Tesla crash in September showed similarities to fatal Mountain View accident • Hacker News Board

Re: Tesla crash in September showed similarities to fatal Mountain View accident

#201

Post by namelost » Thu, Apr 05, 2018, 8:57 AM UTC

sho_hn wrote: post #148

icc97 wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Airline pilot training is designed to handle this, as well as they have a co-pilot who prevents them from being distracted and is able to take over if they are distracted. Tesla is just handing it out to anyone who can afford to buy a Model S/X (and now Model 3) with the absolute minimum of warnings that they can get away with.

I would not be surprised if Musk coldly responded that this is a known problem with no solution, but autopilot still lowers the death rate on average. In other words, for the proponents it's a trade-off. And also the idea that an automatic driver is easier to improve over time (skewing the trade-off better and better) than human drivers. Which of course will snowball when reliance on automation keeps making drivers w…

A high rate of road deaths isn't a fait accompli. Musk would have us believe that technology is the only answer.

The UK has the 2nd-lowest rate of road deaths in the world (after Sweden).

The roads in the UK are not intrinsically safe, they are very narrow both in urban and rural areas which means there are more hazards and less time to avoid them.

However, the UK has strict driver education programme. It is not easy to pass the driving test, with some people failing multiple times. It means that people only get a license when they are ready for it. Drink-driving will also get you a prison sentence and a driving ban.

Re: Tesla crash in September showed similarities to fatal Mountain View accident

#202

Post by jk563 » Thu, Apr 05, 2018, 8:58 AM UTC

m_mueller wrote: post #140

roenxi wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not reading a position in what you've said, but there is an observation here to draw out for the crowd. It doesn't matter all that much if after controlling for those variables it is relatively less safe; in absolute terms it just needs to be as safe as the worst human drivers. That is, we have an accepted safety standard - by definition, the worst human driver with a license. If a Tesla is safer than that, the r…

I don't agree with this position. Autopilot is a new thing that governments need to decide whether it's allowed or not (since it is operating dangerous equipment, so the state has an interest in doing the right thing). If improved safety is not a demonstrably valid argument for allowing it, it IMO doesn't pass the bar for what should be allowed. At that point it's purely a money-grabber from corporations that want th…

What about if it could pass a driving test?

Re: Tesla crash in September showed similarities to fatal Mountain View accident

#203

Post by taneq » Thu, Apr 05, 2018, 9:01 AM UTC

bobsil1 wrote: post #3

Gore point stripe faded: https://imgur.com/a/xHq57 Street View: https://www.google.com/maps/@37.6346515,-122.104109,3a,75y,8...

It seems pretty consistent in the other videos they're showing, too. The left-hand lane marking splits into two lines ahead of the gore point. If the further of those two lines from the car is significantly stronger than the other, then the car will choose that as its new 'left lane' (rather than always choosing the nearer one) and follow it straight into the gore point. I don't think this is a mysterious bug, so much as a significant corner case where their system fails.

Re: Tesla crash in September showed similarities to fatal Mountain View accident

#204

Post by antirez » Thu, Apr 05, 2018, 9:02 AM UTC

ChuckMcM wrote: post #17

I have now talked with two people who have autopilot in their model S's and both said the problem with autopilot is that it is "too good". Specifically it works completely correctly like 80 - 90% of the time and as a result, if you use it a lot, you start to expect it to be working and not fail. If it beeps then to tell you to take over, you have to mentally get back into the situational awareness of the road and the…

"too good" -> "completely correctly like 80 - 90%". I'm unable to make the two sentences make sense in the same statement, since 85% looks extremely low to be considered too good, given that the outcome is to crash if you do not pay attention in the 15%.

Re: Tesla crash in September showed similarities to fatal Mountain View accident

#205

Post by cm2187 » Thu, Apr 05, 2018, 9:03 AM UTC

rypskar wrote: post #181

cm2187 wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s a good point. Not just airbags. It starts to be common to have cars that apply the brakes automatically when they anticipate a collision. I think some research has been done on cars being designed to do less damage to a pedestrian in a collision, I don’t know if it has lead to design changes. Self driving cars may end up being only marginally safer than other new cars. But safety is not in my opinion the main…

>>Convenience and maximisation of traffic are I think the convenience will mean more traffic since many who now use public transport will use their self driving car instead. So in total autopilots could be worse for the environment and require even more roads

I agree with the traffic increasing, though as we are moving toward electric cars, not sure this is an environment problem. At least not an environment problem in big cities.

Re: Tesla crash in September showed similarities to fatal Mountain View accident

#206

Post by YetAnotherNick » Thu, Apr 05, 2018, 9:04 AM UTC

icc97 wrote: post #111

tlrobinson wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Relevant quote from an article about the Air France 447 crash: > To put it briefly, automation has made it more and more unlikely that ordinary airline pilots will ever have to face a raw crisis in flight—but also more and more unlikely that they will be able to cope with such a crisis if one arises. https://www.vanityfair.com/news/business/2014/10/air-france-... (linked to from another HN post today: https://news.yc…

Airline pilot training is designed to handle this, as well as they have a co-pilot who prevents them from being distracted and is able to take over if they are distracted. Tesla is just handing it out to anyone who can afford to buy a Model S/X (and now Model 3) with the absolute minimum of warnings that they can get away with.

