Smart Driving Cars episode 402 with guest Alex Roy

·57 min·5 clips

Alex Roy exposes how companies 'straight wash' their self-driving timelines, erasing failures and complexities.

The episode features Alex Roy, general partner at NIVC, as a guest following his presentation at the Florida AV Conference. Hosts Fred Fishkin and Alan Kornhauser engage Roy in a detailed walkthrough of his slides, which aim to provide a corrected history of autonomous vehicles. Roy argues that companies often 'straight wash' their timelines, omitting failures and complexities. He traces milestones from Da Vinci's self-propelled cart design to the 1995 Nav Lab 'No Hands Across America' semi-autonomous drive. Roy discusses the influence of pop culture, citing Knight Rider and Total Recall's Johnny Cab as early depictions that shaped public expectations. He highlights legislative efforts, such as Florida's 2012 HB 7027 preemption law, and critiques misaligned expectations set by figures like Chris Urmson in 2015. The conversation shifts to practical applications, exploring how humanoids in autonomous vehicles could assist seniors with mobility, referencing companies like Get Papa. Roy introduces 'Roy's Razor,' a test for true autonomy based on whether a user can fall asleep in the back seat. He debates safety as a constraint versus an objective, comparing it to aviation standards. Roy dismisses technical debates over neural nets versus rule-based systems, emphasizing that end-users only care about functionality and affordability. He concludes by stressing the need for the U.S. to lead in exporting safe, affordable autonomous technology, drawing parallels to historical advancements in cars and aircraft.

As heard by us

Alex Roy turns AV history into a blunt lesson about expectations, scale, and what mobility is actually for.

Smart Driving Cars revisits Alex Roy's Florida AV Conference remarks and frames AVs in 2025 as a field that still needs basics, not hype. Fred Fishkin and Alan Kornhauser guide a history-heavy discussion that traces the gap between early expectations and what AVs have actually…

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Why you'd press play

If AV expectations feel out of sync with reality, this is your reset button.

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