I’m taking some time away from Comma • Hacker News Board

Re: I’m taking some time away from Comma

#351

Post by lovehashbrowns » Mon, Oct 31, 2022, 8:03 PM UTC

runlevel1 wrote: post #344

lovehashbrowns wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there needs to be a mix of humility and arrogance. Humility because sometimes there’s an issue that’s unsolvable and a good engineer needs to know to pull back. Arrogance because it takes at least some arrogance to believe there’s a solution where others haven’t found one. There are plenty of times in my career where I wish I were more arrogant. I’d probably be in a completely different place altogether if I…

Wouldn't "confidence" be a better word than "arrogance"?

Sorta, confidence is nice but arrogance is the difference between “I can do that” and “people have tried and failed but I know I can do it because I’m better.” There’s a particular example where I was arrogant (one of the few times) about something, said yes to the project that someone else had already architected, and I re-designed the architecture because I believed I was a better engineer. I need a little more of that. Particularly now, when I have an idea for a company I want to start but internally I’m scared. I’m confident in my ability, but I’m lacking the arrogance to just fucking go for it. I spend more time beating myself up over it than just doing the work. And I wish I just had the dab of arrogance to go for it, as opposed to just confidence.

Re: I’m taking some time away from Comma

#352

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Oct 31, 2022, 8:12 PM UTC

andrewmcwatters wrote: post #49

George’s insights on self-driving cars remind me of when you get the rare exceptional engineer in your company who knows 100% what he or she is talking about down to the exact implementation level and all of the alternatives, and leadership totally ignores them because they foolhardily believe this kid can’t possibly be right—without asking engineering questions to test to see if they’re right about the engineer bein…

[deleted]

Re: I’m taking some time away from Comma

#353

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Oct 31, 2022, 8:13 PM UTC

jackblemming wrote: post #246

Dang Hotz really is the savior of humanity. He's invented so many things I use on a day to day basis like... I'll get back to you on that. Truly a modern day John von Neumann.

[deleted]

Re: I’m taking some time away from Comma

#354

Post by thepasswordis » Mon, Oct 31, 2022, 8:16 PM UTC

phphphphp wrote: post #333

thepasswordis wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>it was just an even more limited environment Huh, so are you saying maybe we're a little close to autonomous cars than we were 5 years ago?

sure, “no closer” is hyperbole and in the most literal sense of the phrase, we are closer because time has passed… but in the practical sense, we are closer today because testing is going well and so permission has been granted to expand testing — the technology is not meaningfully different, what’s happening today could have happened 5 years ago (if safety regulations were more lax and had permitted testing with les…

So what have the engineers working on this been up to for the last 5 years? Nothing?

Re: I’m taking some time away from Comma

#355

Post by Dylan16807 » Mon, Oct 31, 2022, 8:24 PM UTC

jocker12 wrote: post #336

Dylan16807 wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anyone can use 3d mapping and geofencing. That's not a disqualifier. As long as the remote operators and assistance teams are an order of magnitude smaller than putting a driver in every car, then it's close enough to autonomy to count as "closer" and to be useful.

"Anyone can use 3d mapping and geofencing" - that shows you their limitations and also doesn't qualify for "completely autonomous" standard. - Completely means anytime (regarding weather conditions or time of the day), anywhere (no geofencing) and completely adaptive behavior to the permanently and randomly driving conditions humans deal with while driving. Pattern recognition software alone (A.I.) would never be abl…

> doesn't qualify for "completely autonomous" standard

No, but it does qualify for "closer to reality today than they were 5 years ago"

> Pattern recognition software alone (A.I.) would never be able to match human driving performances.

That's okay. A trained human can do much better than necessary, and geofenced pattern recognition software doesn't have to be as good, especially because it should have better reaction times and braking force than a human.

> "As long as the remote operators and assistance teams are an order of magnitude smaller than putting a driver in every car" - the entire gig is way to expensive and requires "time travel" level of scientific achievements, which is 100% fiction and 0% reality.

Why?

If you can run a fleet of 300 cars with 30 people, that's already enough to make tons of money once you get well-established. You don't need any scientific improvements for that, let alone the ones you're exaggerating.

Re: I’m taking some time away from Comma

#356

Post by mikestew » Mon, Oct 31, 2022, 8:27 PM UTC

thepasswordis wrote: post #354

phphphphp wrote: post #333

Earlier quoted context omitted.

sure, “no closer” is hyperbole and in the most literal sense of the phrase, we are closer because time has passed… but in the practical sense, we are closer today because testing is going well and so permission has been granted to expand testing — the technology is not meaningfully different, what’s happening today could have happened 5 years ago (if safety regulations were more lax and had permitted testing with les…

So what have the engineers working on this been up to for the last 5 years? Nothing?

