Yeah, and it is a stupid idea that goes to the philosophy of the NFB and not 
to future technological developments in terms of autonomous vehicular driving 
technology.

In the VA Tech pharce of an experiment, the NFB is attempting to reproduce the 
driving experience for blind people.  The real developments to watch for an 
autonomous vehicle is occurring through DARPA sponsorship as well as at the 
General Motors Tech Center and the Carnegie-Mellon lab.  If developments in 
this area proceed, I would expect autonomous vehicles to be mass-marketed in 
the next decade or two.

The problem with the VA Tech experiment is it relies on too many subsystems 
and a fallible human interpreting the data and acting accordingly.  This would 
never be allowed as a street-legal device.

On the other hand, self-driving vehicles have a real opportunity to address 
some challenging issues which we face.  First, if infrastructure is developed 
in the traffic grid and between other vehicles, then our roads will be much 
safer and still be able to bear a larger traffic flow.  Second, there will be 
a reduction in accidents because there will be no distracted drivers or 
drunken idiots.  Much of this technology already exists; we lack 
infrastructure and a way to coexist with existing driven vehicles.

For more info, check
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=ces-notebook-a-victory-la

Steve, K8SP

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Buddy Brannan" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Friday, August 07, 2009 12:52 PM
Subject: Re: OT, UntilYou Put A Mobile Rig In This Car


Of course you can't drive them anywhere yet, it's called a "prototype"
for a reason. One has to start somewhere, and this would be the
beginning of the project. I'm not sure why you would expect a blind
drivable car to spring, like Athena from Zeus's, head, fully formed
and usable right now anyway, and, moreover, why the NFB has to be "off
its rocker" because it's actually gotten a team of university
researchers to tackle a problem and develop a working prototype.
Progress has to begin somewhere, and no large development just
happens. If you would like to not encourage such progress, or not
encourage anyone to make an attempt at doing anything progressive,
that's fine, and I reckon you're entitled. I, for one, find the
prospect very exciting and am watching these developments with much
interest.