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| Don't let this picture fool you, Honda's system won't actually drive the car, and under no circumstances should you take hands and eyes off the wheel. As if... |
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Like most of us, I wasn't born when Isaac Asimov wrote the sci-fi anthology, I, Robot. 'Man-like Machines Rule the World' shouts the cover of the original 1940 edition - a book that contains the very first reference to the term 'robotics'. Asimov even came up with three 'laws' to guide the behaviour of the intelligent machines that populated his fictional future.
Sixty five years on, in a large industrial complex in Slough, I'm looking at a list of three 'rules' that bear more than a passing resemblance to Asimov's. One: that the system must give priority to the driver so that they might ultimately remain in control. Two: that the operation of the system must be transparent to the driver. And three: that the system must not promote negligence in the driver, thereby endangering their life. The words may be subtly different, but the basic message is the same. "It's okay," it says, "the machine might be smarter than you. But you're the one pressing the buttons."
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| ADAS deactivates after a few seconds if it senses you aren't holding wheel |
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The machine I'm here to assess is the Advanced Driver Assist System, or ADAS. At least that's what it's called until its inventor, Honda, can think of something better. In essence, it's a combination of the firm's Adaptive Cruise Control set-up (ACC) and a gadget called Lane Keeping Assist System (LKAS). Neither concept is new to the market. Adaptive cruise control can be specified on Mercedes' S-Class and Audi's A8, to name but two. And Citroen has been fitting a piece of kit called a 'Lane-Departure Warning' system to its C4 and C5 family cars since last year. Old news, then?
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