Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Tesla issues strongest statement yet blaming driver for deadly crash

abc7news.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

241–250 of 850 posts

Re: Tesla issues strongest statement yet blaming driver for deadly crash

#241

Post by chaboud »

semi-extrinsic wrote: post #162
chaboud wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, to be fair, if someone in the US is able to find a running Renault that can go faster than 30mph under its own power, it's pretty exceptional. I think that Tesla's response is tone-deaf and ill-advised. I'm not presently a Tesla shareholder, but I do have a Model 3 reservation coming up soon. Guess which one of those this public statement makes me want to change...

I think this classic Renault will do a little over 30mph. https://www.hemmings.com/classifieds/cars-for-sale/renault/r...

There was one of these tooling around the campsites at Le Mans a few years ago (probably there every year). Lamborghinis, Ferraris, TVRs. No. The R5 Turbo got all of the crowds. It was awesome.

Nonetheless, I haven’t seen a Renault in the US, in person, in a few years.

Re: Tesla issues strongest statement yet blaming driver for deadly crash

#242

Post by empath75 »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #14
eridius wrote: post #8

I have to wonder why Tesla keeps doubling down on victim-blaming. Is this a case of Elon Musk being insecure about criticism (since he's demonstrated a tendency in the past to react poorly to it)? Or is Tesla trying to actually lower their legal liability? Edit: To clarify, in most of these crashes, it's usually a combination of Tesla's fault and the driver's fault. Which is to say, the driver could have avoided the…

Tesla is exerting and reinforcing that it is not liable for poor driver decisions. If you use any vehicle safety aid while not paying attention, and you die or kill someone while in control of the vehicle, that is your liability. Whether they call their system "Autopilot" is immaterial. You are the responsibly party as the driver, and this is made clear both at purchase time and during vehicle use.

If your brakes fail on a new car, are you responsible?

Re: Tesla issues strongest statement yet blaming driver for deadly crash

#243

Post by thebluehawk »

ansible wrote: post #212
frafra wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Radar is not active if the speed is higher than a specific threshold; it seems it is written in the manual.

> Radar is not active if the speed is higher than a specific threshold; it looks like it is written on the manual. I'm having trouble understanding why that would be the case. Why anyone wouldn't want the radar active when going down the highway. It is not as if it doesn't work at highway speed...

That's because he is wrong. The radar is active at all speeds. In my experience, the radar basically only identifies cars and car shaped objects.

Re: Tesla issues strongest statement yet blaming driver for deadly crash

#244

Post by whistlerbrk »

txcwpalpha wrote: post #59

I used to be in awe of Teslas and I have always been a big fan of Musk, and even after the crash I still imagined myself one day buying a Tesla. But after this response, I've completely lost respect for the company, for Musk, and I don't think I'll ever buy one or advocate for someone buying one. The driver had previously reported to Tesla 7 to 10 times that there was an issue with autopilot, but Tesla told him "no t…

> The driver had previously reported to Tesla 7 to 10 times

I understand this is not a popular opinion on news forums anywhere nor do I write this to absolve in my view Tesla of their poor response nor of their poor choice in naming the system 'autopilot' to start.

But at what point does corporate or government responsibility end and personal responsibility start? If I knew something didn't work and that something could kill me and had reported the issue 7 to 10 times, I would be watching, like a hawk for the issue to recur, or more likely just not using it at all.

People have this insane idea that just because something isn't their fault they don't have to take corrective action in order to avoid the consequences. It is better to be alive than to be correct.

Re: Tesla issues strongest statement yet blaming driver for deadly crash

#245

Post by empath75 »

ajross wrote: post #7
otalp wrote: post #2

Full statement: "We are very sorry for the family's loss. According to the family, Mr. Huang was well aware that Autopilot was not perfect and, specifically, he told them it was not reliable in that exact location, yet he nonetheless engaged Autopilot at that location. The crash happened on a clear day with several hundred feet of visibility ahead, which means that the only way for this accident to have occurred is i…

I'm normally an automation booster, but this is the wrong PR take for sure. I mean, to take this at face value it sounds like Tesla is saying its autopilot doesn't actually work and that if you don't continue to drive your car you're going to die. Maybe that will work in court, but it's not going to sell a lot of cars. I mean... clearly (hopefully) this isn't the attitude being exhibited inside the company. We all kn…

You’re going to die and Tesla is going to issue a press release saying that it’s your fault.

