Robot Cars - Or Herbie Who?

The robot car is one of those staples of science-fiction that, unlike the flying car, anti-gravity belt or backpack rocket, at least seemed achievable in our lifetimes.

You get in, key in your destination, lie back and enjoy a glass of wine, and the car does all the driving and parking for you. Nifty.

Larry Niven figured the automated car of the future would also be entirely self-contained, and double as a survival capsule in disaster situations. Roger Zelazny predicted cars so simple even dogs could drive them, and that the hot new fad would be "spinning" - randomly programming a set of coordinates and then blacking out the windows so you'd have no idea where you'd end up.

Spielberg even made them drive up the sides of buildings in Minority Report.

So how come nobody precdicted that the first successful robot car would be a Volkswagen called Stanley?

The world's second robot car race - which incidentally was organised by the US Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) - has just been held, and of the twenty-three starting vehicles (which included modified humvees, dune buggies and a six-wheeled truck) only three made it across the finishing line. Which is a far improved result from last year's race, when most of the vehicles failed within sight of the starting line.

Nobody seems to have predicted that the robot car would first be a military instrument either, before it became another mass consumer toy of the public. And anyway, what good's the robot car when we're not going to have any petrol left to run them? I guess maybe some things will always remain within the realm of science fiction, even when it looks like they're already happening.