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U.S. eliminates human controls requirement for fully automated vehicles

reuters.com

211–220 of 376 posts

Re: U.S. eliminates human controls requirement for fully automated vehicles

#211
post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>This is problematic for a number of reasons. The most important in my mind is that the risk of the vehicle being hacked and carjacked remotely is always present. Which raises the question: "Why would we engineer vehicles to accept external network connections?" Any communication to/from a vehicle should only be initiated by the vehicle itself. There's no reasonable criteria under which a vehicle should have its syst…

> Or am I missing something important? We absolutely want to remotely control cars at some point, how else will you send a self-driving taxi to a customers or "ask" a car to comeback to the garage for a recall on the underlying hardware or for general maintenance?

Have it poll once a minute and ask for instructions with a display in the car that says "instructed to go to X, accept?" and then have it auto accept after another minute.

Sure that means maybe waiting two minutes for the car to move, but that's not a huge deal, especially if you know that happens and request it two minutes in advance, but it gives anyone in the car the chance to cancel the request if it's invalid.

Re: U.S. eliminates human controls requirement for fully automated vehicles

#212
post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have the technology to replace schoolchildren at a much lower cost than cars

Would that include the piano and karate lessons for the replacement kids?

Coding bootcamp and Krav Maga these days.

Re: U.S. eliminates human controls requirement for fully automated vehicles

#213
post #204

It should open up the possibility of facing backwards, assuming you don't have motion sickness, it's a much safer position to be in to dissipate energy in case of a crash.

Is this because the seat would distribute the force?

Re: U.S. eliminates human controls requirement for fully automated vehicles

#215

This is problematic for a number of reasons. The most important in my mind is that the risk of the vehicle being hacked and carjacked remotely is always present. With the presence of an automation kill-switch and manual human controls the driver can always take back control. Without those, the driver is at the mercy of the hacker. Vehicle automation falls under the SCADA sub-domain of cyber-security. SCADA stands for…

>This is problematic for a number of reasons. The most important in my mind is that the risk of the vehicle being hacked and carjacked remotely is always present. Which raises the question: "Why would we engineer vehicles to accept external network connections?" Any communication to/from a vehicle should only be initiated by the vehicle itself. There's no reasonable criteria under which a vehicle should have its syst…

Think of all the attention you could monetize with a captive audience in a self-driving car. I fully expect it to be exploited by ad companies. And subsequently by hackers.

Re: U.S. eliminates human controls requirement for fully automated vehicles

#216
post #35

If your vehicle is heading relentlessly toward a group of schoolchildren it would be nice to have a way to override it. Either that or no windows so you won't be haunted by it every night of your life.

I'm not sure if I'm optimistic about autonomous vehicles or just very pessimistic about human drivers. I have no confidence that the next driver making a left turn while I'm crossing the road won't kill me. I'm much more comfortable with a computer that is programmed to avoid killing me, even if the software may have the occasional bug, than with a human who may or may not prioritize my life over whatever else it is…

I'm wondering why pedestrian accident prevention isn't standard equipment already. We have sensors all over, adaptive cruise...everything is in place except the junior-developer grade software routine to stop instead of hitting shit. Shows where the priorities are.

Re: U.S. eliminates human controls requirement for fully automated vehicles

#217
post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Or am I missing something important? We absolutely want to remotely control cars at some point, how else will you send a self-driving taxi to a customers or "ask" a car to comeback to the garage for a recall on the underlying hardware or for general maintenance?

Have it poll once a minute and ask for instructions with a display in the car that says "instructed to go to X, accept?" and then have it auto accept after another minute. Sure that means maybe waiting two minutes for the car to move, but that's not a huge deal, especially if you know that happens and request it two minutes in advance, but it gives anyone in the car the chance to cancel the request if it's invalid.

What if you're asleep and the car is in the drive-way? How would you be able to accept/decline in 60 seconds?

Re: U.S. eliminates human controls requirement for fully automated vehicles

#218
post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder if something makes the wheel turn which actually turns the car. Or is the wheel just a visual indicator.

Most cars still have some aspect of mechanical coupling between the steering wheel and the front wheels in case of electrical failure. There are some cars that have had "steer by wire", but it's still very uncommon: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drive_by_wire#Steer_by_wire

I would not own a car that was steer-by-wire because of the risk of electrical failure.

I've had electrical failure in a car before. The alternator died and wouldn't produce enough power at under 2000 rpm. My stereo and lights were flickering and engine was sputtering. In a steer-by-wire system, I'd have lost my steering. I'm just glad I was driving a stick shift, giving me more control over engine speeds so I was able to make it home and not have to get a tow.

Re: U.S. eliminates human controls requirement for fully automated vehicles

#219

I was at a crosswalk and saw a car with the big cameras on top coming Normally I walk and have confidence the human will stop and not want the consequences, or I at least make eye contact with the human driver for reassurance they will stop This time I ran, mumbling “self driving car fuck that”

We need a machine vision version of looking in the eyes. Maybe red lasers that point at your heart to signal that it has compassion for your heart.

Re: U.S. eliminates human controls requirement for fully automated vehicles

#220
I think a lot of people are misreading this. Right now one of the rules to pass a crash test is that there is a steering wheel. This didn't used to be controversial, but now it is. The rules were written in the 70s and just assumed there would always be a drivers seat.

The only thing here is that the government rewrote the rules to no longer assume those things. It's not saying those things aren't necessary, just not required. If the car can meet all the safety standards without it, then that's fine.

It would be like saying today that you can't have a computer without an on/off switch because in the 70s every computer had a physical switch.

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