Ford Motor Co. is teaming up with Domino’s Pizza Inc. to bring the future closer to reality in the form of autonomous vehicles delivering pizzas.

Starting in Ann Arbor, Michigan, the self-driving cars delivering pizzas are part of a trial by Ford to test how people respond to and interact with autonomous vehicles. Given that autonomous vehicles lack the ability to drive to a front door (car crashes aside), the test will require those who have placed the order to walk out to the vehicle to pick up their pizza. But they can do so only after they’ve tapped the last four digits of their phone number into a tablet mounted on the car to allow them access to the back seat of the car, where their pizza is located.

Since the law doesn’t currently allow self-driving cars to drive themselves without supervision, a Ford “safety driver” will be in each vehicle, but won’t be allowed to interact with customers.

Apparently, the test involves deep philosophical questions. Bryan Reimer, a research scientist in the MIT AgeLab, told Wired that “society is, in essence, completely unprepared for the complexities of the transformative change that is ahead in the automotive, mobility space. Does the pizza delivery man need to be there? That’s just one of the many hundreds of questions we don’t know.”

Clearly the question of pizza delivery doesn’t channel the likes of Plato or Aristotle, but Ford said understanding pizza delivery is “crucial” to its future. “We don’t want to wait until we have autonomous vehicle technology all ready to launch to start understanding these businesses, so we’re doing things in parallel,” added Sherif Maraby, Ford’s head of autonomous vehicles.

Domino’s isn’t new to experimenting with futuristic delivery methods, having gone into the history books as the first company to deliver a pizza via drone back in November.

Those who want to experience autonomous vehicle pizza delivery in the Ann Arbor area can do so by selecting the self-driving vehicle delivery option when they order pizza through the Domino’s app or website.

Photo: Ford