There's "asking clarify questions", then there's "intentionally missing the point to be argumentative".

Re: I’m taking some time away from Comma

#357

Post by friend_and_foe » Mon, Oct 31, 2022, 8:27 PM UTC

baligena wrote: post #314

friend_and_foe wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree with you about the guy as a person, I think he's great, but I was considering working there and his requirement that you have to move to SV and work in the office was a deal breaker. The guy seems to understand how our kind of work can be done from anywhere, he seems interested in developing technology to enable self sovereignty, yet it seems he has blinders on on that one issue. I'm sure he has some reaso…

he understand so much and interested that he is quitting. Why not stick thru with it?

He explains it in the article. He's the kind of guy that's good at following through when it's exciting, when it becomes a chore he's more a liability than an asset, so he's handing it over to people who can follow through, he's contributed all he can. Paraphrasing.

Re: I’m taking some time away from Comma

#358

Post by mchaver » Mon, Oct 31, 2022, 8:36 PM UTC

thepasswordis wrote: post #79

tensor wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I stopped reading when he brought the Bible into things. I have no time to waste on that sort of thing.

You have no time to waste on western civilization's foundational text? edit: to the people who want to argue this: show me a body of work which has been more influential on western society. What people seem to identify as 'western' values are largely just judeo christian values. The influence of the bible is so ingrained into our society that you will live out the values within it even if you don't realize it. And th…

> to the people who want to argue this: show me a body of work which has been more influential on western society.

A potential competitor would be Ancient Greek Philosophy (Socrates, Plato, Aristotle). Though it is hard to measure.

> What people seem to identify as 'western' values are largely just judeo christian values.

Nope, 'Judeo-Christian values' is a horrible Christian-Americanism that seems to erase the vast differences in Jewish and Christian experiences.

Judaism is a tribal religion with a huge focus on commandments given to said tribe and understanding the texts. Christianity is a religion concerned with the beliefs of all people, including non-Christians. The structure of their societies are quite different and historically Christian countries did not treat Jews well.

So I would add 'Judeo-Christian values' to the list of absurd and completely ahistoric ideas.

Re: I’m taking some time away from Comma

#359

Post by Dylan16807 » Mon, Oct 31, 2022, 8:39 PM UTC

andrewmcwatters wrote: post #323

Eridrus wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not even geohot is asserting that "SAE Level 2 is the most practical self-driving we are ever going to get", his assertion is that he thinks nobody is going to get there in the next 10 years. He may be right that we won't get there broadly for 10 years, but I think that's a rationalization of how things have gone for him, and the fact that the methods he has worked on don't have a chance of getting there, rather than…

You don't have to tell me about Waymo. I live where they operate. I'm one of the few people in the United States who can actually use their service. They limit where you can go by an approximate 4x9 city block area, and actually less than that, I'm being generous. You have no idea exactly how limited the service is. Effectively, you can't go ANYWHERE in the Phoenix metro area unless your A-to-B destination is squarel…

For a grading analogy, an area like that is level 4 minus, but "coast-to-coast" is level 4 plus. You don't need coast to coast to be "real". If they manage to cover 90% of a metro area, I'd be happy to call it a "real" level 4 service. Right now I'd want an explanation for why they're not adding blocks all the time.

Re: I’m taking some time away from Comma

#360

Post by mchaver » Mon, Oct 31, 2022, 8:44 PM UTC

Matl wrote: post #347

thepasswordis wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is so frustrating to me. People hear "the bible is foundational" and I think they're hearing "the magical stories in the bible are literally true. God sat on a cloud and poofed western civilization into existence!" What I'm saying is that, the Dawkins sense, The Bible was an extremely successful meme. I don't think that's even up for debate. >Not everyone eats everything Jordan Peterson says. People need to find…

> People hear "the bible is foundational" and I think they're hearing "the magical stories in the bible are literally true. God sat on a cloud and poofed western civilization into existence!" That's not what I hear. What I hear is more along the lines of "What's in the Bible is somehow original/more profound than what came before and so THAT is the book to take note of", which just isn't true. > People need to find m…

Agreed, that is what I hear as well. It is kind of like Neo-reactionary gotcha, like ok, you are not Christian, but you still need to accept the bible as being really important.

That being said, there are lots of Bible references in the canon of English language literature. So if ones goal is to understand that, then a synopsis of the Bible stories and commonly quoted phrases might just be sufficient. The book is dry, repetitive and a bit inconsistent. It's value is that it is really old and is associated with a big religion. If a modern writer created the same thing it would have a really low rating on Goodreads.