011-沃尔沃召集志愿者体验无人驾驶

Passage 011-沃尔沃召集志愿者体验无人驾驶
It used to be a far-flung (普遍的) idea more at home in the world of science fiction, but the Swedish car maker Volvo is bringing driverless cars a step closer by recruiting a hundred people to travel to work next year in computer-controlled
vehicles. That's not all. The trial requires the volunteers to read a book, sent texts and c-mails or even watch TV while sitting behind the wheel. The company says the cars will be designed to deal with any emergency so the human won't have to.
Richard Wesker has been giving the technology a try. “To start with, Volvo's volunteers will only use selected commuter routes ( 通勤路线) . They' ve been picked because they don't allow cyclists, pedestrians (行人) . And bear in mind, it's Sweden, because they are regularly cleared of snow, the computer needs to see white lines. As we drove along amongst the lorries (卡车) and buses, the man behind the technology pushed the button, let go of the wheel and started telling me about how it will work.“I mean, no one wants to say it out loud but computers can crash as well as humans, can't they?" “Oh yeah, computers can crash. So when we designed the system, we designed it with backup computers, with double
breaking (刹车) systerms, double steering (驾驶) systems."

“So the cars are gonna do this."
“The Driver may be stting relaxed, reading. We can't count on him or her, so the car has to do it."
“Will anyone actually want to do it? Will they want to commute in the morning with their hands off the steering wheel?
Do you think it's gonna be popular here, the idea of self- driving cars?”
“No, not for us. I don't think people trust them."
“I think that it would be more safe if all the cars were driverless cars because then you take out the human factor.'
“Would you volunteer to try out the driverless car?”
“Yeah, why not?"
“I think they will be a bit scary to not be like able to, yeah, you don't know where it's gonna turn.”
It could still take a decade or two, but eventually children will marvel at (对...感到惊讶) the idea that people actually used to drive their own cars.