Elon Musk Wades Into the Debate Over Robotaxis Killing Cats. Guess Which Side He’s On

In the midst of trying to become The world’s first trillionaireHis stretch Defense contract businesswar”The mind virus woke up,” quarrel With Sam AltmanAnd overseeing a half-dozen tech companies, Elon Musk somehow found time to debate whether a rogue Waymo robotaxi (by the company’s own admission) ran over and killed a beloved bodega cat in San Francisco and whether it was good or bad.

In case you somehow missed it, a cat was run over earlier this week, leading to ongoing outrage against the eponymous perpetrator (Wemo). The cat, whose name was KitKat—but who also went by the title of “Mayor of 16th Street”—was a longtime staple of Randa’s Market in the city’s Mission neighborhood. KitKat owner Mike Zidane, told the San Francisco Standard That her pet was hit by a robotaxy late Monday night. “Honestly, man, it’s hard,” Zeidan said. “He was a one-of-a-kind cat. He brought joy to so many people. People loved him.”

Waymo appears to have admitted that its car ran over KitKat. “We reviewed it, and when our vehicle was stopped to pick up passengers, a nearby cat ran under our vehicle as it was moving,” a company spokesperson told Gizmodo. “We send our deepest sympathies to the cat’s owner and the community that knew and loved him.”

Friday, as a way to add his two cents, Mask retweeted An account that defended driverless cars as saviors, not killers, of neighborhood pets. “5.4 million cats are hit by cars in the United States each year, and 97 percent of those cats die from their injuries,” By @holmersblog. “Autonomy will reduce that number dramatically.”

“True, many pets will be saved by autonomy,” Musk commented.

It’s great that Elon can take time out of his busy schedule to attend talks around KitKat. Big picture, Musk A robotaxi service is being launchedSo we all know which dog he is in this fight. But the fact of the matter is, we don’t really know if autonomous cars will reduce the number of cat deaths.

One of the primary selling points for robotaxis is that human drivers are notorious for running into things, crashing, and otherwise causing dangerous havoc on America’s roadways. And it’s true that human drivers can be unreasonably dangerous. said, The jury is still out It’s about whether robotaxis are actually much safer than human drivers. Speed ​​is a factor A significant portion of traffic deaths, and robotaxis have so far shied away from those speeds. At the same time, there is also the fact that, whether robotics are safe or not, part of living in a free society involves accepting a certain amount of risk associated with that freedom. Today, anyone can get into a car and drive wherever they want to go, regardless of what the car’s software is programmed to do. This will not necessarily be the case in a world run by robotaxis.