Ross Douthat recently asked Andrew Miller if self-driving cars signal a shift toward the "safety focus" of American youth. Frankly, I share this concern, as depriving teenagers of the visceral thrill of hydroplaning into a concrete median is a tragic erosion of our national spirit. Let me be clear: a society that refuses to let its teenagers pilot two tons of steel while texting is a society in decline.
Over lunch with a Waymo executive last week, I confessed my deepest fear about our autonomous future. We are coddling our young. When I was sixteen, my father handed me the keys to a Ford Taurus with failing brake pads and told me to merge onto the Cross Bronx Expressway. The sheer, unadulterated panic of nearly side-swiping a freight truck shaped me into the man I am today. If we surrender the steering wheel to an algorithm, we strip our youth of this essential rite of passage.
By eliminating human error, we are unfortunately eliminating the human soul. A perfect lane change is meaningless if there is no risk of a multi-casualty incident.
Our cultural obsession with safety means a generation will grow up without ever explaining to a state trooper why they drove through a fast-food restaurant backward. We are trading the robust, character-forging crucible of preventable highway tragedies for the sterile comfort of a lidar-guided pod. Frankly, I worry for the republic.