Trust is beside the point. The actual point is that they are able to pay attention to the road, even for prolonged amounts of time, and react to perceived danger, despite not being the ones who are actually in control of the car.
The claim I'm disputing is the one that says people are somehow incapable of paying attention to the road for extended periods of time unless they are in control of the vehicle.
I might agree that a reaction might be jerky and panicky, but then again, they would by definition be so regardless, due to the unexpected nature of accidents
So other road users' safety is reliant on jerky and panicky responses to perceived danger as well as real emergencies.
That sounds like a nice safe system.
For the record, I don't agree. I feel that the average person who would choose to use a self-driving will tend to be overly relaxed and trusting, not what I'd call a backseat driver.
The kind of person who is a backseat driver wouldn't trust the car's driving and would prefer to control it themselves, and thus wouldn't be using the self-driving feature in the first place.
>A backseat driver may be uncomfortable with the skills of the driver, feel out of control since they are not driving the vehicle
Are you saying that the meatbag in a "self-driving car" is equivalent to a backseat driver?
Because if you are, then "self-driving cars" will never be viable because the humans inside don't actually trust them.