The 2030 Self-Driving Car Bet

It’s my honor to announce that John Carmack and I have initiated a friendly bet of $10,000* to the 501(c)(3) charity of the winner’s choice:

By January 1st, 2030, completely autonomous self-driving cars meeting SAE J3016 level 5 will be commercially available for passenger use in major cities.

I am betting against, and John is betting for.

By “completely autonomous,” per the SAE level 5 definition, we mean the vehicle performs all driving tasks under all conditions – except in the case of natural disasters or emergencies. A human passenger enters the vehicle and selects a destination. Zero human attention or interaction is required during the journey.

By “major cities” we mean any of the top 10 most populous cities in the United States of America.

To be clear, I am betting against because I think everyone is underestimating how difficult fully autonomous driving really is. I am by no means against self driving vehicles in any way! I’d much rather spend my time in a vehicle reading, watching videos, or talking to my family and friends… anything, really, instead of driving. I also think fully autonomous vehicles are a fascinating, incredibly challenging computer science problem, and I want everyone reading this to take it as just that, a challenge. Prove me wrong! Make it happen by 2030, and I’ll be popping champagne along with you and everyone else!

(My take on VR is far more pessimistic. VR just… isn’t going to happen, in any “changing the world” form, in our lifetimes. This is a subject for a different blog post, but I think AR and projection will do much more for us, far sooner.)

I’d like to thank John for suggesting this friendly wager as a fun way to generate STEM publicity. He is, and always will be, one of my biggest heroes. Go read Masters of Doom if you haven’t, already!

And while I have you, we’re still looking for code contributions in our project to update the most famous programming book of the BASIC era. Proceeds from that project will also go to charity. 😎

*We may adjust the amount up or down to adjust for inflation as mutually agreed upon in 2030, so the money has the desired impact.