This market addresses the central question in autonomous vehicle (AV) safety. Waymo is accumulating millions of fully autonomous miles, but experts like Professor Philip Koopman of Carnegie Mellon argue that statistical proof of safety, especially concerning rare events like fatalities, requires billions of miles of data.

The baseline for human drivers in the U.S. is approximately 1 fatality per 100 million miles driven. This means that over a 2 billion mile span, human drivers would be expected to cause or be involved in roughly 20 fatal accidents.

This market asks: By the time Waymo's fleet reaches the 2 billion-mile milestone, will their safety record be so clean as to be statistically superior to this human baseline?

Key Definitions:

• "2 Billion Autonomous Miles": Refers to cumulative miles driven by the Waymo fleet in fully autonomous mode (no human driver) on public roads, as officially announced by Waymo/Alphabet.

• "Fatality": The death of any person (Waymo occupant, occupant of another vehicle, pedestrian, cyclist, etc.) resulting from a collision involving a Waymo vehicle.

• "At-Fault": The collision is determined to be the fault of the Waymo vehicle by the official, final report from a relevant government authority (e.g., NHTSA, NTSB, or the primary law enforcement agency that investigated the incident).

Resolution Criteria

This market will resolve to YES if, upon reaching 2 billion cumulative, fully autonomous miles, the total number of at-fault fatalities involving Waymo vehicles is zero (0).

This market will resolve to NO if, upon reaching 2 billion cumulative, fully autonomous miles, the total number of at-fault fatalities involving Waymo vehicles is one (1) or more.

Additional Terms:

• The closing date for this market is January 1, 2040. If Waymo has not officially announced reaching 2 billion miles by this date, the market will resolve to N/A.

• Resolution will be based on a preponderance of evidence from reputable news sources and official government reports. The final determination of "at-fault" rests with the relevant authorities, not Waymo's internal analysis.

Sources

• Update 2025-09-26 (PST) (AI summary of creator comment): - Creator intends to resolve this market to N/A, citing a mismatch with Koopman's AV safety definition.

  • A new market with revised criteria has been created; see the linked comment for details.