Earlier quoted context omitted.
Quoted post unavailable.
A comment like this has no place on HN.
I apologize for creating offense.
San Francisco cops pull over a Cruise driverless car for no lights on
71–80 of 504 posts
Re: San Francisco cops pull over a Cruise driverless car for no lights on
#72I am really worried by the fact that I am the unwilling tester in the Great Driverless Car Experiment.
Tradition has it that when you load-test a new bridge, you put the architect underneath. I feel like this, except I didn't design those driverless cars, somebody else did. Being an experienced software engineer, my trust in the software in these cars is pretty low. And yet they are testing them on me, because I can be the one getting killed.
I think we should set a much higher bar for allowing those cars on the streets, rather than "it kinda works, so let's roll with it".
Re: San Francisco cops pull over a Cruise driverless car for no lights on
#73Earlier quoted context omitted.
Here in UK it's always the owner of the car who is responsible, unless they can say who was driving the car at the time. If they can't then the fine defaults to them - the assumption being that they are responsible for knowing who is using their vehicle. In other countries with similar laws(Poland) it has been argued in front of court that it cannot be the owner's responsibility to know who is driving their car at an…
It's quite logic and an easy rule to take responsible the driver no matter whether they have a driver assist feature on or not. Then the driver could sue the manufacturer for any defect or if the manufacturer misled the user into thinking the system was safe and didn't need human attention. This way, if a system is unreliable, users will start blaming the system and stop using the feature or buying this car. Also, it…
>Also, it allows manufacturers to roll-out features faster and learn faster from the real world.
I don't think that "move fast and break things" is the approach we want for self-driving cars.
Re: San Francisco cops pull over a Cruise driverless car for no lights on
#74Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Did they pass a driver's license check? Thought experiment: imagine a particular self-driving algo were to do something that would warrant a human driver getting their driving licence suspended, would that mean all the cars with that same algo would be simultanously suspended, or just that one car?
That is a very intriguing scenario indeed. Due to the non-deterministic nature of many self-driving systems, I'd reckon a broader investigation would have to follow. Should that investigation reveal a reproducible behaviour, a recall or general suspension of vehicles running that particular software version would seem like a reasonable response. Otherwise suspending just that one car could be an option. It's uncharte…
How is it non-deterministic? If you run the same trained model on the same input data, you should arrive at the exactly identical output.
Re: San Francisco cops pull over a Cruise driverless car for no lights on
#75Earlier quoted context omitted.
> In my native one the term 'cruise' is restricted only for sail Do you not used a cognate word for "Cruise control" in your language? In Hebrew "Shait" is used for sail, but also for the idea of cruise control and a cruise missile. I cannot think of any other uses, not even for patrol vehicles.
In Swedish at least the 'cruise' when talking about in ships and missiles is the same word, but "cruise control" is a completely different word (literally "speed holder"). You can't "cruise" in you car in Swedish.
In Italy our police cars are much faster, a police car is usually called "volante" (literally "flying"), the more correct name is "autopattuglia" which is more like "patrol car".
Then we have the two different animal derived names, police cars are "pantere" (panthers) and the Carabinieri ones are "gazzelle" (gazelles).
As well you can't cruise with a car, the cruise control (often untranslated) is a "regolatore di velocità" (speed regulator), but you can actually mantain a "velocità di crociera" (cruise speed) on a vehicle.
Re: San Francisco cops pull over a Cruise driverless car for no lights on
#76Earlier quoted context omitted.
Wouldn’t it be great to give the government the power to cause a traffic accident for anyone they didn’t like?
They already can. Police will simply crash your car if they feel like it by using their car.
That only happens when your running from them. Imagine if we give the DNC a kill switch to every car in America. Place it under as a tax penalty, and you'd have to wait until their audit finished in your favor for them to consider turning your car back on.
Re: San Francisco cops pull over a Cruise driverless car for no lights on
#77Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not necessarily, if you make your intentions clear, e.g. by slowing down and putting your hazards on.
Well, most of the time. If the cop feels like it, they can make you have a very bad time. https://amp.usatoday.com/amp/7645474002 “An Arkansas woman says she had no safe place to pull over in July 2020 when a state trooper tried to stop her for speeding, so she turned on her hazard lights and slowed down. Moments later, the officer rammed her vehicle, causing it to flip over and injuring the woman”
I think I saw that video - don't get me wrong, the officer was definitely an asshole; but I can see why he was annoyed, there was in fact plenty of space &time for her to pull over.
Re: San Francisco cops pull over a Cruise driverless car for no lights on
#78Earlier quoted context omitted.
In case no one is specifically identified for the infraction, doesn't it come back to the car owner ? Not in the US, but that's how it would work here for illegal parking or if the driver fled from the cops and the car is never found for instance. Even if the owner doesn't own a driving license, that's just where the buck stops. The owner if of course free to try to shove it somewhere else, but that's on them to make…
Parking citations attach to the car (as does civil collision liability generally), but moving violations can only be levied against the driver. Which is how some red light camera fines are avoided, if the driver isn’t clearly identifiable by the camera.
In the US, fines for moving violations identified by camera are the responsibility of the car owner, regardless of who was driving at the time of the infraction. The inability to identify the driver just means that the owner is not convicted of a moving violation, but he is stil l financially responsible for the penalty.
Re: San Francisco cops pull over a Cruise driverless car for no lights on
#79Earlier quoted context omitted.
In EU there is a law that you should drive with headlight all time. Old cars drive with low beam, new cars comes with daytime running lights (DRLs). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daytime_running_lamp#European_...
The US has this law for motorcycles. Maybe we should apply it to driverless cars as well
I feel the need to point out that whilst permanent headlights make vehicles more visible most of the time, in the most dangerous scenario, they actually make you less visible.
Low sun behind the vehicle, especially if it's a motorbike, makes it very hard to see. If the bike isn't lit up at the front you stand a fighting chance. If it's got the front headlight on then you don't even see the silhouette, you just see bright light surrounding and bright light from the middle.
Motorcycle Action Group in the UK has had to run a handful of "repeal this safety law because it actually makes things more dangerous" campaigns in the last 20 years.
Re: San Francisco cops pull over a Cruise driverless car for no lights on
#80Earlier quoted context omitted.
It might not, but the behaviour would be the same, so the effect is achieved.
No, because on a narrow road, coming to a stop blocks the vehicle behind you.
If your on a narrow road where you can't safely pull over, you don't stop. You continue until you could safely pull over enough.
Stopping would cause more harm than good if they're actually trying to get around you.