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The self-driving car is a red herring

nautil.us

41–50 of 320 posts

Re: The self-driving car is a red herring

#42

I like Filip Piekniewski's take on this [0] - deep learning is appropriate for environments where the cost of mistakes is low (or the errors are reversible) and you're able to 'average them out'. Self-driving cars are absolutely not in that category. "If your errors are irreversible and you can't average them out, and your application is in open domain where there will never be a shortage of out of distribution sampl…

I can see it being possible to "average out" the mortality of self-driving cars when you consider how high road mortality is. But they won't be the same deaths, some would be things a human driver would avoid. We generally define the safety requirements of self-driving cars as being close to airliner reliability but also generally accept that roads, cars and drivers have much lower standards than that right now. So in this environment we can very soon be stuck in an uncanny valley where self-driving cars would already be a net positive in reducing road fatalities but at a level that is still generally considered unacceptable.

Re: The self-driving car is a red herring

#43
post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many nines of reliability do self driving cars need before they're safe? They have to operate in weather. Rain, snow, dark. They have to adapt to novel conditions. I put the self-driving car in the same category as the flying car and jet pack. This one just happens to have VC funding. I don't think we'll see these things for another decade, and when that next decade arrives we'll be saying the same. Another decad…

>They have to operate in weather. Rain, snow, dark. No they don't - a self driving car that knows when it can't drive is perfectly acceptable - not everyone can drive in extreme conditions reliably - doesn't mean they can't drive.

>a self driving car that knows when it can't drive is perfectly acceptable

I don't agree, because of the grey area between the car knowing it can't drive and believing it can, but in practice doing so poorly.

Re: The self-driving car is a red herring

#44
Even if the self-driving can be implemented only partially it can be a big gain.

E.g. suppose the car can only drive itself on highways in daytime in good weather. It still a great convenience feature to have if you don't have to drive for 80-90% of your commute (with the above conditions) and you only have to take over in the city.

Re: The self-driving car is a red herring

#45

Self-driving cars, computer speech recognition and the collapse of the federal reserve system. Things that are going to perpetually happen next year since the inception of Hacker News.

The federal reserve won't collapse, they have the ability to create money.

The currency the federal reserve multiplies? That could collapse.

Since 2020, the dollar menu is gone, home and stock prices skyrocketed. In a year I've seen ~30% inflation. There's no reason for the inflation to stop there.

(Note, I have lots of investment, inflation may help me)

Re: The self-driving car is a red herring

#46
post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many nines of reliability do self driving cars need before they're safe? They have to operate in weather. Rain, snow, dark. They have to adapt to novel conditions. I put the self-driving car in the same category as the flying car and jet pack. This one just happens to have VC funding. I don't think we'll see these things for another decade, and when that next decade arrives we'll be saying the same. Another decad…

When self driving cars will be consistently more reliable than 99% of human drivers, that will be enough. That is not a lot of nines.

>When self driving cars will be consistently more reliable than 99% of human drivers

How could you even calculate this? By running massive experiments and seeing if fewer people die over a given period of time driving versus self-driving? Do you really think we can run such an experiment?

Re: The self-driving car is a red herring

#47
post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is "Linux on the Desktop next year" still a thing?

I think we called it a win on "The year of desktop linux" when it was clear that Linux was mainstream enough for Microsoft to tie it up with a bow and offer in their app store. Jokes aside, we're at the point where everyone who wants linux on the desktop can get linux on the desktop without having to struggle. Big, known enterprise-friendly companies like Dell and Lenovo will sell you their flagship and business lapt…

It was never hard to run Linux. It was always hard to make Linux perform at the same expectations as Windows.

Messing around with chromium versions and netflix's plugin was not fun when you just wanted to watch a show.

It's not polished, any distro.

But Linux server is GOAT.

Re: The self-driving car is a red herring

#48
post #15
post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many nines of reliability do self driving cars need before they're safe? They have to operate in weather. Rain, snow, dark. They have to adapt to novel conditions. I put the self-driving car in the same category as the flying car and jet pack. This one just happens to have VC funding. I don't think we'll see these things for another decade, and when that next decade arrives we'll be saying the same. Another decad…

> How many nines of reliability do self driving cars need before they're safe? That depends on your perspective. I think most of us just wants it to be more reliable than a human driver that's not drunk or sleep deprived. But the liability challenges could mean you'll want more "perfect" reliability. > They have to operate in weather. Rain, snow, dark. They have to adapt to novel conditions. Seems like the solutions…

> more reliable than a human driver that's not drunk or sleep deprived.

No thank you. Almost all the humans I share the road with are neither drunk nor sleep deprived. Putting robotic drivers on the road that make daylight driving as dangerous as 1am driving is not my idea of progress. It'd be a bloodbath.

Re: The self-driving car is a red herring

#49
post #15
post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many nines of reliability do self driving cars need before they're safe? They have to operate in weather. Rain, snow, dark. They have to adapt to novel conditions. I put the self-driving car in the same category as the flying car and jet pack. This one just happens to have VC funding. I don't think we'll see these things for another decade, and when that next decade arrives we'll be saying the same. Another decad…

> How many nines of reliability do self driving cars need before they're safe? That depends on your perspective. I think most of us just wants it to be more reliable than a human driver that's not drunk or sleep deprived. But the liability challenges could mean you'll want more "perfect" reliability. > They have to operate in weather. Rain, snow, dark. They have to adapt to novel conditions. Seems like the solutions…

“Good Enough” will mean that an autonomous car will be effectively useless between 6 and 8 months of the year in the north.

Most of the roads may be clear, but “all” of them never are. Shaded areas are the worst, and can remain iced over for months at a time. Ice, especially intermittent ice, is bad. Slush, deep snow, and packed snow can be miles worse.

Winter driving, as any Californian who has migrated north will tell you, is a dramatically different skill than driving on the roads of California or Arizona. It’s non-deterministic - turning the wheel doesn’t always turn the car. The car will move sideways on the road with no steering input. The speed of the wheels is completely divorced from the speed of the car.

Re: The self-driving car is a red herring

#50
post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many nines of reliability do self driving cars need before they're safe? They have to operate in weather. Rain, snow, dark. They have to adapt to novel conditions. I put the self-driving car in the same category as the flying car and jet pack. This one just happens to have VC funding. I don't think we'll see these things for another decade, and when that next decade arrives we'll be saying the same. Another decad…

>They have to operate in weather. Rain, snow, dark. No they don't - a self driving car that knows when it can't drive is perfectly acceptable - not everyone can drive in extreme conditions reliably - doesn't mean they can't drive.

I am imagining the whole fleet of self-driving cars stopping on the side of the road at the same time every time a little rainstorm blows through, kinda like what happens now for a snowstorm. Except rain is a heck of a lot more common. I guess we won't be seeing self-driving cars in the PNW ;)
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