to preserve this revenue. Electric cars will be far more efficient than big gas-powered automobiles that often just carry one or two people. But we’ll probably still rely on fossil fuels to produce much of the electricity.
He talks about safety, which comes up a in a few different guises. Early on there’s someone at GM appalled at the way CMU was testing the Boss car for the DARPA challenge. (Funny story.) Sadly there have been fatalities recently--both Tesla drivers and a pedestrian killed by an Uber self-driving car test. There are two distinct approaches that are being pursued right now. One is the driver assist technology like Tesla autopilot, and another is the fully driverless car--the Firefly prototype doesn’t have a steering wheel, just an on-off button. He’s deeply skeptical of driver assistance, and probably appalled at the way Tesla and Musk seems to down-play the serious risks of driver assistance.
The book is full of great stories and Burns’s first-person account of what happened in the development of autonomous and non-gas vehicles. It also tells stories about some of the key contributors to the technology--Chris Urmson, Red Whittaker, Sebastian Thrun, Anthony Levandowski, and others. The book combines these anecdotes with reflections on technical and economic changes affecting the automobile industry.
Burns is an advisor to Waymo, Alphabet’s self-driving car subsidiary. He worked at GM for 40 years, eventually serving as corporate vice president for research and development reporting to the CEO. He was unusual--as Detroit car executive who cared deeply about sustainability. He sponsored projects like hydrogen fuel cell propulsion systems and a collaboration with Segway that built a two-wheeled, two-person electric vehicle that looks a little like an auto rickshaw without a driver.
Burns sees three trends coming together that will transform the automotive industry:
Driverless technology
Electric vehicles
Transportation as a service
The first two are technical changes. The third is a new business model.
The book begins with a narrative about the DARPA autonomous vehicle challenges, particularly the CMU team that was funded by GM. The Stanford team enters the story, and it continues when a set of them wind up working on Google’s Chauffeur project.
The story mixes in more background about engineering these systems. Burns did some modeling work around 2010-2011 to see how transport-as-a-service would work. He found a surprisingly small fleet could serve a city like Ann Arbor, Mich.
He also looked at total costs of our current cars-- $4.5 trillion/year to operate. If we make a large-scale transition to autonomous, electric vehicles, it will represent a tremendous economic improvement. Transportation should cost 10x less per mile, bring the benefits of on-demand cars to many more people. These savings mean less money flowing to established economic players. Auto manufacturing would employ many fewer people, which will be a burden for people employed by the industry today.
Oil companies probably get the majority of this $4.5 trillion. We need to shift away from fossil fuels, but oil companies are going to fight to preserve this revenue. Electric cars will be far more efficient than big gas-powered automobiles that often just carry one or two people. But we’ll probably still rely on fossil fuels to produce much of the electricity.
He talks about safety, which comes up a in a few different guises. Early on there’s someone at GM appalled at the way CMU was testing the Boss car for the DARPA challenge. (Funny story.) Sadly there have been fatalities recently--both Tesla drivers and a pedestrian killed by an Uber self-driving car test. There are two distinct approaches that are being pursued right now. One is the driver assist technology like Tesla autopilot, and another is the fully driverless car--the Firefly prototype doesn’t have a steering wheel, just an on-off button. He’s deeply skeptical of driver assistance, and probably appalled at the way Tesla and Musk seems to down-play the serious risks of driver assistance.
September 6, 2018
Good info
But why are electrics so rare? Why no self driving? Those are the obvious questions
But also, he said electric cars will be cheaper....why is Tesla so damn pricy?
And one of the things a fleet of taxis won’t handle: rush hour. This has to be solved by better mass transit. Here in houston—everywhere?—it sucks
But why are electrics so rare? Why no self driving? Those are the obvious questions
But also, he said electric cars will be cheaper....why is Tesla so damn pricy?
And one of the things a fleet of taxis won’t handle: rush hour. This has to be solved by better mass transit. Here in houston—everywhere?—it sucks
March 10, 2020
All I can say is that I genuinely did not want this book to end. Rarely, do you encounter a piece of writing about a technology that has not fully matured, yet is in the midst of disrupting the entire world as we know it. Burns did an amazing job in balancing out the introduction of the movers and shakers of this industry whilst portraying them as real people with real everyday challenges rather than technological pioneers you cannot really relate to, their disputes, their conquests, their visions were right there for everyone to see. I was able to envision and feel what it was like to be part of the DARPA challenge eagerly waiting for the race to start and celebrate the triumph of the winning team, to walk in Silicon Valley surrounded by competitive and self motivated tech leaders, to be part of an exciting google venture from start to finish. The author’s personal journey from Detroit’s GM to Mountain View to academia was also quite enriching as he did not hold back on how it felt like to transition through these radically different environments. There was a beautiful sequence that not only followed the maturity of the technology itself but the growth experienced by everyone who was involved. That being said, the book does sometimes dwell into too much detail but I cannot say that I was bored at any point whilst reading it. I must confess though that I take a highly personal interest in the transportation disruption and so my review could be lacking objectivity that other readers may be better able to provide. In conclusion, I would like to say that I think this is an important piece of work that chronicles the evolution of autonomous vehicles through the lenses of an insider that I don’t believe anyone else has provided quite as well. It successfully introduces us to the real people who can be credited with bringing this technology to market whilst sharing the struggles, the pitfalls and the peaks of the industry as a whole and simultaneously addresses almost every question and wandering thought regarding the technology. Thank you Lawrence Burns for your candidness, for your efforts and most importantly for including us in this world.