I don't remember the source, but I have read somewhere that it is very lightly enforced in a plane and many pilots sleep in the plane for a long time.

Re: Tesla crash in September showed similarities to fatal Mountain View accident

#207

Post by YetAnotherNick » Thu, Apr 05, 2018, 9:06 AM UTC

antirez wrote: post #204

ChuckMcM wrote: post #17

I have now talked with two people who have autopilot in their model S's and both said the problem with autopilot is that it is "too good". Specifically it works completely correctly like 80 - 90% of the time and as a result, if you use it a lot, you start to expect it to be working and not fail. If it beeps then to tell you to take over, you have to mentally get back into the situational awareness of the road and the…

"too good" -> "completely correctly like 80 - 90%". I'm unable to make the two sentences make sense in the same statement, since 85% looks extremely low to be considered too good, given that the outcome is to crash if you do not pay attention in the 15%.

Some people do it. Think of it as 0-100 scale, 0 useless, 100 making no mistake ever, and not as some percent of correct action.

Re: Tesla crash in September showed similarities to fatal Mountain View accident

#208

Post by jaggederest » Thu, Apr 05, 2018, 9:08 AM UTC

namelost wrote: post #201

sho_hn wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would not be surprised if Musk coldly responded that this is a known problem with no solution, but autopilot still lowers the death rate on average. In other words, for the proponents it's a trade-off. And also the idea that an automatic driver is easier to improve over time (skewing the trade-off better and better) than human drivers. Which of course will snowball when reliance on automation keeps making drivers w…

A high rate of road deaths isn't a fait accompli. Musk would have us believe that technology is the only answer. The UK has the 2nd-lowest rate of road deaths in the world (after Sweden). The roads in the UK are not intrinsically safe, they are very narrow both in urban and rural areas which means there are more hazards and less time to avoid them. However, the UK has strict driver education programme. It is not easy…

> The roads in the UK are not intrinsically safe, they are very narrow both in urban and rural areas which means there are more hazards and less time to avoid them.

Actually, paradoxically that means they are actually safer. People drive slower on narrower roads, which means that accidents are within the safe energy envelope that modern cars can absorb.

Very, very few people will ever die as a passenger or driver in a car accident at 25 mph / 40 kph. At 65mph / 100kph, the story is completely different.

Re: Tesla crash in September showed similarities to fatal Mountain View accident

#209

Post by Confusion » Thu, Apr 05, 2018, 9:09 AM UTC

icc97 wrote: post #111

tlrobinson wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Relevant quote from an article about the Air France 447 crash: > To put it briefly, automation has made it more and more unlikely that ordinary airline pilots will ever have to face a raw crisis in flight—but also more and more unlikely that they will be able to cope with such a crisis if one arises. https://www.vanityfair.com/news/business/2014/10/air-france-... (linked to from another HN post today: https://news.yc…

Airline pilot training is designed to handle this, as well as they have a co-pilot who prevents them from being distracted and is able to take over if they are distracted. Tesla is just handing it out to anyone who can afford to buy a Model S/X (and now Model 3) with the absolute minimum of warnings that they can get away with.

> Airline pilot training is designed to handle this

It is certainly designed to do that, but even for airline pilots there are limits to what is possible.

You cannot train a human to react within 1ms; that's just physiologically impossible. Nor can you train a human to fully comprehend a situation within x ms, where x depends on the situation.

So the autopilot would have to warn a human say 2x ms before an event that requires attention, where it can of course not yet know of the event, so that amounts to 'any time there could possibly be an event 2x ms in the projected future'. Which is probably: most of the time. Making the autopilot useless.

Re: Tesla crash in September showed similarities to fatal Mountain View accident

#210

Post by EnderMB » Thu, Apr 05, 2018, 9:11 AM UTC

namelost wrote: post #201

sho_hn wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would not be surprised if Musk coldly responded that this is a known problem with no solution, but autopilot still lowers the death rate on average. In other words, for the proponents it's a trade-off. And also the idea that an automatic driver is easier to improve over time (skewing the trade-off better and better) than human drivers. Which of course will snowball when reliance on automation keeps making drivers w…

A high rate of road deaths isn't a fait accompli. Musk would have us believe that technology is the only answer. The UK has the 2nd-lowest rate of road deaths in the world (after Sweden). The roads in the UK are not intrinsically safe, they are very narrow both in urban and rural areas which means there are more hazards and less time to avoid them. However, the UK has strict driver education programme. It is not easy…

As someone that has been caught speeding, it's also worth mentioning that one of the big reasons why the UK has improved its road safety statistics is a reasonably new initiative where you get an option on your first offence to either take the points on your license or to attend a safety workshop.

IIRC, the workshop was about three hours, but it was surprisingly useful. The instructors treated you like adults and not children or criminals, and they gave fairly useful tips on driving and looking out for things like lights suddenly changing, ensuring you are in the right gear, how you're supposed to react if an emergency vehicle wants you to go forward when you're by a set of traffic lights with a camera, etc.

However, on the drink driving front, given the news with Ant from Ant and Dec I think it's safe to assume that not everyone gets a prison sentence for drink driving.