Polestar Pays Oxford to Measure the Thrill. File the Obituary.

On May 19, Polestar and the SDG Impact Lab at the University of Oxford announced a pilot study to answer one question by science: whether the thrill of driving can be measured at all. Six senior doctoral fellows were recruited. They read brain activity alongside biometric and behavioral data while people drive a high-performance Polestar, with testing at the Gotland Ring in June. It closes this summer; the findings are promised for the fall.

The method is elaborate; the meaning is not. A company that has to hire Oxford to learn whether its own cars are fun has already answered, in the asking. So I have filed the death notice for the thrill of driving, cause of death left blank until the fellows report, to run the day the study closes.

Grant the science. Its purpose sits beside it. Christian Samson, Polestar's head of product attributes, says the data can be used by the engineering team "as an added layer for fine tuning our cars' vehicle dynamics and performance attributes." That is not measurement so much as inventory: your own pleasure, tuned to a spec and sold back to you.

Picture the commuter at a red light two years on, in his new Polestar. The weight of his steering and the map of his throttle were tuned to the pooled readout of six strangers wired up in a lab he will never see. His idea of fun arrived pre-decided, by a fellowship he never met.

Hank will tell you the thrill died with the engine and did not need Oxford to confirm the funeral. He is half right, which for Hank is a personal best.

So the notice runs without heat. The Thrill of Driving, born with the first car, is survived by a data set, a promotional content series, and the fine-tuning department. Cause of death: it was finally observed. Services are planned for the fall, at Oxford, before the people who paid for them. In lieu of flowers, the family asks that you keep driving as though no one is counting.