THESE DAYS, MODERN cars come with sophisticated driver assistance tools, like adaptive cruise control, which maintains a set distance from the car in front, and active steering, which keeps a vehicle in its lane. They can also brake automatically if the driver doesn’t spot a stopped object ahead, and warn when there’s a motorbike hovering in a driver’s blind spot. These features are the start of the promise of our autonomous future, where cars will drive themselves and we will be but passengers in a self-driving world.