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Police Say Video Shows Woman Stepped Suddenly in Front of Self-Driving Uber

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Re: Police Say Video Shows Woman Stepped Suddenly in Front of Self-Driving Uber

#91

Post by daodedickinson »

sjg007 wrote: post #38
branchan wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the woman suddenly walked in front of the car at the last minute, I don't see how the situation could have been avoided, no matter how fast a computer is able to process the information from the sensors. There was also a driver behind the wheel, so it would suggest that humans are just as clueless.

If I was driving a car and saw the pedestrian ahead of time walking or trying to cross I would have slowed down and changed lanes away fro them or at least moved far right if safe. Same thing when you pass bicycles. Change lanes away if possible or at the very least give more buffer. You can never tell what someone may do so you should anticipate the unexpected.

Yep, after a friend had someone try to use her van to commit suicide I am paranoid and get ready to avoid every pedestrian. I don't know what I'd do if I lived somewhere with many pedestrians.

Re: Police Say Video Shows Woman Stepped Suddenly in Front of Self-Driving Uber

#93

Post by Dylan16807 »

retsibsi wrote: post #78
Mantipath wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure. 3 MPH would have made a difference. So would 3 MPH less after that, and 3MPH more... heck, if it had been going 2 MPH total she'd probably be fine! In the aftermath of a front collision it would always have been safer if the car had been going slightly slower, regardless of the speed limit. The strangest part of watching this story unfold has been discovering that some people have faith that speed limits are an…

I see this attitude a lot, but it seems strange to me. Of course any hard line will be somewhat arbitrary, but we need to draw hard lines if we want unambiguous, consistently enforceable laws. What's special about speed limits that makes it okay to ignore them? To me they seem analogous to age-of-consent laws, which of course are not perfectly chosen for every individual -- and of course there's no magical change tha…

It's analogous to that, except that speed limits very reliably take the reasonable-balance number and then drop it several mph. It's a feedback loop, where people drive faster and limits are set with driving faster in mind.

Re: Police Say Video Shows Woman Stepped Suddenly in Front of Self-Driving Uber

#94

Post by phkahler »

dwighttk wrote: post #85

It is astonishing how many conflicting bits of information are slowly trickling out about this person's death.

Especially when there is video of it. Please tell me there is dashcam footage, since that's the first thing that should be available as evidence with a self-driving car.

Re: Police Say Video Shows Woman Stepped Suddenly in Front of Self-Driving Uber

#95

Post by DoreenMichele »

daodedickinson wrote: post #90

If this car hit a woman coming from so far on the other side of the street, how are they going to deal with suicides? A coworker was driving home once when a man jumped out in front of her van and she barely stopped in time. He started whomping on her driver's side window screaming "Why didn't you hit me?!?!" again and again. She quickly got away and tried to come up with an explanation for her kids and called 911.

I don't think we can really know whether or not this incident was a suicide.

Re: Police Say Video Shows Woman Stepped Suddenly in Front of Self-Driving Uber

#96

Post by tintor »

Zitrax wrote: post #72
CobrastanJorji wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Per this old article from 2016, yes: https://medium.com/waymo/sounds-of-the-self-driving-car-c26f...

The culture of using the horn differs a lot between countries. Would they use locale aware honk schemes? And similarly are self driving cars listening? Will they detect emergency vehicles by the sirens, or even listen to other cars honking at them?

Emergency and police vehicles by sirens yes, but likely not other cars.

Re: Police Say Video Shows Woman Stepped Suddenly in Front of Self-Driving Uber

#97

Post by nathanielc »

Taniwha wrote: post #71
danso wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, to me, this is the most relevant part of the posted article: > “It’s possible that Uber’s automated driving system did not detect the pedestrian, did not classify her as a pedestrian, or did not predict her departure from the median,” Smith said in an email. “I don’t know whether these steps occurred too late to prevent or lessen the collision or whether they never occurred at all, but the lack of braking or swe…

it could be that they never saw someone pushing a bike across a road in tests before, maybe it confused that with someone riding on the road at a different angle

If either of those two cases is true, then the AI is not ready to be driving on public roads.

Re: Police Say Video Shows Woman Stepped Suddenly in Front of Self-Driving Uber

#98

Post by lhorie »

danso wrote: post #44

The NYT just published a graphic that purports to show the location of the vehicle and the victim: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/03/20/us/self-drivi... This is the first report I've seen that indicates the Uber AV was in the right lane. Remember that the victim was crossing from left to right, and that all of the visible damage on the AV is on the right-side bumper. It's very hard to imagine a scenario in…

> Elaine Herzberg was struck while walking her bike across the street somewhere in this area

How do I know this graphic isn't entirely speculative?

Re: Police Say Video Shows Woman Stepped Suddenly in Front of Self-Driving Uber

#100

Post by mirimir »

danso wrote: post #88
mirimir wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, so now she's crossing three lanes. So that's about 9 meters. At 1-3 meters per second for her, and 17 meters/second for the Uber SUV, it should have seen her 3-9 seconds (50-150 meters) before impact. That's a pretty clear fail. I wonder what the Uber's field of view is. At what distance should it have detected stuff about 9 meters off track? But she did likely walk out from landscaping. So perhaps she initial…

> That's a pretty clear fail. And yet the police were so quick to say that camera footage indicates that Uber was likely not at fault. It was so quick that it makes me inclined to think it's pretty obvious. However, after the SF Chronicle published its exclusive interview with the Tempe's chief of police, the Tempe Police PR person had to issue a statement that, "Tempe Police Department does not determine fault in ve…

It's probably just PR.
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