We can say this for sure: Google cars DO NOT know what to do with bicycles. Give them the right of way? Go fast and first? Run them over?

We know this because a cyclist posted this bit about a funny exchange had between a Google car and the lowly bike at a four-way stop. It makes me think of two creatures crossing in the wild, not quite sure of what to make of the other, gingerly moving forward so as not to draw attention, but really wanting to get out of the situation. 

Here's the bit, and I left in the cyclist's strange predilection for lower-case:

a Google self-driving Lexus has been in my neighborhood for the last couple of weeks doing some road testing.

near the end of my ride today, we both stopped at an intersection with 4-way stop signs.

the car got to the stop line a fraction of a second before I did, so it had the ROW. I did a track-stand and waited for it to continue on through.

it apparently detected my presence (it's covered in Go-Pros) and stayed stationary for several seconds. it finally began to proceed, but as it did, I rolled forward an inch while still standing. the car immediately stopped...

I continued to stand, it continued to stay stopped. then as it began to move again, I had to rock the bike to maintain balance. it stopped abruptly.

we repeated this little dance for about 2 full minutes and the car never made it past the middle of the intersection. the two guys inside were laughing and punching stuff into a laptop, I guess trying to modify some code to 'teach' the car something about how to deal with the situation.

the odd thing is that even tho it was a bit of a CF, I felt safer dealing with a self-driving car than a human-operated one.

Well, well. The Google car is intimated by a standing, rocking cyclist, eh? And the cyclist felt safer facing off against a potentially man-eating machine without a human brain, than by a car driven by a living organism? And there were laughing people punching a laptop, you say? Very interesting.

Super thanks and h/t to the Verge.