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Tesla confirms “Autopilot” crash in Montana

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Re: Tesla confirms “Autopilot” crash in Montana

#171

Post by agumonkey »

Musk is losing its mind. Blaming the user won't work long with life critical systems. Unless he expects backing from the NRA, putting complex and dangerous devices that can't escape dangers themselves in the hands of the average joe will create incidents. And even if he's legally not to blame I don't think he's gonna sale cars long with such images in the public mind.

I hope he's not putting too much hubrys in the AutoPilot thing and try to enforce it at any cost. Soon there'll be so many corner cases, AP will only "best used while parked with nobody inside nor outside the car, preferably with engine stopped too".

The reason I liked Tesla/Musk before is that he pushed quality and safety Unconditionally. I'm starting to think it was mostly nerd honeymoon phase. Either revamp the logic (sensors-recall and software) or disable it.

Re: Tesla confirms “Autopilot” crash in Montana

#172

Post by studentrob »

dimino wrote: post #115

What the hell is happening in this comment thread? Do we not all realize that, per-mile-driven, Tesla's auto pilot is much safer than human driving? I thought we were prepared to deal with the inevitable crashes, but based on the chicken littles here, maybe I was wrong.

> Do we not all realize that, per-mile-driven, Tesla's auto pilot is much safer than human driving?

Good question. It's not safer. Tesla's quoted statistic of one death per 94 million miles driven in the US is not as useful as it could be. That includes motorcycle deaths and roads and conditions in which the Tesla AP is not likely to be engaged. When you limit it to divided roads, the rate is more like 1 death per 150 million miles driven [1], which makes the Tesla less safe than your average American vehicle, and that still includes motorcycles.

[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/technology/comments/4sgxv1/while_te...

Re: Tesla confirms “Autopilot” crash in Montana

#173

Post by Corrado »

lucb1e wrote: post #31
cloakandswagger wrote: post #14

> "No force was detected on the steering wheel for over two minutes after autosteer was engaged," said Tesla, which added that it can detect even a very small amount of force, such as one hand resting on the wheel." Why doesn't the "autopilot" turn off if no hands are detected on the wheel?

Well the whole autopilot feature is silly if you need to keep your hands on the wheel. Then you might as well steer yourself, or am I missing something? (I don't know details about this feature, I just know it steers automatically on highways.) Until full driver attention is no longer needed, enabling "autopilot" and saying in the manual "PS. you still need to stay as alert as you normally would and keep your hands o…

I think the value of "autopilot" for me would come in increased awareness when my attention is fading. When I'm coming home at 2AM from a gig and the road is long, straight, flat, and boring, my attention wanders. Sure, I start out strong, but soon my eyes just don't focus correctly anymore. I roll down the windows and turn up the radio to stay awake but sometimes I don't realize how I got from here to there.

That 30 minute trip could end in disaster or, using something like "autopilot", it could end with me pulling into my garage without issue. I tend to think that it will be very useful in these types of situations.

Re: Tesla confirms “Autopilot” crash in Montana

#174

Post by sriram_sun »

trhway wrote: post #47

>"It's a winding road going through a canyon, with no shoulder," Shope told CNNMoney. The driver told Shope the car was in Autopilot mode, traveling between 55 and 60 mph ... in SUV (Model X)... are people trying to win Darwin award?

Agree. I was shocked to read the actual speed it was going at. However, the insurance companies might be starting to worry.

Re: Tesla confirms “Autopilot” crash in Montana

#175

Post by kbenson »

ghaff wrote: post #108
studentrob wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cool. Tesla should review this book and talk. Paraphrasing a few quotes from your link ... "The most difficult challenging tech problem is not full autonomy, but rather the interaction between automated systems and humans" The subtitle of the book is also notable: "Robotics and the Myths of Autonomy" The speaker almost seems to be arguing that full autonomy is impossible. If we start up a system, then its behavior ha…

It's not so much that full autonomy is impossible. We "fire and forget" many type of systems with no possibility of human intervention--at least not in a timely manner. What you can't do is start an automated process, comforting yourself that an inattentive human can always take over in a split-second if the automation messes up.

> What you can't do is start an automated process, comforting yourself that an inattentive human can always take over in a split-second if the automation messes up.

