Despite High Hopes, Self-Driving Cars Are ‘Way in the Future’ • Hacker News Board

Re: Despite High Hopes, Self-Driving Cars Are ‘Way in the Future’

#281

Post by jm4 » Wed, Jul 17, 2019, 6:55 PM UTC

gamblor956 wrote: post #202

magashna wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tesla made it cool. Prius was never primarily known for being eco-friendly, it was known as the car that dorks and hippies drove. Ignoring the cultural impact of Tesla is why plenty of green vehicles failed in the past.

Tesla made it cool. Outside of SV, Teslas aren't viewed as any cooler than Priuses. They're actually seen as much worse--elitist vehicles--since Priuses are affordable for most families and Teslas are not, plus require lots of expensive infrastructure just for basic use. I know a few people who drive Teslas. Not one of them is someone who would even be remotely described as cool. I know a lot of people who drive Priu…

The Prius succeeded in spite of itself. They are ugly as hell, didn't offer plug in capability for years despite customers begging for it, so slow you can barely merge onto the highway and not the most ideal family car. It's the kind of car you put up with because you want to be green or you have a shitty commute and you're tired of paying $4/gallon for gas. Nobody buys a Prius for any reason other than that it's a hybrid with great fuel economy. Nobody. Then there was the Honda Insight which was worse in every way.

Teslas appeal to both the customers who want to be green and the ones who don't give a rat's ass about the environment. They look nice, they go fast, they hardly require any maintenance and they have a badass infotainment system which no other manufacturer has been able to get right. The first Model S really popped and people were buying it in spite of the uncertainty around it being electric. Then they started loading them up with tech and driver aids.

I get that it's not everyone's cup of tea, but I don't know how anyone who's into cars can look at one and not find something cool about it.

As for "expensive infrastructure", you do realize the first car manufacturers didn't decide to start building gas cars in the beginning simply to take advantage of the gas station infrastructure that was already in place? Electric cars are here to stay. Sooner or later somebody had to start building charging stations just like somebody had to start building gas stations.

Re: Despite High Hopes, Self-Driving Cars Are ‘Way in the Future’

#282

Post by winternett » Wed, Jul 17, 2019, 6:57 PM UTC

HALtheWise wrote: post #166

When read literally, there is no way that any system ever, human or automatic, will be able to drive on "any road" with "perfect safety". Crazy freak accidents happen, and human drivers regularly aren't able to handle them. On top of that, most people just can't safely drive in thick fog, icy conditions, or pouring rain. No amount of intelligence will allow a car to drive through a sufficiently flooded street. Just l…

We keep forgetting that in the 1920s they said -all- cars would be flying in the year 2000, and it never happened... Heck, some could say we still don't have cars that can fly realistically, we only have flawed prototypes, and they aren't safe. It's not being pessimistic, it's being realistic. Most of the hype surrounding the self driving car discussion is generated and promoted by people and companies on the profit receiving end of the discussion.

Right now it's primarily based off of cameras watching painted lines on roads. Also not a solid practice. If someone wanted to cause accidents all they'd have to do is paint the lines off the road on a section above 60 MPH.

Another problem is maintenance of these vehicles. Accidents are caused a lot by owners not properly maintaining the car's subsystems like brakes, fluids, and even keeping sensors and windshields clean. Too much performance unpredictability is introduced into the equation by things like this to make self driving cars a reality, and makers cannot reliably answer who will own up to responsibility in case of an accident.

There's also the concept of "free will", i.e. how will these cars work around human drivers, what about everyone relinquishing their personal rights to own cars, will drivers be able to go off the maps and radar routes, etc. And none of those questions can be answered. For planes, boats, large haulers and buses maybe, provided they stay in designated lanes, but for cars? I don't see it happening any time soon unless all of the questions can be answered acceptably.

Re: Despite High Hopes, Self-Driving Cars Are ‘Way in the Future’

#283

Post by tigershark » Wed, Jul 17, 2019, 7:01 PM UTC

almost_usual wrote: post #133

baggachipz wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Tesla which is run by a delusional snake oil salesman who had a single hit with the Model S Being that dismissive and willfully ignorant discredits your entire argument. A snake oil salesman produces nothing and hoodwinks people. I drive my "snake oil" every day and not only is it the best car I've ever driven, it's the coolest thing I've ever owned. I routinely watch his "snake oil" launch huge payloads to orbit a…

It's hard to judge Tesla at this point, most automotive companies really can't be judged until their vehicles are on the road heavily for over a decade. I've said this before but I can't imagine a Tesla on the road today being on the road in thirty years. Hopefully I'm wrong. Otherwise we're going to have a lot of 'good for the environment' vehicles in landfills like cellphones. While the gas guzzling 30+ year old To…

There are Teslas with 900,000 km. It's a bit less than 3 times the distance from the earth to the moon and a lot of 30 years old card have less km than that.

Re: Despite High Hopes, Self-Driving Cars Are ‘Way in the Future’

#284

Post by standyro » Wed, Jul 17, 2019, 7:02 PM UTC

the only thing I see in this thread are hundreds and hundreds of people who have never had the opportunity to drive a car with Tesla Autopilot or Comma.ai EON (this article included)

Those two products are literally the best purchase I've made in years, and have enabled hours of mental energy in my life freed up from the confines of soul crushing traffic in major American cities.

remember that slashdot comment about iPods being lame?

people will look at articles like this, and threads like this in the same way in 5 years...

