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Normalized crash data shows Autopilot is much less safe than Tesla claims

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Re: Normalized crash data shows Autopilot is much less safe than Tesla claims

#11

Post by kfor »

lordnacho wrote: post #3

Wow, adjusted for driver age the difference vanishes. That's quite an interesting observation, and it shows the importance of proper statistics. It also raises questions about companies producing their own stats, it's often only when someone takes the time to dig into it that we discover this kind of thing. I am not holding my breath waiting for the common consumer to understand statistical critical thinking though.…

I highly recommend How to Lie with Statistics (1954) to learn more about these sorts of misleading stats: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_to_Lie_with_Statistics

Re: Normalized crash data shows Autopilot is much less safe than Tesla claims

#12

Post by yrral »

How about the predominately male ownership of teslas causing higher accident rates. I see the paper adjusts for age and road type but missing gender is a pretty big slip-up?

I didn't read the paper fully but grepped for "gender" and "sex" and couldn't find anything.

Re: Normalized crash data shows Autopilot is much less safe than Tesla claims

#14

Post by kadoban »

ProAm wrote: post #5
lordnacho wrote: post #3

Wow, adjusted for driver age the difference vanishes. That's quite an interesting observation, and it shows the importance of proper statistics. It also raises questions about companies producing their own stats, it's often only when someone takes the time to dig into it that we discover this kind of thing. I am not holding my breath waiting for the common consumer to understand statistical critical thinking though.…

If you have taken a course in statistics you'll know its always possible to make the numbers looks favorable to your cause. It would take several unrelated blind third parties to do this correctly and no public company will ever let that happen, especially Tesla.

They should be forced to let that happen. It's crucial for public safety.

Re: Normalized crash data shows Autopilot is much less safe than Tesla claims

#15

Post by gnicholas »

gameswithgo wrote: post #6

EDIT: After reading the full paper and not just the twitter graphs, some of what I said is wrong. That is, they also controlled for age, and when controlling for age and road type, autpilot was just worse. On the one hand I had the same suspicion about the unadjusted data, on the other hand the fact that autopilot isn't worse is pretty promising! However, average human rates include people driving drunk, tired, elder…

> the fact that autopilot isn't worse is pretty promising!

Presumably drivers take over when it makes mistakes, which tilts the stats a bit.

> When I was 19 probably safer to use autopilot.

As a parent, I wonder about what safety tech I would let my kids use when learning to drive. I want to make sure they fully learn how to drive, which makes me think I shouldn't let them use too much semi-autonomous tech.

At the same time, it seems foolish to tell them not to use blind spot monitors, or to even expect them to "check their blind spot" the old-fashioned way if their cars have monitors.

Interestingly, my father (in his 70s) tells me he'll never trust blind spot monitors, so I'm seeing a generational difference even between him and me. Too bad, since older drivers probably could benefit the most from not having to look back when changing lanes. Older eyes take longer to re-focus, so it's more likely an older driver would miss something happening ahead on account of having looked rearward.

Re: Normalized crash data shows Autopilot is much less safe than Tesla claims

#18

Post by rurp »

lordnacho wrote: post #3

Wow, adjusted for driver age the difference vanishes. That's quite an interesting observation, and it shows the importance of proper statistics. It also raises questions about companies producing their own stats, it's often only when someone takes the time to dig into it that we discover this kind of thing. I am not holding my breath waiting for the common consumer to understand statistical critical thinking though.…

> It also raises questions about companies producing their own stats

Companies saying "trust us, we have the data to prove it" while keeping that data secret should be ignored. Especially if their CEO has a long history of blatant dishonesty! I'm most annoyed that people gave any weight to Tesla's safety statistics claims in the first place.

Re: Normalized crash data shows Autopilot is much less safe than Tesla claims

#20

Post by sandworm101 »

jacquesm wrote: post #8
gnicholas wrote: post #2

Underlying study is here. [1] Full disclosure, I co-wrote the piece for The Daily Beast [2] that originally suggested that Tesla's methodology was seriously flawed. I am not a Tesla-hater though — I just thought it was odd that the company was playing quite so fast and loose with their safety claims. 1: https://engrxiv.org/preprint/view/1973/3986 2: https://www.thedailybeast.com/how-tesla-and-elon-musk-exagge...

> I just thought it was odd that the company was playing quite so fast and loose with their safety claims. That's because it's marketing, not science.

And because it's Tesla, not Honda.

Every car company does marketing. Few make over-the-top safety claims about their products. This is the company that decided to have its cars not stop at stop signs. Normal rules don't apply to Tesla.

https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-60230072

"In recall documents, the electric vehicle maker notes that if certain conditions are met, the "rolling stop" feature is designed to allow the vehicle to travel through all-way-stop intersections at up to 5.6mph without coming to a complete stop."

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