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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

#241

Post by jobu »

dahfizz wrote: post #103
shihab wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An average person doesn't need to directly access the data. As long as journalists or researchers can, an avg person could rely on their analysis/opinion instead.

I would certainly not rely on journalists' to actually have a look at the data, let alone to have the technical skills to analyze and report on it. As it is, reporters don't bother mentioning / linking to the data, or mentioning the lack of publicly available data.

Data-journalism is actually a thing, and bigger organizations like the New York Times have done some pretty impressive work building tools and training programs for their reporters.

https://open.nytimes.com/how-we-helped-our-reporters-learn-t...

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

#242

Post by jasonhansel »

jjulius wrote: post #94
paxys wrote: post #22

I have felt since day 1 that "autopilot is better than the average driver!" is the most misleading fact/statistic in the industry. The "average driver" involved in an accident includes drunk drivers, road ragers, habitual speeders, teenagers, people driving in bad conditions (rain, snow), people driving without sleep and several other risky groups that most people buying Teslas aren't part of. To be worth it, the car…

I don't disagree with your broader statement about autopilot's safety relative to other drivers, but... >The "average driver" involved in an accident includes drunk drivers, road ragers, habitual speeders, teenagers, people driving in bad conditions (rain, snow), people driving without sleep and several other risky groups that most people buying Teslas aren't part of. ... what ? Tesla owners absolutely can be habitua…

For an individual person to be willing to adopt autopilot on safety grounds, autopilot has to be safer than that individual person's driving, not just safer than the average person's driving.

If your driving skill is above the mean (because you're never a road rager, speeder, etc.), then you're worse off using Autopilot, even if Autopilot is as safe as the average driver.

Since most people probably consider themselves above average drivers (and in fact most people may be above the mean if the bad drivers are outliers), this limits the number of people who will believe that Autopilot makes them safer.

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

#243

Post by FireBeyond »

tacLog wrote: post #36
gnicholas wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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 sa…

> 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. I have never owned a car with blind spot monitoring. Do people really just rely on them completely? Even in dense urban environments with bikes around? Or is it more of a judgement call? Different perspectives on this would be nice. I h…

No. Even as a tech geek... I use it as an aid, but not as the primary. Even when I'm driving a fire engine with a dash monitor that has seven always on, always visible cameras around it, I thought I'd use them a lot more than I do. I do use the cameras in my car supplementarily too, helps me dial parking perfectly, etc. But I still find myself doing visual checks.

But I also grew up and had my formative driving learning years without the benefit of such aids.

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

#244

Post by FireBeyond »

LeifCarrotson wrote: post #117
tacLog wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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. I have never owned a car with blind spot monitoring. Do people really just rely on them completely? Even in dense urban environments with bikes around? Or is it more of a judgement call? Different perspectives on this would be nice. I h…

It's practially a trope how in sci-fi movies with flying futuristic cars, it's a demonstration of extreme competence for a character to demand "manual controls" to pilot the vehicle...like every normal driver does today. I expect that will become more and more real-world. Even today, most drivers don't know how to drive a manual transmission vehicle, much less how to double-clutch one without synchros or how to stop…

Perhaps pedantic, but also genuine curiosity, thinking about it:

> how to stop on ice without ABS

My understanding is that ABS won't do anything to help you stopping on ice, anyway. On ice, braking is hampered by lack of traction on tires, whereas ABS is trying to avoid the challenges of tires locking up, so you can maintain (some semblance of) directionality.

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

#245

Post by ummonk »

maxdo wrote: post #237
ummonk wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It wasn't much of an accomplishment for Tesla to introduce safety features across its lineup, when its lineup consisted of luxury cars. Today, other car manufacturers are standardizing safety features across their model lineups while manufacturing cars that are a third the price of the cheapest Tesla.

BMW is a luxury Car, you still have to pay for safety extra. That's the difference. One car brand make it mandatory, other ask you extra dollars for every safety camera to install.

BMW is hated for a reason, and most car manufacturers (not just Tesla) would compare favorably to it.

Pretty much every major manufacturer makes safety features standard on the base models across their lineup today.