September 23, 2018
The definitive history of AVs to date
if you want to understand where we are and how we got here, read this book. Balances technical and non technical concepts well. Tells the story of all the key milestones with first hand accounts in many cases. Burns himself has had a front row seat and makes this far more engaging as a result. A couple minor bits seem excluded, such as shift away from Google's custom vehicle, firefly.
if you want to understand where we are and how we got here, read this book. Balances technical and non technical concepts well. Tells the story of all the key milestones with first hand accounts in many cases. Burns himself has had a front row seat and makes this far more engaging as a result. A couple minor bits seem excluded, such as shift away from Google's custom vehicle, firefly.
September 1, 2019
Cannot say enough good things about this book. Have recommended it to colleagues and family members. Bought copies for my sons since this book makes a compelling argument for alternative fuels, transportation on demand and autonomous vehicles.
September 4, 2018
Great read> This will change your view of the future. Highly recommend.
March 27, 2024
I've found it quite interesting, although half of it (the who did what) could be thrown out (I'm more interested in the (how and why, the science of it and the vision, than the names of people). The book takes you on a journey from racing in the desert with the first iteration of self-driving vehicles to debating why a Tesla didn't notice a truck from the side. I liked the book because it made me think about the future and how and when the vision of self-driving materializes. So, my thoughts that came up...
- Since we can't switch all existing vehicles to new technology, there will be a gradual adaptation. While the vision is awesome, it only takes full effect if the majority or all vehicles are self-driving. Since people still drive old rusty cars (not because they think they are old timers) simply because they do not have the means to upgrade, any new amazing tech will take decades to replace the current car fleet of the world.
- The points are valid, and replacing how we use cars with robotaxis will lessen costs, pollution, traffic, and whatever. There will ALWAYS be individualistic people who will want to own their vehicle. For lack of a better reason, they will refuse to sit where another human just sat. The same people build saunas at home and don't go to spas because that is shared. Also, there will ALWAYS be people who want to take driving into their own hands, and no, restricting them to a track will never work because that is boring. They'll use public roads.
- Will gas stations and parking lots no longer be necessary? Where will the unused robotaxi fleet rest? Just cruise the roads constantly, hoping for a fare? Where will they charge? Who will plug them in?
- First, the more widespread electric adoption will lessen the gas demand. With ample supply (don't get me started on that running out; they've been saying that forever, and they always find more), the price will go down. Then suddenly electric will not seem cheaper anymore, slowing the adoption. Eventually, when "only gas-guzzling enthusiasts" will use gas, and no more gas stations nearby, the fuel trucks (maybe electric xD) will come to you or become mobile refueling spots and go wherever fuel is needed, on-demand, right? Or how those people would be serviced without gas stations?
- Insistence on using optical instead of radar for sensing is stupid imho. If we have the tech to see through dust and fog (even UV/IR or whatever can see through that, and I wouldn't call that optical), why not use it? Isn't being superior to human eyes the point? I always think of weird European unmarked roads in bad weather. Yeah, good luck navigating that optically.
- Subscription cm-level GPS will be needed much like in agricultural applications.
- Halfway solutions that are "autopilot" but not really, just make people lazy and kill each other by not paying attention. A car that holds the wheel for you (lane assist) makes you forget to actively participate, but when you really need to, it's over too quickly.
- Responsibility should/will always be on the driver/owner of the vehicle if it kills someone.
Lots of questions and an exciting vision for the future, but I think it's FAR away. Even electric adoption is (s)low. The infrastructure (electric grid) is not prepared either. Do I want this future? I'll accept it, that's all I can say. I like my car (PHEV), and I enjoy driving it. I can still read books (listening) while driving, as I did with this one, so for that reason, I don't need the car to drive itself. Would I want to do something else while getting transported? If I wanted to, I could just use taxis right now. If a car is vastly underutilized anyway, it might even be cheaper to invest what it costs and use taxis. But I don't want to go down that rabbit hole.
