Robotic cars are a still a distant dream.

I can't believe I'm the only person who quite fancies the idea of a fully robotic car. Imagine being able to go to a lovely
country pub for the evening and then, instead of driving home through hedges and dry stone walls like real country people
do, simply instructing the car to take you back to civilisation. Presently, this is only possible by employing a man with a
diesel car and an elephant-felling air freshener.

But I've now tried one and I'm pretty sure it isn't going to happen in my lifetime. Building a car that can follow a pre-determined
course around a track at high speed is easy enough, but a truly autonomous one that is aware of its surroundings is something
altogether more difficult. And the problem is with the one thing that we thought would make it possible - the computer.

Now Moore's Law, formulated in 1965, stated that the number of transistors that could be fitted to a given size of integrated
circuit board would double every two years, and this turns out to have been pretty much spot on.

Moore was one of the co-founders of Intel, so he's probably quite chuffed.

As a result of all this, computers in the broadest sense - i.e. electronic processors - have become very good at things we find
extremely difficult, such as big sums, controlling the air-conditioning temperature, and accurate accountancy.
Computers can redraw three-dimensional graphs in seconds, spell and advance the ignition in a petrol engine.
Computers can play chess.

Computers, in fact, are not at all sophisticated. They are simply a great deal of simplicity brought together; layer upon layer
of strings of on and off or yes and no or go and stop. This is great for dealing with the unerring logic of financial spreadsheets,
but hopelessly inadequate for controlling a robotic home help or, indeed, a self-driving car. The robot car that I tried could
recognise a parked car on its own side of the road and another one coming in the opposite direction, but in negotiating the
hazard it drove as if controlled by a committee. Which it was, sort of.

I'm going to be bold here, while simultaneously bracing myself for the usual onslaught from scientists and teachers, and say
that computers have led us to a sort of technical hiatus at which they are unable to help us further.

Another great leap forwards is required; greater even than the shift from valves to silicon chips.

Consider the example of my cat, who has never helped me one jot in the preparation of a GST return.
But when he's pursued by the bulldog from down the road he can make a superbly co-ordinated leap from pavement to railing
to tree trunk to precarious branch, every time. At least until I shoot the dog. A robotic cat controlled by the type of digital processor
we have at present will never be able to do this, even if Moore's Law applies for another thousand years, because it has the
wrong sort of brain.

The anatomy of the cat is well understood, as are the mechanics of its limbs. The stumbling block is the means of control.
The cussed nature of the processor means we are obliged to analyse it using the science of mathematics which, though
amazing, is still only a language and a means of trying to understand the world. It is not actually able to understand the workings
of a cat fully, or even the action of a human being who is merely driving a car. Therefore, the computer cannot replicate these things.
To use the language of Investors in People, the computer needs skills.

Recently, I've spent a lot of time with people working at the cutting edge of robotics and I can see that a great deal has been
achieved with artificial intelligence. But what's needed now is some sort of artificial instinct.
And until that is achieved, I'm afraid you're going to have to drive the car yourself.

So enjoy.

To be able to drive a car you need to be a psychic; know exactly what the other drivers are going to do.
Realise that stupidity is driving the car that is fast approaching your drivers door and is about to shunt you across the road
into the path of another oncoming car, driven by someone who is busy fielding calls on his mobile phone rather than paying
attention to the carnage unfolding in front of him. Unfortunately, these things happen far too quickly for a computer to even
comprehend.