I think that depends quite a bit on how much is automated. Traditional cruise control is an automation, and I'm sure there have been accidents that resulted from it, but generally it automates so little that you really can't become inattentive (unless you fall asleep). Variable cruise control has more automation, and I would guess the percentage of automation related accidents it played a part in compared to traditional cruise control is higher due to people trusting the system when it is misbehaving. Tesla's autopilot is much farther along this spectrum.

Re: Tesla confirms “Autopilot” crash in Montana

#176

Post by kirrent »

coredog64 wrote: post #96
CaptSpify wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And this is why I don't think they should call it "autopilot". The name is misleading, imo

How about"copilot"?

CoPilot? Someone who can completely take over for you when you're feeling tired. Compared to an Autopilot which requires pilot or skipper supervision I think copilot would be a far worse term if it weren't for the fact that the name doesn't really matter too much.

Re: Tesla confirms “Autopilot” crash in Montana

#177

Post by Dylan16807 »

cperciva wrote: post #117
cpncrunch wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, that's precisely how (real) autopilots work. If the autopilot can't reliably continue flying (e.g. in extreme turbulence, severe icing, or failure of some part of the system), it will immediately disengage with a loud warning sound, and the pilot has to take immediate control.

You're both right. That's exactly how aircraft autopilot systems work... and it doesn't work. There have been several plane crashes -- most notably AF447 -- which resulted from autopilot systems disengaging when the (human) pilots had insufficient situational awareness to safely take over control of the aircraft.

The confusion between normal and alternate law on AF447 is not because the autopilot transferred control to the pilots when they weren't ready. The same thing could have happened if the transfer was made with full preparation. It was a signalling and training issue, not evidence that auto->manual transitions are bad.

Re: Tesla confirms “Autopilot” crash in Montana

#178

Post by awestroke »

raverbashing wrote: post #156

"It's a winding road going through a canyon, with no shoulder," Shope told CNNMoney. The driver told Shope the car was in Autopilot mode, traveling between 55 and 60 mph" Wow, really? This is not the Autosteer's fault, it's pure negligence

Also, the car told the driver to take back control of the vehicle, which the driver ignored.

People with no respect for the danger of driving are going to get hurt, with or without driver assist technology.

Re: Tesla confirms “Autopilot” crash in Montana

#179

Post by Dylan16807 »

greendestiny wrote: post #103
cpncrunch wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, that's precisely how (real) autopilots work. If the autopilot can't reliably continue flying (e.g. in extreme turbulence, severe icing, or failure of some part of the system), it will immediately disengage with a loud warning sound, and the pilot has to take immediate control.

If planes had to fly within centimetres of hard barriers there would be no autopilot.

I trust a computer much more than a human to keep a tiny gap at high speed for hours on end.

Also if you have a nice clear barrier, it becomes easier to automatically manage steering.

Re: Tesla confirms “Autopilot” crash in Montana

#180

Post by studentrob »

mevile wrote: post #146
meddlepal wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This a thousand times. Why is this allowed? And then going the extra mile and calling it autopilot which has all kinds of connotations about not needing to give a fuck about what the vehicle does. Bad bad bad. Recall and remove the feature until it's ready for actual use. Don't put everyone else on the road at risk so you can beta test.

It's already something other cars on the roads have. Tesla just did it on the cheap and Tesla gets more press because it's not a 100 year old car company and its founder is Elon Musk.

Other cars require hands on the wheel at more frequent rates, as I understand it. There's no conspiracy. Everyone wants a good product out of Tesla. Sometimes that means additional pressure. 100 year old car companies have experienced plenty of pressure, and these days they anticipate the pushback. The difference between the companies is not how the press treats them, but how they handle and respond to adverse events. This article says it better [1]

> At Ford Motor Company, executives told me about all the pushback they received when they introduced features we now view as standard. People resisted and feared seat belts, airbags, automatic transmission, automatic steering, antilock brakes, automatic brakes, and trailer backup assist. Ford does extensive focus groups on new features that push boundaries, holding off on introducing ones that too many people don’t understand.

> Tesla doesn’t operate that way. When the company’s Autopilot software, which combines lane-keeping technology with traffic-aware cruise control, was ready last Fall, Tesla pushed it out to its customers overnight in a software update. Suddenly, Tesla cars could steer and drive themselves. The feature lives in a legal gray area.

[1] http://fortune.com/2016/07/11/elon-musk-tesla-self-driving-c...

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