- Since we can't switch all existing vehicles to new technology, there will be a gradual adaptation. While the vision is awesome, it only takes full effect if the majority or all vehicles are self-driving. Since people still drive old rusty cars (not because they think they are old timers) simply because they do not have the means to upgrade, any new amazing tech will take decades to replace the current car fleet of the world.
- The points are valid, and replacing how we use cars with robotaxis will lessen costs, pollution, traffic, and whatever. There will ALWAYS be individualistic people who will want to own their vehicle. For lack of a better reason, they will refuse to sit where another human just sat. The same people build saunas at home and don't go to spas because that is shared. Also, there will ALWAYS be people who want to take driving into their own hands, and no, restricting them to a track will never work because that is boring. They'll use public roads.
- Will gas stations and parking lots no longer be necessary? Where will the unused robotaxi fleet rest? Just cruise the roads constantly, hoping for a fare? Where will they charge? Who will plug them in?
- First, the more widespread electric adoption will lessen the gas demand. With ample supply (don't get me started on that running out; they've been saying that forever, and they always find more), the price will go down. Then suddenly electric will not seem cheaper anymore, slowing the adoption. Eventually, when "only gas-guzzling enthusiasts" will use gas, and no more gas stations nearby, the fuel trucks (maybe electric xD) will come to you or become mobile refueling spots and go wherever fuel is needed, on-demand, right? Or how those people would be serviced without gas stations?
- Insistence on using optical instead of radar for sensing is stupid imho. If we have the tech to see through dust and fog (even UV/IR or whatever can see through that, and I wouldn't call that optical), why not use it? Isn't being superior to human eyes the point? I always think of weird European unmarked roads in bad weather. Yeah, good luck navigating that optically.
- Subscription cm-level GPS will be needed much like in agricultural applications.
- Halfway solutions that are "autopilot" but not really, just make people lazy and kill each other by not paying attention. A car that holds the wheel for you (lane assist) makes you forget to actively participate, but when you really need to, it's over too quickly.
- Responsibility should/will always be on the driver/owner of the vehicle if it kills someone.
Lots of questions and an exciting vision for the future, but I think it's FAR away. Even electric adoption is (s)low. The infrastructure (electric grid) is not prepared either. Do I want this future? I'll accept it, that's all I can say. I like my car (PHEV), and I enjoy driving it. I can still read books (listening) while driving, as I did with this one, so for that reason, I don't need the car to drive itself. Would I want to do something else while getting transported? If I wanted to, I could just use taxis right now. If a car is vastly underutilized anyway, it might even be cheaper to invest what it costs and use taxis. But I don't want to go down that rabbit hole.
April 30, 2020
Autonomy: The Quest to build the driverless car was an intriguing novel that depicted the development of self-driving cars over the last few decades. This book was given to me by my dad who thought I might enjoy reading about it since I like cars, so i decided to give it a read. The author, Lawrence D. Burns, was a former General Motors executive and current advisor to the Google self-driving car project which gave him valuable insight into the development of the driverless car revolution.
The book itself was one big story of several engineers who work on developing driverless vehicles, and each section of the book has a different focus for the car. The first and what I thought was most interesting part of the book discussed the Carnegie Mellon team and how they designed their car to compete in the DARPA competition. This competition had teams design a car that could drive a race spanning a few hundred miles in the desert, all while avoiding obstacles. The motive behind such an event was to promote the development of driverless technology which would help soldiers avoid lethal obstacles such as landmines in Afghanistan. Throughout the rest of the novel, Burns tells stories of other various competitions such as the second DARPA event, his time at GM, and even other interesting stories such as the first fully-autonomous pizza delivery. Throughout the stories, one can observe the development of the technology used to make the semi-autonomous cars and the people who strive to make them a reality.
Since this is a non-fiction book that recounts real-life events, the story has not ended - but just begun. Burns leaves the audience with what he believes the future of the auto industry will look like (obviously with driverless cars). Easily the best part of the book for myself was how he put in perspective the integration of self-driving cars into society by referencing the very beginning of the auto industry. He makes note that back when cars were first invented, people mostly rode horses, and very few people drove a car. Now, pretty much no one rides horses as their primary mode of transportation, and there are still people who ride horses, but there are designated spots for them. Burns believes that cars will see the same fate as horse riding - uncommon but not extinct.
I personally liked the book, and it really went in-depth about the self-driving car. This is an idea that kids in the seventies or eighties saw in their cartoons but could never conceive the idea of this becoming a reality in their adult lives. As for the subject of the novel, I can’t see myself owning a self-driving car in the near future. There’s something about the thrill of driving a car that one will not get from self-driving cars. Don’t get me wrong, self-driving cars will be safer, more efficient, and easier to operate (no kidding) than a manual car, but I’m not completely on board with the idea quite yet. This is a future that seems inevitable, so I’ll either see myself sitting in a metal cage being driven around by a computer, or I’ll find myself with the other non-conformists over in the horse paddock.
