As for autonomous cars . . . there are LEGIONS of personal injury lawyers simply salivating over the opportunities for personal enrichment at the expense of people & businesses with deep pockets . . .
This. No longer will being hit by a car entail trying to figure out if the driver and/or their minimum liability insurance can cover your costs; you're going after the car manufacturers, software companies, etc. that can afford to pay for all the pain and suffering you can imagine.
Ability is one thing, but I don't know how realistic it is to think that people will lose interest in the ability or opportunity to control where they're going. Unless he means that people will be afraid to go somewhere unless a machine is showing them how to get there. That would be sad.
Consider that to get the max benefit of this tech, cars will be built to work together and to communicate with each other.
And how often do we
still lose cell signal, or even just the data signal, on even relatively major roads? Even when it's not completely lost, how well is a control system going to work over that connection that takes 3-4 minutes to load your Facebook feed? An per-car backup that can function without the central computer just means even more liability for the car manufacturer.
Personally, I would like something along the lines of a basic autopilot for long trips; going from here to Weatherford, for example, is 27 miles of 75mph US281, turn right onto I20 and go another 15 miles. Even if driver interaction was necessary for that interchange, you could still automate 42 miles of a 55 mile trip with nothing more than simple collision avoidance, speed control and lane holding.