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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

#291

Post by ricardobeat »

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...

> naturalistic driving study of 28 vehicles

The study seems to extrapolate from this. Tesla has something like 10 billion miles total driven on Autopilot, on a fleet of a million cars.

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

#293

Post by jgeada »

dzader wrote: post #221
ummonk wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

"Boeing instructed pilots to take corrective action in case of a malfunction, when the airplane would enter a series of automated nosedives. " https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_737_MAX_groundings

And that is why the whole 737 Max fleet got grounded and none of those planes were allowed to be operational until Boeing put in place a fix for the problem.

And most airlines ended up cancelling pending orders for the 737 Max and switched to a different brand that didn't play nearly as fast and loose with safety.

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

#294

Post by adolph »

contravariant wrote: post #138
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 to summarize: - Freeways account for 93% of distance travelled with Autopilot - Freeways account for 28% of the distance travelled by regular drivers. - "vehicles on non-freeways crashed 2.01 times more often per mile" a quick back of the envelop calculation suggests merely driving on the freeway lowers accidents per mile by ~40%, which accounts for most of the difference between Autopilot and regular drivers.

There are additional confounding variables noted in the paper:

  - Age of driver
  - Specific highways used (congestion, road conditions)
  - What is classified as a highway
Overall this is pretty good news for "autopilot" systems. It gives some humans an ego-boost as they clutch to steering wheels like John Henry. It gives others interested in a more relaxed driving experience the confidence that the computer isn't going to kill them any worse than they already do.

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

#295

Post by heavyset_go »

ActorNightly wrote: post #167
heavyset_go wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Regulators are asleep at the wheel.

Its kinda amazing to see the cognitive dissonance that people have when it comes to "regulators". When these regulators get swayed by the car industry into stupid stuff like 25 year import rule, or how they still keep speed limits around which have nothing to do with safety as they are based on outdated MPG savings initiative and end up disproportionally affecting lower income people, they rightfully are criticized.…

People with different opinions than yours are not a monolithic entity, so please don't paint me with the same brush as others just because my opinion has more similarities with theirs than with yours. Similarly, regulators are not a monolithic entity, and it is completely possible to want regulators to do one thing while also criticizing them about other things. Otherwise, your post has big "You criticize regulators, yet you want them to do something? Curious!" energy.

> Kinda makes it easy to see who has irrational hate for Tesla/Musk versus those who actually care about technology.

Another broad brush stroke and false dichotomy. It's entirely possible to care about safety before caring about TSLA's shareholder value, which has nothing to do with "irrational hate" or not "caring about technology".

For example, you won't see me complaining about Waymo's self-driving cars, because their program prioritizes safety instead of moving fast and breaking things/bodies. Does that sound like not caring about technology, or can you only care about technology as long as you're completely uncritical of Tesla's blatant disregard for safety?

> The correct thing for the "regulators" to do is to make it mandatory that every car has the same set of cameras and instruments that Tesla cars do, and that data is streamed to a publicly funded data warehouse where its open source and available for anyone to use.

That's just your opinion, and it's certainly convenient for Tesla. The "correct" and ethical thing for Tesla to have done is to keep their beta testing to closed tracks where all participants agree to be experimented only after giving their informed consent and just compensation for the risks involved. Instead, the entire public is being experimented on without their consent, and they're being experimented on by untrained non-professionals.

The "correct" and ethical thing for regulators to do is ensure that Tesla ceases experimentation that can get the public killed and maimed, that the public never consented to.

Similarly, the "correct" and ethical thing for Tesla to do is to not try to portray their Level 2 autonomous system as being Level 4 or greater. Regulators, ideally, would handle that issue, too.

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

#296

Post by femto113 »

This has been obvious for a long time, because if it wasn't true it would be trivial for Tesla to disprove it, and they haven't. Allow me to quote myself (from a discussion about an Autopilot related crash in 2019 [1])

"The fact that Tesla consistently refuses to share full data on identical models driving with autopilot turned on, enabled but not turned on, and not enabled is extremely suggestive that the overall safety rates for autopilot on are not better."

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19929793

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

#297

Post by HeyLaughingBoy »

sandworm101 wrote: post #20
jacquesm wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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…

What's the condition? No cop present? I know people who've gotten tickets for that.

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

#298

Post by dmitriid »

laen wrote: post #248
ummonk wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

> If there are issues with the name "autopilot" for Tesla, the same argument needs to be made for aircraft manufacturers.

Pilots require extensive training (an re-training). The must meet certain criteria to even fly certain types of plains. And they have to go through additional training if they have to switch planes (going from Airbus to Boeing for example).

So, if we're making "teh same argument" for Tesla, then Tesla needs all that to call its system an autopilot.

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

#299

Post by maxdo »

gambiting wrote: post #254
maxdo wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, https://www.tesla.com/safety https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9KR2N_Q8ep8 Tesla roll out cars in generations. So just take a $40k Model 3/Y platform was introduced in 2017 and compare it with any car been introduced that year. My friend bought a BMW in 2019 for similar money, it doesn't have half of that. Maybe you can have them but you have to buy extra packages for extra money. Tesla don't sell safety features…

>> My friend bought a BMW in 2019 for similar money, it doesn't have half of that. That's an incredibly bad example, because in German brands you have to pay extra for basic safety features(famously in the new Polo you have to pay extra to have more than the basic 3 airbags, I don't even know how that's allowed). Look at a brand new Peugeot/Citroen/Kia/Hyundai and you will pay less than what a Model 3 costs and get j…

You just excluded 60% of luxury market. Peugeot/Citroen almost not exists in US. Kia and Hundai they will be the biggest competitors among legacy auto brands. Even though their tech is not ambitious, basically copy paste from best and make it a bit cheaper, but not very cheap :)

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

#300

Post by kevin_thibedeau »

jlmorton wrote: post #284
kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The driving public knows when it can't take such calculated risks. Does the ML classifier know what it isn't seeing?

I think there are two arguments here: legality, and actual safety. I would argue that the slow rolling stop is perfectly safe in all cases, but the law exists as it is only to reduce ambiguity for enforcement. It's not a calculated risk - there is no circumstance where it's unsafe.

It is definitely unsafe to enter an intersection where visibility is compromised by an obstruction, hill, or curve. Rolling such stops is dumb even when you don't see anything to stop for.
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