The book itself was one big story of several engineers who work on developing driverless vehicles, and each section of the book has a different focus for the car. The first and what I thought was most interesting part of the book discussed the Carnegie Mellon team and how they designed their car to compete in the DARPA competition. This competition had teams design a car that could drive a race spanning a few hundred miles in the desert, all while avoiding obstacles. The motive behind such an event was to promote the development of driverless technology which would help soldiers avoid lethal obstacles such as landmines in Afghanistan. Throughout the rest of the novel, Burns tells stories of other various competitions such as the second DARPA event, his time at GM, and even other interesting stories such as the first fully-autonomous pizza delivery. Throughout the stories, one can observe the development of the technology used to make the semi-autonomous cars and the people who strive to make them a reality.
Since this is a non-fiction book that recounts real-life events, the story has not ended - but just begun. Burns leaves the audience with what he believes the future of the auto industry will look like (obviously with driverless cars). Easily the best part of the book for myself was how he put in perspective the integration of self-driving cars into society by referencing the very beginning of the auto industry. He makes note that back when cars were first invented, people mostly rode horses, and very few people drove a car. Now, pretty much no one rides horses as their primary mode of transportation, and there are still people who ride horses, but there are designated spots for them. Burns believes that cars will see the same fate as horse riding - uncommon but not extinct.
I personally liked the book, and it really went in-depth about the self-driving car. This is an idea that kids in the seventies or eighties saw in their cartoons but could never conceive the idea of this becoming a reality in their adult lives. As for the subject of the novel, I can’t see myself owning a self-driving car in the near future. There’s something about the thrill of driving a car that one will not get from self-driving cars. Don’t get me wrong, self-driving cars will be safer, more efficient, and easier to operate (no kidding) than a manual car, but I’m not completely on board with the idea quite yet. This is a future that seems inevitable, so I’ll either see myself sitting in a metal cage being driven around by a computer, or I’ll find myself with the other non-conformists over in the horse paddock.
March 2, 2019
This book reminded me of "The Road Ahead" by Bill Gates. This is an impressive account on Self Driving Technology, that is about to come and consume us in the near future. The book is very well written. Initially, I had plenty of doubts on the author, Lawrence D Burn's style, thinking that he was one of the pure management type guys, looking at things in a disconnected way, trying to associate himself with changes brought about by others. I was proven wrong. This attitude transformed into respect for the author as I followed his journey along. I started appreciating his insights, his outlook towards this project, his commitments, and really understood where he was coming from when the author provided more context into his own up bringing and background. He provided the view from Detroit, that many following the self-driving space will miss, and it an important viewpoint to consider.
The book starts with the DARPA race, narrates the events, and stories of people who are shaping this story. GM, and Google play a very important role in the story. The book shines in presenting, well researching personal accounts from various actors like Red Whitaker, Chris Urmson, Sebastian Thrun, Larry Page, Antony Levandowski, Travis Kalanick, as well as many people from the top management in established car companies. It was good to get a first hand account on how people running established businesses think, and make decisions. It also shares the grit, and adventures of engineers who work to push the envelop of the possibilities. The book indirectly highlights the value/policy stances taken by companies such as Waymo, Tesla, and Uber pursuing self driving technology after giving the backround on the limitations of the technology, which were known to everyone developing it. It should be noted that as of 2019, Tesla and Uber have both been responsible for loss of lives with their pursuit of this adventure, and both have escaped consequences for their mistakes.
With all the events, book lays the solid ground for what is to come and expected in the next few years or decades for Autonomy. I will count this book as one of the good business books that I have read in recent years.
The book starts with the DARPA race, narrates the events, and stories of people who are shaping this story. GM, and Google play a very important role in the story. The book shines in presenting, well researching personal accounts from various actors like Red Whitaker, Chris Urmson, Sebastian Thrun, Larry Page, Antony Levandowski, Travis Kalanick, as well as many people from the top management in established car companies. It was good to get a first hand account on how people running established businesses think, and make decisions. It also shares the grit, and adventures of engineers who work to push the envelop of the possibilities. The book indirectly highlights the value/policy stances taken by companies such as Waymo, Tesla, and Uber pursuing self driving technology after giving the backround on the limitations of the technology, which were known to everyone developing it. It should be noted that as of 2019, Tesla and Uber have both been responsible for loss of lives with their pursuit of this adventure, and both have escaped consequences for their mistakes.
With all the events, book lays the solid ground for what is to come and expected in the next few years or decades for Autonomy. I will count this book as one of the good business books that I have read in recent years.
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