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Driverless cars are stuck in a jam

economist.com

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Re: Driverless cars are stuck in a jam

#51

Post by TheSpiceIsLife »

theieindjri wrote: post #38
crocal wrote: post #8

The article misses an important point. It’s not only a problem of technology, it’s also a problem of risk acceptance. While we accept to be killed by our own mistakes at the wheel, society (we) will not accept that a machine makes the same, even if the failure rate is on average /better/. This is the fundamental issue Elon Musk has. The driverless bar for safety is way higher than very clever driver assistance or eve…

I don't understand why so many otherwise smart people fell for FSD hype. I'm not talking about the many con artists - I'm talking about the tech-savvy people who genuinely bought into FSD hype. How is it not obvious that FSD most likely requires artificial general intelligence and is, thus, probably somewhere between "many decades away" and "humans will never achieve it"?

If I had to have an opinion, this would be it.

I don't see why self-driving vehicles can't be dependant on additional self-driving-vehicle-related-signage or sensors embedded in / around / near roads, etc etc.

Humans are fairly dependant on additional signage, maps, and navigation tools (Google / Apple Maps).

Re: Driverless cars are stuck in a jam

#52

Post by unityByFreedom »

GhostVII wrote: post #35
xbmcuser wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree that ditching Lidar by Musk is the wrong move. From what I have read most if not all the self driving accidents that Tesla have been involved in could have been avoided if a Lidar type sensor was involoved. With tech available trying to use the same limits as human vision is stupid.

I think Musk has no choice but to ditch Lidar. He has promised to provide full self driving on cars already on the road, and retrofitting all of those cars with Lidar is incredibly expensive.

Bologna. He had/has a choice, he chose snakeoil salesman. Tesla could have focused on affordable (or luxury) electric vehicles. The choice to add self-driving was all Musk.

Re: Driverless cars are stuck in a jam

#54

Post by [deleted] »

goatinaboat wrote: post #34
crocal wrote: post #8

The article misses an important point. It’s not only a problem of technology, it’s also a problem of risk acceptance. While we accept to be killed by our own mistakes at the wheel, society (we) will not accept that a machine makes the same, even if the failure rate is on average /better/. This is the fundamental issue Elon Musk has. The driverless bar for safety is way higher than very clever driver assistance or eve…

The driverless bar for safety is way higher than very clever driver assistance or even rocket science. One bad driver kills themselves and maybe a handful of others. One bad software update kills... everyone. So, the demand that the software be near-perfect is not at all unreasonable. It’s strange not to acknowledge this fundamental difference.

[deleted]

Re: Driverless cars are stuck in a jam

#55

Post by phinnaeus »

theieindjri wrote: post #38
crocal wrote: post #8

The article misses an important point. It’s not only a problem of technology, it’s also a problem of risk acceptance. While we accept to be killed by our own mistakes at the wheel, society (we) will not accept that a machine makes the same, even if the failure rate is on average /better/. This is the fundamental issue Elon Musk has. The driverless bar for safety is way higher than very clever driver assistance or eve…

I don't understand why so many otherwise smart people fell for FSD hype. I'm not talking about the many con artists - I'm talking about the tech-savvy people who genuinely bought into FSD hype. How is it not obvious that FSD most likely requires artificial general intelligence and is, thus, probably somewhere between "many decades away" and "humans will never achieve it"?

It takes more than a tech-savvy person to understand the difference between a difficult problem and a Hard Problem. It might be a thought experiment to pose during a technical interview, though you might encounter highly optimistic people that are otherwise very talented engineers.

Re: Driverless cars are stuck in a jam

#56

Post by aSplash0fDerp »

Just to ask, haven't there been several reports of LTE/5G protocols being compromised, making the worst-case scenario one script-kiddie away from major disruptions?

Why would they even contemplate building on a compromised foundation or worse yet, accelerating a roll-out? Since most of the tech from last century was built on trust models/trusted environments, waiting for a clean rewrite sounds like a better plan .

I personally hope we see them build new 21st century cities and dedicated autonomous highways to grow driverless technology, instead of trying to overlay it on the existing horse and buggy infrastructure with time-period correct code/models.

The world doesn't need any more digital diarrhea on its plate.

Re: Driverless cars are stuck in a jam

#57

Post by rayiner »

robotresearcher wrote: post #49
rayiner wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.wired.com/story/tesla-autopilot-why-crash-radar/

That article describes a failure of Tesla’s system that had terrible consequences. It gives no data comparing with human performance.

That article describes a systematic design defect of Tesla’s system. (It’s a defect that all camera based systems have. They are designed to ignore stationary objects because they can’t adequately distinguish background objects from obstacles.) Car and Driver tested this last year, and the Tesla ran into the stationary dummy nearly every time. This is something humans have almost no problem dealing with.

Re: Driverless cars are stuck in a jam

#58

Post by studentrob »

emiliobumachar wrote: post #39
unityByFreedom wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're imagining a scenario where everyone has a self-driving car and completely ignoring cost and social factors. Who among us would admit, " yes, I am a bad driver, I need this more expensive thing to take control in the event of an accident "? Very few is my guess. In 2019, people use these for convenience, not because they think the system is a better driver. I bet that's true even for Waymo's taxis. As for getti…

I don't think total coverage is necessary. If 10% of the cars are self-driving, to a first approximation there will be 10% less drunk drivers. Cost is definitely an issue, but reducing accidents and increasing convenience have a cash value which could pay for it if the research pans out. What social factors do you have in mind?

> If 10% of the cars are self-driving, to a first approximation there will be 10% less drunk drivers.

It seems unlikely that people who buy/use early self-driving cars have the same percentage of drunk driving as the general population. Surely employment rates would be a factor, for example.

Re: Driverless cars are stuck in a jam

#59

Post by robotresearcher »

unityByFreedom wrote: post #45
robotresearcher wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have data that supports what you think?

That's not how this works. If the cars are safer, there should be independent data that shows this. As it is, we get one-sentence "safety reports" from the manufacturer with a single data point. They're not safer by default because the manufacturer says so.

The claim was that Tesla’s system is not safer, and that only level 4 would increase safety. I asked if data supported those two independent claims.

I’m ok if we assume that things are unsafe before we have evidence they are safe, but that’s not the same as declaring they are unsafe without evidence.

Re: Driverless cars are stuck in a jam

#60

Post by bittercynic »

theieindjri wrote: post #38
crocal wrote: post #8

The article misses an important point. It’s not only a problem of technology, it’s also a problem of risk acceptance. While we accept to be killed by our own mistakes at the wheel, society (we) will not accept that a machine makes the same, even if the failure rate is on average /better/. This is the fundamental issue Elon Musk has. The driverless bar for safety is way higher than very clever driver assistance or eve…

I don't understand why so many otherwise smart people fell for FSD hype. I'm not talking about the many con artists - I'm talking about the tech-savvy people who genuinely bought into FSD hype. How is it not obvious that FSD most likely requires artificial general intelligence and is, thus, probably somewhere between "many decades away" and "humans will never achieve it"?

Doesn't seem obvious to me. FSD using affordable sensors seems like an unsolved problem, and I haven't heard a convincing proof that it is or isn't solvable.

Did high accuracy OCR without AGI seem possible before it was developed?

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