There is a significant difference between flying on autopilot in an empty sky and auto-driving on a crowded road. It baffles me that the pilots could be distracted for 90 minutes. 90 minutes after the plane was supposed to start it's descent? Didn't any passengers notice that the plane was that late? What about the flight crew? They certainly didn't pull out their laptops a few minutes before descent, they had to have them out a while before they were supposed to land. But nonetheless, the plane was flying in a relatively empty sky, so the chances for a mid-air crash seem to be relatively low. But as for cars on auto-pilot, that's an entirely different story. The Lexus example seems really silly (and dangerous) when you consider that roads are repaved, and painting may take an extra day or two, so lines may suddenly disappear or become the light, temporary lines that sometimes appear on new roads. Or, in construction areas, lines may be re-painted and the old lines are sometimes slightly visible. These sudden changes can cause the car to quickly go off course. What happens at 55, 65, 75, 80 MPH when a car suddenly goes off course? Should it slow/stop, causing problems for cars behing (and possibly an accident?). What if an alarm goes off indicating that the car is off course? How long will it take the driver to look up and figure out what is happening and get the car back on track? Certainly not enough time. What if the driver is texting and really wants to type that last word or letter in their message before looking up? What if the driver is asleep. Auto-piloted cars seem like the silliest idea, unless there is some sort of guide wire embedded in every highway. But then again, what about power failures, severed lines? I actually saw someone the other day, driving on the highway with BOTH hands on her Blackberry. These are the type of people who will think that these assisting devices are actually controlling the car, rather than just assisting.

I don't think the author was saying we were 'already there' in terms of the technology being in place to have self driving cars tomorrow. Only that we were well on the way. But maybe I misread the article.

I would as soon try to read your huge block of text as I would eat an entire apple in one bite.

Write in paragraphs, dude. That is why God invented them.

Sorry, just found out that Safari has problems with formatting in The Fray. Next time I will use FireFox.