Driverless cars are coming. Google already has prototypes and other companies are in hot pursuit. Experts tell us that within a decade, driverless cars will be common in our cities and on our highways.

How do you feel about driverless cars?

Some of us look forward to giving up the wheel and relaxing while cars drive us more safely than we could ourselves. These sophisticated machines with a capacity to sense and learn will not make the common mistakes that almost all drivers make. Car accidents will go down, insurance costs will drop, and we’ll be better off.

Hold on. Not so fast. Others worry that “smart cars” will quickly become much smarter than people, and along with many other smart technologies, will threaten our autonomy and independence. And, what happens to the 3.5 million people in the United States who drive cars and trucks for a living? Do their jobs disappear? And do they join the chorus of angry voters who lose their jobs and are shut out from the benefits from the exponential growth in smarter and smarter technologies.

It is no accident that Vivek Wadha titled his new and provocative book, The Driver in the Driverless Car.

Vivek Wadha is a Distinguished Fellow at Carnegie Mellon University and lives in Silicon Valley.