101–110 of 120 posts
A good place to get started with the tech details of EV design is with the Tesla, Inc patents themselves:
US Patent Application for Integrated Electric Motor Assembly Patent Application (Application #20170291482)
Chen shows a picture of Easter morning in NYC in 1900 and asks the viewer to play "Where is the car?". After several seconds he highlights the one car in the frame surrounded entirely by house-and-buggy carts.
He then shows a picture of the Easter morning in NYC in 1913 and asks the reverse question: "Where is the horse?", as there is only 1 horse visible in the picture.
Obviously this is a carefully selected anecdote, but this is a really compelling argument that forward progress will be faster than expected.
In the urban zone, there will be competition for scarce roadway as businesses no longer paying a driver, go increasingly JIT, and elite commuters value door to door service. No city gov't will be able to resist the right to tax per mile, tax rush hour surge charges, and tax luxury idle vehicles. This will push the middle and lower market into on demand rentals. And without the driver as an informal superintendent of the vehicle, there will be a very annoying problem of getting into a car that a gross person knew they were never going to be in again. Enter the eye in the sky. Except for customer with a 4-star reputation or higher. This will create a race to the bottom for anyone who can't or won't establish reputation to get passage on an autonomous vehicle.
I think we can't even fully contemplate yet how alienating and de-humanizing self-driving cars are going to large parts of our society, and how amazing they're going to be for others.
The final video [1] has a pretty compelling argument for the conversion to self-driving cars happening quicker than expected: Chen shows a picture of Easter morning in NYC in 1900 and asks the viewer to play "Where is the car?". After several seconds he highlights the one car in the frame surrounded entirely by house-and-buggy carts. He then shows a picture of the Easter morning in NYC in 1913 and asks the reverse qu…
The most interesting phenomenon is "sleepers": people who sleep Friday night as their car drives to some scenic overlook sunrise and drive them home from retreat on Sunday night. Rural back roads will be moving at full stream in the dead of night with 'ghost cars' when they were once were completely quiet; zoning will limit noise, speed, illumination, toll's win go up, but airbnb's will flourish. In the urban zone, t…
A couple of years ago there was a new article on the front page pretty much every day about the great new thing that will change our lives--3D printing. I'm worried that whatever happened to 3D printing is about to happen to self driving. What did happen to 3D printing?
Yes, I agree that you shouldn't take the premise for granted (that self-driving cars will be here soon). A high-profile Uber investor has said that level 4 self-driving won't be in the U.S. for 25 years: https://www.cnbc.com/2017/04/06/bill-gurley-uber-investor-se... That means they can service people without driver's licenses and people who can't drive -- the old and the young. Also, Chris Urmson said the transition…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, I agree that you shouldn't take the premise for granted (that self-driving cars will be here soon). A high-profile Uber investor has said that level 4 self-driving won't be in the U.S. for 25 years: https://www.cnbc.com/2017/04/06/bill-gurley-uber-investor-se... That means they can service people without driver's licenses and people who can't drive -- the old and the young. Also, Chris Urmson said the transition…
What are people doing abut this? https://www.wired.com/story/self-driving-cars-power-consumpt...
I think the intro kind of overstates the downside. Lots of people will be happy to pay for more fuel if it means they don't have to drive.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, I agree that you shouldn't take the premise for granted (that self-driving cars will be here soon). A high-profile Uber investor has said that level 4 self-driving won't be in the U.S. for 25 years: https://www.cnbc.com/2017/04/06/bill-gurley-uber-investor-se... That means they can service people without driver's licenses and people who can't drive -- the old and the young. Also, Chris Urmson said the transition…
What are people doing abut this? https://www.wired.com/story/self-driving-cars-power-consumpt...
I think it will halve as the tech progresses, just due to optimization. Also, no windshield means better aerodynamic possibilities that could compensate for the loss.
This is kind of a meta comment, but I’ve been lurking on HN for a while on car posts in particular. I have the impression that HN in general doesn’t like cars all that much, and in fact we would be much better of without them. I can’t argue with the facts: congestion and pollution in large cities, such as London, have never been higher where almost all on-road public transport is still run on diesel. However, I think…
Well, beyond that, I have to wonder if self-driving cars are really the solution we're looking for, rather than more mass transit.