Re: Tesla issues strongest statement yet blaming driver for deadly crash

#246

Post by kzrdude »

Phrodo_00 wrote: post #193
tathastu wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tesla's autopilot page ( https://www.tesla.com/autopilot ) says (as of today): Full Self-Driving Hardware on All Cars All Tesla vehicles produced in our factory, including Model 3, have the hardware needed for full self-driving capability at a safety level substantially greater than that of a human driver.

While it might imply otherwise, the message is clear about the _hardware_ being ready for self-driving. That doesn't mean the car is capable of self-driving in general.

Doesn't help, the message they are sending are misleading customers and that's irresponsible.

Re: Tesla issues strongest statement yet blaming driver for deadly crash

#247

Post by Ryudas »

Dwolb wrote: post #117
tc wrote: post #18

Tesla probably shouldn't be saying anything about this at all, even just to avoid giving it more news cycles. But if they were going to say something, here's what they should have said the first time. ---- We take great care in building our cars to save lives. Forty thousands Americans die on the roads each year. That's a statistic. But even a single death of a Tesla driver or passenger is a tragedy. This has affecte…

Tesla need to stop calling it 'Autopilot'. The name implies drivers don't need to drive and is most likely a big reason drivers are lured into a false sense of security.

I find this argument so often. Autopilot has never been a term for autonomous, just as its used in aviation. Just because people don't know the proper term or have an erroneous idea of the term, doesn't mean tesla has to have the burden of people misinterpreting what it says.

Re: Tesla issues strongest statement yet blaming driver for deadly crash

#248

Post by cdancette »

patcheudor wrote: post #107
tc wrote: post #18

Tesla probably shouldn't be saying anything about this at all, even just to avoid giving it more news cycles. But if they were going to say something, here's what they should have said the first time. ---- We take great care in building our cars to save lives. Forty thousands Americans die on the roads each year. That's a statistic. But even a single death of a Tesla driver or passenger is a tragedy. This has affecte…

>t's a tool to help attentive drivers avoid accidents that might have otherwise occurred. This needs far more discussion. I just don't buy it. I don't believe that you can have a car engaged in auto-drive mode and remain attentive. I think our psychology won't allow it. When driving, I find that I must be engaged and on long trips I don't even enable cruise control because taking the accelerator input away from me is…

For me it's the opposite. I feel like with cruise control on, I'm much more attentive to the road and the surroundings and feel much safer.

It really annoys me when I have to constantly look at the speed to avoid getting above the limit and it is very tiring for long drives.

Re: Tesla issues strongest statement yet blaming driver for deadly crash

#249

Post by almost_usual »

fapjacks wrote: post #155
patcheudor wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>t's a tool to help attentive drivers avoid accidents that might have otherwise occurred. This needs far more discussion. I just don't buy it. I don't believe that you can have a car engaged in auto-drive mode and remain attentive. I think our psychology won't allow it. When driving, I find that I must be engaged and on long trips I don't even enable cruise control because taking the accelerator input away from me is…

I have to preface my post to say that I think developing self-driving automobiles is so important that it's worth the implied cost of potentially tens of thousands of lives in order to perfect the technology, because that's what people do; make sacrifices to improve the world we live in so that future generations don't have to know the same problem. But I think you're right. I think the "best" way to move forward unt…

> I have to preface my post to say that I think developing self-driving automobiles is so important that it's worth the implied cost of potentially tens of thousands of lives in order to perfect the technology, because that's what people do; make sacrifices to improve the world we live in so that future generations don't have to know the same problem.

I generally agree with this philosophy but this is very optimistic, at least in the United States. This is a country where we can't even ban assault rifles let alone people from driving their own vehicles. You're going to see people drive their own vehicles for a very long time even if self driving technology is perfected.

Re: Tesla issues strongest statement yet blaming driver for deadly crash

#250

Post by brewdad »

greglindahl wrote: post #151
SilasX wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"And furthermore, here is why we don't see fit to stop using the name Autopilot, even as we recognize that false sense of security it implies to the average person: ..."

Is there any evidence that this is an actual problem?

You don't think there's an implied difference between Autopilot vs a name like Driver Assist? Even Co-pilot would be be a better name as it implies an expectation that the driver is still ultimately responsible.
Post reply on HN