Re: Despite High Hopes, Self-Driving Cars Are ‘Way in the Future’

#285

Post by bobthepanda » Wed, Jul 17, 2019, 7:05 PM UTC

TeMPOraL wrote: post #255

AtlasBarfed wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the standard of self-driving becomes something akin to how airplanes fly, then weather will be a delay, bypass, or do not fly precondition to the execution of the flight plan. All this stuff about "it's right around the road" vs "it'll never happen" is all unspoken assumptions around what it means to take a "safe" "trip" "in a car" "driven" "autonomously". Safe? Compared to humans that are alert, humans with smart…

> I think what needs to happen is that you need programs tailored to specific routes/roads. As you drive any distance, you download/cache the programs for the routes and execute them. Wow. That's so obvious in retrospect. I wonder why I haven't considered it before, nor why I haven't read of it before either. I imagine having stationary "traffic controllers", semi- or completely automated, that keep real-time informa…

Who would be responsible for maintaining static sensor networks and processing centers? The current transport authorities who do such a great job maintaining dumb roads?

A lot of the problems with AVs are not just technological, but political and social in nature.

Re: Despite High Hopes, Self-Driving Cars Are ‘Way in the Future’

#286

Post by tigershark » Wed, Jul 17, 2019, 7:05 PM UTC

gamblor956 wrote: post #104

saiya-jin wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Tesla which is run by a delusional snake oil salesman Dude, you may not like Musk personally (which is glaringly obvious), but at least stick to the facts - he triggered much needed car industry transformation more than anybody else in recent times. industry itself wouldn't change itself so rapidly even if planet would be burning, that's obvious. And mankind gravely needs it now. Plus small detail about revolutioni…

Ah yes, because it's not like the Prius demonstrated that there was a market for green car, or the CA or federal green car credits and HOV access provided incentives to people to buy said green cars, or federal regulations regarding fleet emissions standards created the market for trading emissions credits that has singlehandedly kept Tesla afloat everytime it's come closer to running out of money. No, apparently Tes…

The Prius is hybrid, what has it to do with green cars?

Re: Despite High Hopes, Self-Driving Cars Are ‘Way in the Future’

#287

Post by mhermher » Wed, Jul 17, 2019, 7:05 PM UTC

toomuchtodo wrote: post #109

mhermher wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't disagree but I thought that they triggered some sort of transformation. Here you are agreeing with me that they didn't.

I'm not agreeing at all. BMW just lost their CEO because they've lost so many sales to Tesla. Other automakers are desperately trying to play catchup to them. I have never had people come up to any other car I've owned (Chevrolet, Mercedes, Jeep, Toyota, Lexus, Infiniti) besides our Model S and Model X with questions, tell us the car is beautiful (in an Aldi parking lot no less), or want to go for an impromptu ride a…

CEOs come and go and that has nothing to do with Tesla, despite how much you want it to be.

So the transformation that he triggered was that people would ask about your car? Or what? A 0.5% market or thereabouts market share?

What a mission to accomplish! Bravo.

Re: Despite High Hopes, Self-Driving Cars Are ‘Way in the Future’

#288

Post by skizm » Wed, Jul 17, 2019, 7:06 PM UTC

standyro wrote: post #284

the only thing I see in this thread are hundreds and hundreds of people who have never had the opportunity to drive a car with Tesla Autopilot or Comma.ai EON (this article included) Those two products are literally the best purchase I've made in years, and have enabled hours of mental energy in my life freed up from the confines of soul crushing traffic in major American cities. remember that slashdot comment about…

Can Tesla's autopilot really navigate "major American city" areas with no human interaction? I thought it was just a slightly smarter cruise control for highways only and the driver still needs to be somewhat alert?

Re: Despite High Hopes, Self-Driving Cars Are ‘Way in the Future’

#289

Post by kerng » Wed, Jul 17, 2019, 7:06 PM UTC

Level 5 AV will never exist, because there isn't even a Level 5 human.

How about we just see if an AV can pass a license test to operate in a jurisdiction? They probably can already- but we do have higher expectations on AV then we have with humans I think. Which is good.

Re: Despite High Hopes, Self-Driving Cars Are ‘Way in the Future’

#290

Post by bobthepanda » Wed, Jul 17, 2019, 7:07 PM UTC

ghaff wrote: post #178

HALtheWise wrote: post #166

When read literally, there is no way that any system ever, human or automatic, will be able to drive on "any road" with "perfect safety". Crazy freak accidents happen, and human drivers regularly aren't able to handle them. On top of that, most people just can't safely drive in thick fog, icy conditions, or pouring rain. No amount of intelligence will allow a car to drive through a sufficiently flooded street. Just l…

It's actually not a very useful quote because, as you say, taken literally it's an impossibly high bar. What is required to be useful is either 1.) Demonstrably better than human (whatever that means exactly) for a well-defined subset of roads and conditions such as interstate highways under some subset of weather or 2.) Demonstrably better than human for any roads and conditions that a typical adult human would typi…

There are open questions about whether or not intermediate levels of automation might actually be more dangerous because they lull human drivers into a false sense of security, so I don't even know that 1 is necessarily sufficient.