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Tesla in autopilot mode crashes into parked Laguna Beach police cruiser

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Re: Tesla in autopilot mode crashes into parked Laguna Beach police cruiser

#121

I keep wondering what the customer benefit of Level 2 autopilot is if not to lower your attention and relax your mind. Tesla's "out" is that drivers are supposed to retain full attention and oversight of the autopilot system -- but then if you strictly follow this rule, what is the benefit of autopilot? I can see the benefit to Tesla and future Tesla customers of essentially crowdsourced fleet learning. But what is t…

Yes. There is zero chance I'd use a system like this. Regular freeway driving is already boring enough that I worry about losing focus. (I supplement with things like caffeine and audiobooks.)

There's some threshold of interventions/minute that I think humans just aren't very good at. Which is why there are systems like Threat Image Projection, which turns baggage scanning into what is effectively a video game: https://www.rapiscansystems.com/en/products/rapiscan-threat-...

Re: Tesla in autopilot mode crashes into parked Laguna Beach police cruiser

#122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have full self driving hardware != full self driving software != full self driving capabilities. Auto pilot - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autopilot "An autopilot is a system used to control the trajectory of an aircraft without constant 'hands-on' control by a human operator being required. Autopilots do not replace human operators, but instead they assist them in controlling the aircraft. This allows them to focus…

Don't pretend that Tesla doesn't know exactly what people think when they hear "autopilot". It can be literally true and still deceptive marketing, like a jar of yogurt labeled "light" because it's lighter in color than the regular kind.

It is funny how rather than debating the point and relying on what words actually mean resolves to pedantry on hackernews.

Re: Tesla in autopilot mode crashes into parked Laguna Beach police cruiser

#123
post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> An autopilot maintains heading, and that's all. Aircraft autopilots can follow a flight plan, maintain an altitude or rate of climb/descent, do an instrument approach, and (using ADS-B) perform an automated avoidance maneuver when another aircraft is too close.

Some of them can. Others are no more than a gyroscope linked to the rudder.

Sure, but that's like pointing out that Toyota Corollas exist.

Re: Tesla in autopilot mode crashes into parked Laguna Beach police cruiser

#124

I keep wondering what the customer benefit of Level 2 autopilot is if not to lower your attention and relax your mind. Tesla's "out" is that drivers are supposed to retain full attention and oversight of the autopilot system -- but then if you strictly follow this rule, what is the benefit of autopilot? I can see the benefit to Tesla and future Tesla customers of essentially crowdsourced fleet learning. But what is t…

The benefit for Tesla would be selling more cars because people think they are getting a technology that isn't really ready but Tesla's claiming is (but also claiming not really, read the fine print).

Re: Tesla in autopilot mode crashes into parked Laguna Beach police cruiser

#125
post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The manufacturer puts a warning label, but the usage model/UI is clearly flawed. Not just the model/UI but the actual sensor suite. Remember, the Tesla that resulted in a decapitation had over-saturated cameras that couldn't see a tractor trailer. Of course, that's where the UI comes into play, because if the driver hadn't been watching Harry Potter, he would have seen the tractor trailer as well.

That's the thing, how do you make an UI that unambiguously conveys that the car hasn't seen an object in front of it, so that the driver can react to it? Maybe with AR the car could highlight the objects detected so that the driver can brake if the car doesn't see an object it knows about, but a head mounted display seems pretty clunky.

I think the idea is that the UI needs to force you to always pay attention.

Re: Tesla in autopilot mode crashes into parked Laguna Beach police cruiser

#126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't pretend that Tesla doesn't know exactly what people think when they hear "autopilot". It can be literally true and still deceptive marketing, like a jar of yogurt labeled "light" because it's lighter in color than the regular kind.

It is funny how rather than debating the point and relying on what words actually mean resolves to pedantry on hackernews.

Like how you're ignoring the repeated assertions that Tesla salespeople and Musk are misrepresenting or outright lying about the "autopilot's" capabilities?

If you want to debate the point, you can't just ignore all the parts that you inconveniently have no answer to.

Re: Tesla in autopilot mode crashes into parked Laguna Beach police cruiser

#127
post #66

Why they not partner with Google? I think they have much better talent pool at AI to handle this. I hope they are using all the crash data to make it more robust.

Because Google/Waymo is using lidar which adds ~$150K to the cost of the car.

I thought it was more the fact Elon didn't like the aesthetics of the roof equipment, like he's trying to design an automobile the same way Apple designs a laptop

Re: Tesla in autopilot mode crashes into parked Laguna Beach police cruiser

#129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So then we should ban cruise control too? No, we should educate people how to use new technologies properly.

If Tesla called Autopilot "cruise control with lane-keep assist", I think people would be a lot less likely to abuse it. By calling it Autopilot (and even letting people pay for "full self driving capability" in advance) is enticing people to use it dangerously.

First of all, they do call it that. There is no “turning on AutoPilot”. You turn on “traffic aware cruise control” and “Autosteer” separately. You can turn on TACC and not autosteer, or turn them both on, or drive yourself and switch between these modes very easily. Collectively the self driving features come in an “Enhanced Autopilot” package which you can purchase to have those individual features enabled.

Secondly, I have a Model 3. The idea that the name is misleading people is the dumbest thing i’ve ever heard. Even if people were confused, their confusion would be cleared up very quickly within a few days of use. When you pick up the car they talk to you extensively about what it can and can’t do, and there are many warnings in the car that explain it. People who make this argument probably haven’t tried using AutoPilot.

Put this is context. you can’t just release a perfect system on day 1. In order to get the software to that level earlier versions need to be seeded into the public. I am 100% convinced the software is a huge safety and convenience win as it is.

Re: Tesla in autopilot mode crashes into parked Laguna Beach police cruiser

#130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wrote the initial interface specification for the co-ordination system in Rio's open-pit mines. The mere fact that we were able to account for the state of every moving thing in the pit makes this a completely different proposition to self-driving vehicles in an uncontrolled real-world environment. At a guess it's at least ten to a hundred times easier.

Eventually this could be put into place in the broader traffic ecosystem - if all the cars on the road were required to have a transponder sort of arrangement on board, you could have a central point of control, and perhaps tie in people's phones etc to locate pedestrians. I do want to note that I am aware that there is an unfathomably large amount of complexity behind that however.

There's a movement towards this; look up "Vehicle-to-Everything" or "V2X". The idea is to enable things like one vehicle transmitting sensory information or intent to others around it, helping to prevent rear-end collisions, etc. My personal take is that it's well intentioned, but there will always be things that aren't part of the corpus of communicating devices that will then limit the utility. I suspect the communication of sensor data is the more useful part than some of the demos I've seen so far of, for example, a car sending an alert to a person's phone so they don't step into a driveway when it's reversing.
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