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An Update on Last Week’s Accident

tesla.com

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Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#341

Post by TAForObvReasons »

Arnt wrote: post #334
TAForObvReasons wrote: post #315

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

The expectation is simple: value human life. Don't try to do beta tests and simultaneously market it as if it's production quality. Accidents happen, but own up to them; don't immediately and fervently insist that you were not at fault before the investigation even starts.

It may be easy to casually update software and break builds, but when human lives are at risk a healthy dose of conservatism is appropriate.

But you're right -- it's probably unfair to expect a SV company to prioritize anything over profits (we saw that with Facebook, right?)

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#342

Post by Arnt »

skywhopper wrote: post #331
Arnt wrote: post #297

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 th…

I've heard that before and it still sounds puzzling... Elon Musk has an ego the size of Mars, right? So he wants to sell autopilot-equipped cars to everyone, and his basis for comparison is everyone.

(Last posting from me today.)

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#343

Post by tptacek »

According to the IIHS, which is sponsored by insurance companies and rates cars for safety, for models years 2009-2012, the following cars have had zero fatalities:

* Kia Sorento

* Lexus RX 350

* Subaru Legacy

* Mercedes Benz GL

* Audi A4 4WD

* Honda Odyssey

* Toyota Highlander

* Toyota Sequoia

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#344

Post by jehlakj »

I find it terrifying how auto pilot cars give the driver a false sense of security. When a car has statistically proven claim that it is safe, drivers are more likely to have less focus on the car. It’s like comparing reaction times of a manually driving individual to that of a passenger. What seems to be 6 seconds may in reality feel like a split second due to the lack of context. I want to say that there are overhead costs to getting back into driving mode when you haven’t been fully aware of your surroundings. This happens with a much lesser degree when I’m using cruise control, but I still avoid it when there is a fair number of cars on the road.

If I have to be well aware of the warnings that the system puts out, I might as well stick to no auto pilot. The chances are low, but any chance is enough to keep me from using it. the roads are designed for humans after all.

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#345

Post by airstrike »

emiliobumachar wrote: post #263
andrewstuart2 wrote: post #5

Really not much additional info here aside from the number of warnings the driver had. Also, the standard "Tesla is 10x safer" metrics that get pulled out each time a crash gets sensationalized. What I think they fail to address, especially in this case, is that the autopilot did something a human driver who was paying attention would never do. Autopilot does a great job of saving people from things even a wary drive…

"the autopilot did something a human driver who was paying attention would never do" "this isn't an average accident statistic, a lapse in attention or evasive maneuvering. " "That's not a mistake a healthy human will make." Almost every driver thinks they're significantly better than average. Few are. If a human driver's lapse of attention causes a similar crash, how much less of a tragedy is it just because we can…

> Almost every driver thinks they’re significantly better than average. Few are.

Actually, about half of drivers are better than average.

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#346

Post by lettergram »

jakewins wrote: post #320
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…

> Don't tell us how safe Tesla's are compared to the entire US driving population: Tell us how safe they are compared to equivalent vehicles from other manufacturers. I'm having a hard time to find an exact number comparison, but: - Tesla claims 1 fatality per 320M miles Compared to - A 2015 study of 2011 model year vehicles showed, for instance, Volvo XC90 had never been involved in a driver fatality (1) - There are…

Probably should also note, that the average Tesla driver is likely male, has money (i.e. more risk taking), etc. Essentially, compare to sports cars as opposed to high end vehicles.

They we're originally advertised as sports cars really. 0 to 60 faster than any other car, etc.

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#347

Post by aoeusnth1 »

jakewins wrote: post #320
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…

> Don't tell us how safe Tesla's are compared to the entire US driving population: Tell us how safe they are compared to equivalent vehicles from other manufacturers. I'm having a hard time to find an exact number comparison, but: - Tesla claims 1 fatality per 320M miles Compared to - A 2015 study of 2011 model year vehicles showed, for instance, Volvo XC90 had never been involved in a driver fatality (1) - There are…

Eh, you can't cherry pick specific (model, year) combinations after the fact without overfitting. You expect some variation in deaths per (model, year) and by searching for the least deadly ones, you'll dramatically influence your estimate simply because you used a maximizing search instead of a broad survey of a-priori safe models.

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#348

Post by thebruce87m »

mentos wrote: post #314

I wonder if Tesla can recreate the crash environment given the data captured from their sensors to reproduce the failure in a simulation? See this article about a company attempting to do this in Unreal Engine 4 https://www.unrealengine.com/en-US/blog/51vr-crafts-photorea... Imagine a future where every car uploads their sensor data to reconstruct a growing 3D model of the road network. Using this network AI can simu…

I would hope the serious players are already doing this.

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#349

Post by blarneystun »

TwoBit wrote: post #132
tuna-piano wrote: post #37

Their statement blames: -The driver -The crushed barrier -Statistics But they do not take responsibility themselves. It's apparent and in my opinion shameful. If Tesla's goal of this is to just share the facts, why didn't they state what AutoPilot did? In addition to statements like "...the driver’s hands were not detected on the wheel for six seconds prior to the collision.", wouldn't it make sense to have a stateme…

What you are asking them to do is legal suicide. If they were to claim this was their fault, they would be immediately slapped with multi-million dollar lawsuits from everybody who ever had a problem with auto pilot. It would end the company.

Really? I don't think so. It's not like a "confession".

Can't people sue them even without their admission of any responsibility whatsoever? I think so.

And that they simply say: "We are sorry, we take full responsibility." does not open them up to lawsuits -- the courts still have to hear the arguments to back up "actual legal liability" and then adjudicate / elaborate a verdict / judgement, right?

Comments from lawyers, please. Very interesting.

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#350

Post by bluetwo »

wilun wrote: post #298
jVinc wrote: post #159

I really hate the whole Tesla angle of "technically we are not lying but we know people are going to mis-remember and misrepresent what we are writing". Take for instance: > The driver had received several visual and one audible hands-on warning earlier in the drive... What this means is that during this incident there were No visual or audible clues that a crash was about to happen What they are saying is that while…

Tesla always blame the "driver" (and publicly so, nonetheless) when they are killed by their "autopilot" (which is actually driving, that is fulfilling the purpose indicated by its name, despite being not very good at it...) -- either directly, or by carefully stating misleading statements that are both technically correct and incredibly dishonest in the context of both the events and the surrounding text. Why people…

I think the regulations will come soon enough. Tesla, Uber, etc are trying to get as many miles booked as possible before this happens.
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