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Why collision avoidance is harder for an AI-based system

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Re: Why collision avoidance is harder for an AI-based system

#71

Post by Gibbon1 »

hangonhn wrote: post #44

Hang on. That argument makes no sense. We've had subsumption architecture for a long time now( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subsumption_architecture ). Subsumption architecture puts some of the intelligence in the lower level systems. While the higher level controls can tell the lower level systems what it wants, it can't do things that the lower system determines is dangerous. So if a normal Mercedez has a collisio…

That sort of thing is common in industrial controls. Start the big ass air compressor and if the oil pressure doesn't hit 100 psig in five seconds the interlock trips. That's handled by a controller on the pump itself.

Also really common or required that the interlock be totally separate from the control system.

Re: Why collision avoidance is harder for an AI-based system

#72

Post by daveguy »

jvanderbot wrote: post #53
icc97 wrote: post #17

> Also, lets back up our AI’s with old school collision avoidance! Intelligence is not the same as perfection, at least for now. The car was travelling at 38mph and never braked. Even if the collision-avoidance only saw it at the last moment it would still have braked and potentially slowed the car enough so that the woman was injured instead of being killed. I'm all for self-driving and fully believe it can improve…

This is absolutely a case where an autonomous system should have out-performed a manned system. Lasers see through darkness very well. A camera-only system is insufficient.

Not to mention it wasn't even very dark on the road. If you look at other video and images, that stretch is very well lit. The dash cam video was poorly calibrated / selected (but probably not used in the decision process of the AI).

Re: Why collision avoidance is harder for an AI-based system

#73

Post by TTPrograms »

jfrankamp wrote: post #58
saetaes wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Doesn’t the author recommend exactly that in the last sentence of the article?

Yes. For new readers, suggestion for this article: start with the last sentence. Then skim the article re AI. Then respond. So we don't have to keep saying/hearing "Why not both?". The author's take is: both!

But let's make sure that the definition of AI doesn't encompass this because...?

Re: Why collision avoidance is harder for an AI-based system

#75

Post by magoon »

Unpopular question but here goes:

What if some crashes are unavoidable? e.g. somebody darts out in front of a mobile vehicle. We accept that trains are not at fault for striking “trespassers” on their railways.

Also, when we all drive cars with collision avoidance systems, who gets sued by whom? If my car e-brakes for no reason and I get rear-ended, is the guy who hits me still at fault like usual?

I believe computer control will be super helpful and is here to stay, but it’s interesting to see it implemented in cars as emergency help versus in modern commercial airliners (where autopilot and landing control systems are ubiquitous) when it is only relied on for the most routine and straight-shot ability.

Re: Why collision avoidance is harder for an AI-based system

#76

Post by ams6110 »

jmalicki wrote: post #61
jdmichal wrote: post #2

> AI is not preprogrammed to monitor a known input from a sensor to take a predefined action. I guess one of my outstanding questions, which reading this only confirmed, is why this is the case? I mean, humans are pretty good examples of intelligence. And yet we still have and use these anti-collision systems. Because, in the end, when wrong decisions are made these systems save lives. Why would AI-driven vehicles no…

" I mean, are we going to also remove ABS, because the AI could learn to modulate the brakes itself?" I think that's a reasonable definition of ABS - an AI (in most cases for ABS, an expert system AI) that knows how to best mediate the brakes, with levels of performance that exceed the vast majority of humans.

The conventional ABS system is not AI in any sense. It is a few sensors and maybe some look up tables of what to do under various speed / brake pressure / wheel rotation situations

Re: Why collision avoidance is harder for an AI-based system

#77

Post by Karlozkiller »

Retric wrote: post #66
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Integrating AI with a subsumption architecture sounds interesting but could still not work. You would be abstracting a lot of details (as well as potential action) from the training process, so the overall result you get still might not work. Training on everything might actually yield a better result. Does anyone know how iRobot (Brooks' company) does it?

The AI can still drive the car normally, the only thing that changes is it's prevented from running into another car at full speed. Which is no worse than having drivers override the system forcing a disengagement.

Yes, as long as you add a huge penalty to the training algorithm for triggering any underlying safety system I see no problem in that. (Otherwise I can see a completely mad car that believes everything is safe as it never crashes even when reckless )

Re: Why collision avoidance is harder for an AI-based system

#78

Post by jsjohnst »

magoon wrote: post #75

Unpopular question but here goes: What if some crashes are unavoidable? e.g. somebody darts out in front of a mobile vehicle. We accept that trains are not at fault for striking “trespassers” on their railways. Also, when we all drive cars with collision avoidance systems, who gets sued by whom? If my car e-brakes for no reason and I get rear-ended, is the guy who hits me still at fault like usual? I believe computer…

> If my car e-brakes for no reason and I get rear-ended, is the guy who hits me still at fault like usual?

What’s different about your SDC slamming on its brakes vs you doing the same thing? That’s why the law says how much spacing is to be between cars!

> What if some crashes are unavoidable?

From all evidence which is publicly available at this time, it appears this accident was anything but unavoidable, so the question is a red herring.

Re: Why collision avoidance is harder for an AI-based system

#79

Post by pj_mukh »

hangonhn wrote: post #44

Hang on. That argument makes no sense. We've had subsumption architecture for a long time now( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subsumption_architecture ). Subsumption architecture puts some of the intelligence in the lower level systems. While the higher level controls can tell the lower level systems what it wants, it can't do things that the lower system determines is dangerous. So if a normal Mercedez has a collisio…

Very true. Which is why I'm still waiting for what happened to all the lower level safety systems, presumably driven by lighting invariant LIDAR or RADAR systems, in the Uber situation.

The article kind of mentions: "cyclist detection from 3D point cloud is much harder task than cyclist detection from an image"

The system didn't need to know that it was a "cyclist". There was something there, in its path. Stop.

Re: Why collision avoidance is harder for an AI-based system

#80

Post by couchand »

ltrcola wrote: post #67
icc97 wrote: post #17

> Also, lets back up our AI’s with old school collision avoidance! Intelligence is not the same as perfection, at least for now. The car was travelling at 38mph and never braked. Even if the collision-avoidance only saw it at the last moment it would still have braked and potentially slowed the car enough so that the woman was injured instead of being killed. I'm all for self-driving and fully believe it can improve…

Humans can't properly detect the most vulnerable users in all conditions. Not an excuse for this system failing to perform, but all self-driving cars have to do is be a little bit better for net safety to improve. People are notoriously unreliable. Computers don't get drunk or sleepy, for instance.

> all self-driving cars have to do is be a little bit better for net safety to improve.

That's true abstractly but ignores several important real-world factors about the adoption of self-driving cars.

On the one had, autonomous cars have to be a lot better than humans to prevent these sorts of PR trash can fires or they won't be given the opportunity to improve net safety.

On the other hand, people are so bad that we're liable to soon live in a world of autonomous cars, regardless of the effect on net safety.

I hope they can be made safe, because it's vital for the future of our car-obsessed culture. But I don't have as much faith as you.

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