Real-time computing algorithms will replace humans in an innovative series of driverless races to be staged alongside the regular Formula E season, promotors said on Wednesday.
The Formula E championship features 10 teams of two drivers on city-centre circuits. Brazilian Nelson Piquet Junior won the inaugural 2014/2015 world championship.
It is seen as a cleaner and greener alternative to Formula One and the news of the Formula E initiative coincides with the Paris-hosted COP21 global climate talks.
Now Formula E and Kinetik, a technology company specialising in electric vehicles and trains, will also stage races between 10 teams of two driverless cars on the same circuits as a warm-up show to the main event.
This new championship called 'ROBORACE' will start for the 2016-2017 season. The Artificial Intelligence (AI) guided one-hour races will run over the full championship.
Won't taking humans out of the driver's seat take all the drama and excitement out of the sport?
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Knowledge Troll on Thursday December 03 2015, @06:39AM
Won't taking humans out of the driver's seat take all the drama and excitement out of the sport?
It will when the cars are so good they all drive exactly the same line every time. They might be that good right now or it could look more like an episode of robot wars and that'd be pretty exciting. The first year there was a robot car race no vehicle made it more than 4 miles and the one that made it that far caught on fire: PBS Nova S33E14 The Great Robot Race [youtube.com]. Though the second year 4 teams finished and I don't think anyone caught on fire. That episode of NOVA is a great introduction to driver-less vehicle technology. Plus John Lithgow narrates.
(Score: 2) by Knowledge Troll on Thursday December 03 2015, @07:02AM
Note: high performance drivers often use their hands to operate the parking brake pedal and feet to operate the hand brake lever. It all makes sense if you live in Colorado, Alaska, Oregon, Washington or Canada.
(Score: 2) by darkfeline on Thursday December 03 2015, @11:03AM
That's not possible since multiple cars cannot exist in the same location at the same time, unless of course you submit yourself to tailing the car in front for the entire race.
Join the SDF Public Access UNIX System today!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 03 2015, @03:47PM
If your cars cannot be in the same location at the same time, that must be because they are fermionic (i.e. half-spin). Fortunately there's an easy fix to that: Add a single electron to each fermionic car, and then the cars get bosonic; it is well known that bosons can be in the same location at the same time. ;-)