I dream of robots: Get out of my dreams and into my car

First off, let's clarify the title here a bit: I don't actually dream of robots. That sounds...a bit creepy actually, and if I had my druthers I'd dream about bunnies and French Bulldogs and gummy candies every night.

Yep, that there's the stuff nightmares are made of...

However, as a lazy human the idea of having a minion (robot or otherwise) to perform my least enjoyed tasks is a tempting offer. While there are several responsibilities that I would gladly hand off to a bot (cleaning litter boxes quickly springs to mind), the idea that seems best attuned to robotic assistance is one that is already being looked into. And that idea is robot drivers.

Consider the possibilities of sitting comfortably in a vehicle, enjoying the view passing by, reading and drinking coffee. You don't have to worry about stop signs or bicycle lanes or who actually has the right-of-way at that four way stop (it's usually whoever stopped first, for what it's worth). It sounds so...relaxing.

See? 60's-style technicolor Dad gets it!

Now, I can already hear some of you in the back whispering about how Google is working on a self-driving car - and I know some of you are thinking "Amber, if you want a robot driver why not just take the bus or a train and get the same effect?" True enough, riding a subway or bus does relieve me of the responsibilities of driving -- while placing it into the hands of another entirely fallible human (who may or may not have a worse driving record than I do). Let me regale you about the time I was on a MUNI train that took the wrong track and wound up miles from where it was supposed to be, or the time I was on a MUNI bus that hit a taxi cab (everyone was okay). Or talk to anyone in the Bay Area during a BART strike.

People are still needed to operate buses and trains and subway cars, and each of them is entirely capable of having a bad day, or a cold, or simply being short tempered at how long it takes to turn left in this city (Which is forever. And ever. And ever.).

Robot drivers won't be upset if someone cuts them off. They're not going to be distracted by their smartphones; they don't have personal vendettas against lane-splitting motorcyclists; they won't drink and drive, and unlike the majority of Uber drivers, they aren't chatting me up for popularity points. All they want to do is execute their mission of getting to a destination safely.

Okay, he would probably drink and drive.

So in the end, maybe I do day-dream a little bit about robots - about how they can make our future safer, more efficient, environmentally cleaner, and overall easier. And maybe I'm inspired by living in an increasingly crowded city with a growing traffic problem and an aging public transportation system, but I can't see an issue with making the streets safer, one robot at a time.