Noah J. Goodall
Papers
1
Total Citations
139
H-Index
1
About
Noah J. Goodall is a leading researcher in transportation ethics and autonomous vehicle safety, best known for probing the moral and technical challenges of programming ethical decision-making into self-driving cars. His seminal 2016 paper, “Can you program ethics into a self-driving car?”—cited over 139 times—uses a vivid hypothetical scenario to expose the limitations of rule-based ethics in real-world crashes, arguing that current systems lack the legal and moral frameworks to handle ambiguous, human-driven accidents. Goodall’s work bridges philosophy, engineering, and public policy, influencing debates on liability, algorithmic transparency, and the “trolley problem” in autonomous systems. Beyond ethics, he has contributed to crash reconstruction and driver behavior modeling, with his research cited by regulators, automakers, and ethicists worldwide. His ability to translate complex ethical dilemmas into accessible, provocative examples has made him a sought-after voice in the emerging field of machine ethics. For students and researchers, Goodall’s work is essential reading for understanding why programming a car to “do the right thing” is far harder than it sounds.
Research Focus
Key Achievements
Top Papers
- 1Can you program ethics into a self-driving car?139 citations · 2016