An Update on Last Week’s Accident • Hacker News Board

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#331

Post by skywhopper » Sat, Mar 31, 2018, 3:38 PM UTC

Arnt wrote: post #297

pja wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And no, you can't get out of culpability by claiming statistical superiority. Quite. Tesla is deliberately comparing their modern vehicle design & wealthy driver base (statistically one of the safest cohorts) with the entirety of the U.S. driving population. This is bad statistics: We expect Tesla vehicles to have far fewer accidents than the mean US vehicle per mile, because Tesla's are expensive modern vehicles wit…

Do you expect 370% above average for any cohort? That's amazingly amazing. That must mean that some other cohorts are correspondingly far below the average, what are they?

Less rich people, less healthy, driving smaller, older, less well maintained, less safely designed cars in more dangerous/remote locations. That’s a bunch of factors contributing to safety or lack thereof. Vehicle age alone is a huge factor in safety. Even the likelihood the driver and passengers are wearing a seatbelt is likely vastly different between Teslas vs all cars on the road. All those factors add up.

But that’s not even the point. The point is that the numbers Tesla gave are meaningless. Tesla’s stats would only be meaningful if you compared them to similarly sized/priced cars of the same age cohort with the same market segment. The fact that Tesla compares its luxury high-priced large sedans to all cars and not its own segment is itself very telling. They have those stats, and they would use them if they were compelling.

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#332

Post by learnstats2 » Sat, Mar 31, 2018, 3:43 PM UTC

dghughes wrote: post #312

pja wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Firstly, wealthy drivers can afford to keep their cars in better shape and can afford better cars in the first place. Neither of these factors depend on self-driving technology. Secondly, Tesla themselves makes it clear that their self-driving can't be relied upon to driver the car unsupervised - the driver has to be paying attention at all times in case the Tesla self-driving code decides to do something catastrophi…

> Wealth correlates with health correlates with better reaction times & general fitness. But at some point between wealthy and rich the person hires a (non-wealthy) driver and now they're back to square one.

Wealthy people can better control the quality of the driver.

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#333

Post by nugi » Sat, Mar 31, 2018, 3:44 PM UTC

datamingle wrote: post #144

oldgradstudent wrote: post #63

In keeping with the "Autopilot" terminology, this was "Controlled Flight info Terrain". Tesla demonstrates their usual abuse of statistics. 1.25 fatalities per 100 million miles is the average across all types of terrain, conditions, and cars. The death rate in rural roads is much higher than in urban areas. The death rate on highways is much lower than average. The death rate with new cars is much lower than average…

It is only dangerous, if it is worse than the average driver.

No, it is still killing people, but average people are cuppable. Big difference.

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#334

Post by Arnt » Sat, Mar 31, 2018, 3:44 PM UTC

TAForObvReasons wrote: post #315

scoggs wrote: post #309

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you. Do people really want Tesla to use another company's failure / worse #'s via statistics in their review of this accident? At least they are responsive, seemingly open, and seemingly empathetic. They are obviously handling things in a business first manner as corporations will but it hardly feels as inhuman as people seem to be making it out to be.

You forget the key rule: "Move fast and break things", including people and expectations of human decency

There's always someone who expects more. If you make a doodah that reduces (name something bad) by 30% someone will expect 40%, if it improves (name something good) by 50% someone will expect 60%, and by the way it costs too much, whatever it costs.

Name your expectations up front, please.

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#335

Post by tptacek » Sat, Mar 31, 2018, 3:46 PM UTC

kristianc wrote: post #180

pja wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And no, you can't get out of culpability by claiming statistical superiority. Quite. Tesla is deliberately comparing their modern vehicle design & wealthy driver base (statistically one of the safest cohorts) with the entirety of the U.S. driving population. This is bad statistics: We expect Tesla vehicles to have far fewer accidents than the mean US vehicle per mile, because Tesla's are expensive modern vehicles wit…

> Quite. Tesla is deliberately comparing their modern vehicle design & wealthy driver base (statistically one of the safest cohorts) with the entirety of the U.S. driving population. This is bad statistics: We expect Tesla vehicles to have far fewer accidents than the mean US vehicle per mile, because Tesla's are expensive modern vehicles with (relatively) wealthy drivers who can afford to keep them maintained & will…

For the same reason those drivers will pay less for car insurance for almost any car they buy: they are actuarially safer drivers.

