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At TechCrunch Disrupt 2025, Waymo co-CEO Tekedra Mawakana said society will ultimately accept a fatal robotaxi crash as part of the broader tradeoff for safer roads overall. TechCrunch reports: The topic of a fatal robotaxi crash came up during Mawakana's interview with Kristen Korosec, TechCrunch's transportation editor, during the first day of the outlet's annual Disrupt conference in San Francisco. Korosec asked Mawakana about Waymo's ambitions and got answer after answer about the company's all-consuming focus on safety. The most interesting part of the interview arrived when Korosec brought on a thought experiment. What if self-driving vehicles like Waymo and others reduce the number of traffic fatalities in the United States, but a self-driving vehicle does eventually cause a fatal crash, Korosec pondered. Or as she put it to the executive: "Will society accept that? Will society accept a death potentially caused by a robot?" "I think that society will," Mawakana answered, slowly, before positioning the question as an industrywide issue. "I think the challenge for us is making sure that society has a high enough bar on safety that companies are held to." She said that companies should be transparent about their records by publishing data about how many crashes they're involved in, and she pointed to the "hub" of safety information on Waymo's website. Self-driving cars will dramatically reduce crashes, Mawakana said, but not by 100%: "We have to be in this open and honest dialogue about the fact that we know it's not perfection." Circling back to the idea of a fatal crash, she said, "We really worry as a company about those days. You know, we don't say 'whether.' We say 'when.' And we plan for them." Korosec followed up, asking if there had been safety issues that prompted Waymo to "pump the breaks" on its expansion plans throughout the years. The co-CEO said the company pulls back and retests "all the time," pointing to challenges with blocking emergency vehicles as an example. "We need to make sure that the performance is backing what we're saying we're doing," she said. [...] "If you are not being transparent, then it is my view that you are not doing what is necessary in order to actually earn the right to make the roads safer," Mawakana said.

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The Hollywood A-lister proved a jump-scare for millions watching across America when she voiced the Game 4 intro just minutes before the game began.

The Jasper County Sheriff's Office announced that the truck hauling the monkeys had overturned north of Heidelberg, which is about two hours west of Jackson, and warned locals to steer clear.

The departure of Brendan Rodgers from Celtic provides another battlefield for the war that has been circling the club, most of the firing being done from entrenched positions.

There are certain things which unite Dermot Desmond and Donald Trump. First of all, they are both billionaire businessmen who share a mutual love of golf.

John Edwards was never one of Fleet Street's armchair reporters, sitting in a comfortable office in front of a computer screen. For almost 60 years he was always where the action was.

Palaces, cemeteries, jails and even whole villages made the nation's 20 most haunted places, according to a Halloween survey. (file image)

The actor, 26, who revealed on Monday he'd tied the knot with his longterm girlfriend, had shared his passions for particle physics while starring on the HBO show.

Gerald Cera, 28, was sentenced to six years in jail after being found guilty of conspiracy to assist unlawful immigration in August earlier this year, a court heard.

NVIDIA has introduced NVQLink, an open system architecture that directly connects quantum processors with GPU-based supercomputers. The Quantum Insider reports: The new platform connects the high-speed, high-throughput performance of NVIDIA's GPU computing with quantum processing units (QPUs), allowing researchers to manage the intricate control and error-correction workloads required by quantum devices. According to a NVIDIA statement, the system was developed with guidance from researchers at major U.S. national laboratories including Brookhaven, Fermi, Lawrence Berkeley, Los Alamos, MIT Lincoln, Oak Ridge, Pacific Northwest, and Sandia. Qubits, the basic units of quantum information, are extremely sensitive to noise and decoherence, making them prone to errors. Correcting and stabilizing these systems requires near-instantaneous feedback and coordination with classical processors. NVQLink is meant to meet that demand by providing an open, low-latency interconnect between quantum processors, control systems, and supercomputers -- effectively creating a unified environment for hybrid quantum applications. The architecture offers a standardized, open approach to quantum integration, aligning with the company's CUDA-Q software platform to enable researchers to develop, test, and scale hybrid algorithms that draw simultaneously on CPUs, GPUs, and QPUs. The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) -- which oversees several of the participating laboratories -- framed NVQLink as part of a broader national effort to sustain leadership in high-performance computing, according to NVIDIA.

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Four-year-old Luca, an Amur Tiger; Django, a ten-year-old mainland clouded leopard; and Mo, a four-year-old Southern African cheetah, were examined using specialist CT scans in a mobile unit.

John Ashby, 32, of no fixed abode, was on Tuesday charged with one count of rape and sexual assault following an alleged attack on a woman who was not known to him.

Naomi Clark snapped up the two-bedroom home in Burnham Market, Norfolk, for a reported £300,000 earlier this year. She now wants to raze it to the ground and replace it with a four-bedroom property.

The Frasier star, 70, announced his baby news while appearing on Monday. The actor has built a large family over the years with his children spanning in ages from 42 to his newborn baby.

The Confederation of British Industry (CBI) said uncertainty about the forthcoming Budget was weighing on sentiment, leaving firms to delay decisions until they receive further clarity

The 28-year-old nepo baby showed off his buff physique as he was seen enjoying a family day at a pumpkin patch in Brentwood, California on Sunday.

Strictly Come Dancing star Amber Davies has addressed why she looked visibly upset during Sunday's results show.

Single-person dwellings will account for 33 per cent of all households in England by 2032 - rising to 8.57million, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS). (stock image)

CHRISTOPHER STEVENS: Mary turned 90 last March, though she's as bright as ever, and for this six-part celebration she is giving cookery lessons in everything from spaghetti to sponge

Celebrity Traitors is being watching by a whopping one in four adults as incredible viewing figures for the BBC series have been revealed.