Driverless car future predicted

Contemplating things that are regarded as completely normal today, but that will be utterly obsolete by the time his young daughter becomes an adult, comedian Richard Herring said in The Metro newspaper on 14 October that: “For example, I doubt my daughter will ever have to drive a car. Either because the world will have run out of fuel or, more likely, cars will drive themselves.

“We look at self-driving vehicles with suspicion now,” he added. “But in 18 years’ time, I think pretty much no one will be learning to drive. Why would any self-respecting teenager waste their time being taught something that can be done automatically, and won’t most parents be delighted that their kids will be safe on the roads?

“Personally I will miss the opportunity to give my daughter her first driving lesson and thus be paid back for the awful way I behaved to my own dad when he was kind enough to try to teach me the basics of how to operate a car,” Herring concluded. “But I am hoping that I can hang on long enough to at least get my personality and memories downloaded onto a computer, so that I can… criticise her driving constantly, even though she’s not driving.”