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

#246

Post by [deleted] »

maxdo wrote: post #231
dmitriid wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Autopilot is a tool. You can miss use it, sure. But if you care about safety it's hard to match with what they offer. 1. It's not autopilot, by any measurable criteria 2. As the adjusted data clearl shows, it's not that hard to match it. And since you mention Volvo, they definitely match it. They are honest enough though not to call it "autopilot", or "full safe driving" or pin the plame for its failures on the dri…

The author is projecting his assumptions based on 400 people questioned. Is it fair. Most Cars volvo produced is not as safe simply because Volvo is still making most of the money on Gasoline car, and they are less safe vs electric. Do we need to create a screaming article "Vovlo is deliberately making money on old tech that kills people"? Again volvo is a premium brand, so they don't want to invest more in EV to mak…

[deleted]

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

#247

Post by maxdo »

oblio wrote: post #238
maxdo wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The author is projecting his assumptions based on 400 people questioned. Is it fair. Most Cars volvo produced is not as safe simply because Volvo is still making most of the money on Gasoline car, and they are less safe vs electric. Do we need to create a screaming article "Vovlo is deliberately making money on old tech that kills people"? Again volvo is a premium brand, so they don't want to invest more in EV to mak…

> Again volvo is a premium brand, so they don't want to invest more in EV to make your car more safe. Dude, really? https://group.volvocars.com/company/innovation/electrificati...

Volvo's plans all in the future, it's just a commitment. today is there in 2025, tomorrow web designer put another beautiful article with 2030. Gasoline cars is less safe to the same car with the same set of airbags just because of It's physics e.g. lower center of gravity, no engine in the front that can kill you during forward collision, battery at the bottom serve as a protection layer during other type of crashes.

In fact tesla is about to release structural batteries cars, that will use battery as part of the cars body, makes it even more safe. Model Y with structural pack will be out in March 2022.

Volvo at this moment promoting hybrids and ICE that doesn't have this features, because it's bloody business. And money is money.

Just compare real actions of Volvo who claim one of the safest brand and Tesla.

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

#248

Post by laen »

ummonk wrote: post #207
dmitriid wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Autopilot is a tool. You can miss use it, sure. But if you care about safety it's hard to match with what they offer. 1. It's not autopilot, by any measurable criteria 2. As the adjusted data clearl shows, it's not that hard to match it. And since you mention Volvo, they definitely match it. They are honest enough though not to call it "autopilot", or "full safe driving" or pin the plame for its failures on the dri…

Yup. Autopilot on aircraft is very different because pilots don't have to be ready to take over on a moment's notice. Of course they have to be monitoring the flight but they can be generally assured that the autopilot won't decide to just fly into a mountain with only fractions of a second for the pilots to intervene.

There are moments a pilot has seconds to react and disengage autopilot.

Example: Traffic Resolution advisories require a 5 second reaction time and 2.5 seconds for any follow-on reactions. This reaction time includes the time to disengage autopilot and also put the aircraft into a climb-or-dive. Studies show that a situationally aware pilot takes at least 2 seconds to start the reaction, and another second to achieve the proper climb/descent. There are other times on e.g. approach, or ground collision warnings with even narrower margins for disengaging autopilot.

Pilots generally know when they need to be hyper-aware with autopilot and so do competent Tesla drivers. If there are issues with the name "autopilot" for Tesla, the same argument needs to be made for aircraft manufacturers.

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

#249

Post by chaxor »

RyEgswuCsn wrote: post #204
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...

So it sounds like it's Simpson's paradox [1] at work. I had always wondered why many people are slow to accept self-driving cars despite the claims of them being statistically safer. I think that explains it --- to make consumers confident about the self-driving technologies, it is not enough for them to be able to handle the "easy" kind of driving (e.g. on highway and under relatively good visibility conditions) bet…

Can you explain how Simpsons paradox applies here?

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

#250

Post by CSSer »

oblio wrote: post #230
RyEgswuCsn wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So it sounds like it's Simpson's paradox [1] at work. I had always wondered why many people are slow to accept self-driving cars despite the claims of them being statistically safer. I think that explains it --- to make consumers confident about the self-driving technologies, it is not enough for them to be able to handle the "easy" kind of driving (e.g. on highway and under relatively good visibility conditions) bet…

The thing is, you don't even need Tesla "self driving" for that. Adaptive cruise control, tech we've had for what, 20+ years? is more than enough for most highways, it takes out ~80% of the stress/boredom of driving, especially since lane changes are minimal and curves are gentle. The hard parts of driving (aka not highways) are the real problem, as expected. We solved the easy parts in 2000 and who knows if we'll so…

I have a car with adaptive cruise control and lane assist, and most of my morning commute (on days when I go into the office) is driven on the highway. Most of the time I don't turn it on because I'm in a self-perceived hurry to get to work, so I forget.

You know what would be really nice? Something that detects when it's safe and reasonable to suggest turning on adaptive cruise control so I use it more. Maybe something like detecting I've driven a few miles at a consistent rate of speed above a certain threshold.

The hard parts are definitely the problem, but there are lots of easy wins left on the table too.

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