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#336

Post by biktor_gj » Sat, Mar 31, 2018, 3:48 PM UTC

yougotit wrote: post #291

biktor_gj wrote: post #192

I don't care about Tesla at all, not a fan boy or anything, but I don't understand all the blaming on Tesla for this accident. So, the guy had complained 'between 7 and 10 times' about Autopilot malfunctioning there, yet he kept on using it Autopilot disengaged before the crash, giving visual and audible alerts before turning off, yet he didn't take the wheel, so he probably was doing something else instead of keepin…

Ha, you just fell for Tesla PR. Maybe you should read their statement again. It is gullible people like you that they create these misleading statements.

Not at all, and I assume they will be hiding as much as they can to avoid as many problems as they can, but that's not my point. If you have a problem with something, you don't keep playing with it when you know it's going to fail. My Philips TV turns on by itself at night. Instead of waking up at 3am to shut it down I power it down hard before going to bed instead of putting it on standby. The same way, if you know you have a problem with something that can kill you in some road you just don't keep using it "in case it does it right this time"... ...and in any case if you dont trust the system, you dont keep your hands off the steering wheel... (unless the guy had a heart attack or something just before the accident and that was why he didn't do anything, we're all assuming he was capable of driving but he might have lost conciussness or something , then autopilot disengaged, then the crash happened, but I don't know, and everything we can do is speculate...

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#337

Post by meganibla » Sat, Mar 31, 2018, 3:49 PM UTC

heavenlyblue wrote: post #266

leggomylibro wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Doesn't seem like a great idea. It would probably fall under the usual ~29/30 chance you wind up in the hospital with more problems instead of succeeding, and with all those lithium batteries you'd have a good chance of going out burning which I think most people would prefer to avoid. At that point, why not just drive off a cliff or find a tall building?

And besides, a car w/out an autopilot is probably easier to crash into a wall.

But no headlines and no expensive crash investigation.

Say you’re in the car business and you don’t like Tesla and say you want to find people who are suicidal or maybe have some kind of debt and you can help them as long as they help you. Their family will be taken care of as long as they crash their Tesla into a concrete divider.

I’m definitely not saying that’s what happened here but possible to imagine this scenario.

Hey even shorting the stock could make this worth someone’s while.

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#338

Post by nugi » Sat, Mar 31, 2018, 3:49 PM UTC

AKifer wrote: post #284

Humans do not understand such an arguments in such a situation. Hope you will do better business on Vulcan dear Tesla.

Watch that edge bud.

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#339

Post by nugi » Sat, Mar 31, 2018, 3:52 PM UTC

zadwang wrote: post #243

I just wouldn’t buy a Tesla at this point because: 1) the autopilot is not reliable. The accident shows clearly that it can dive straight into wrong path without giving warning. This is unacceptable, however small the probability. 2) the battery explosion is making the accident ever so dangerous. 3) Tesla’s response is disgusting. It may be true that statistically or on the average it is safer, but I am not a number.…

My ONLY reason I don't already own one (before recently) is their draconian anti-repair strategy, remote bricking, and other heavyhanded tactics against 'owners'. Apparently you are just paying for the privlige of borrowing one from tesla.

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#340

Post by ryandrake » Sat, Mar 31, 2018, 3:53 PM UTC

leereeves wrote: post #242

chris_t wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Wealth correlates with health correlates with better reaction times & general fitness I agree with your general point, but you can't just join up 2 correlations like that, that isn't always going to work when there are other confounding factors (and there always are). Wealth also correlates with age which anticorrelates with reaction times and general fitness.

According to insurance adjusters, age correlates with lower accident rates.

Lower accident rates, or a lower percentage of injury or fatal accidents? I find it hard to believe 80 year olds are getting into fewer accidents than 40 year olds unless it’s because they drive less frequently.