The University of Essex, in the UK, is organizing a special car racing competition. This contest will involve model cars driven by what they call an evolutionary software which is able to learn through experience on the track. Although the race takes place with model cars in order to keep the costs as low as possible for the researchers, it will help design Computer Intelligence that will control driverless vehicles in the future. In some 10 or 15 years time, you probably wont have to make any small talk with a taxi driver as there wont be any!
Sources: University of Essex and CIG 2007 Car Racing Competition