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Tesla's 2M car Autopilot recall is now under federal scrutiny

arstechnica.com

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Re: Tesla's 2M car Autopilot recall is now under federal scrutiny

#21

Post by FireBeyond »

One of the big things to remember from all of this is that "if airbags do not deploy, Tesla does not consider it an accident" when it is touting its (already inaccurate and misleading for other reasons) "safety".

As an automobile manufacturer, there is no good conscience reasoning that Tesla is unaware that active restraint and airbag systems of today are far more nuanced and weigh multiple criteria when deciding to deploy (as compared to initial/early implementations, which were essentially "if collision=true and speed >= X mph then deploy"). You can have a very significant incident (two that I've witnessed recently as a paramedic involved vehicles into stationary objects at ~30mph) without airbag deployment. But if that was a Tesla in FSD that hit something at 30mph and didn't deploy airbags, well, that's not an accident according to Tesla.

That also doesn't account for "incident was so catastrophic that restraint systems could not deploy", also "not counted" by Tesla. Or just as egregious, "systems failed to deploy for any reason up to and including poor assembly line quality control", also not an accident and also "not counted".

Re: Tesla's 2M car Autopilot recall is now under federal scrutiny

#22

Post by whoknowsidont »

psunavy03 wrote: post #11
vasco wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Just hammer the people who abuse them with reckless driving charges. That surely helps the now dead people they crash into. The manufacturer can prevent deaths by adding safety features, so it should to a reasonable extent.

So we are also going to require breathalyzer interlocks on everyone's car as well?

Honestly not opposed to this.

Re: Tesla's 2M car Autopilot recall is now under federal scrutiny

#23

Post by bottlepalm »

I'd rather be driving on the road with Autopilot cars than the impatient drivers, road ragers, distracted people on their phone, and people who drive like they're in a video game.

I drive with it on 95% on the time, and I really only need to interrupt when it's too slow and too cautious.

Re: Tesla's 2M car Autopilot recall is now under federal scrutiny

#24

Post by FireBeyond »

tgma wrote: post #14
loudmax wrote: post #7

If Tesla hadn't named their driver assistance system "Autopilot" they would have saved so much trouble (not to mention lives).

I can see you can potentially argue (unsuccessfully IMHO) that it is marketing fraud in inducing purchases of the vehicle, but I don't buy it that a single person who actually owns the vehicle and have driven on Autopilot for more than a week is confused by the abilities of the system because the name is Autopilot. People text and drive _all the time_ on their ICE carriages without Autopilot too. Thus the claim that…

Yeah, except of those people who have bought (at a significant price) those features, and understand that they're nowhere near their "aspirational" goals (When Tesla has been called out by the SEC and DMVs for some of Musk's more absurd statements, the company has quietly whispered to them "these are aspirational goals", and in one case, to the California DMV, "Musk's visionary statements are not reflective of engineering reality")...

a significant portion of them still allow their car to do stupid/dangerous/risky things, because they believe that the car learns and adapts from this, and sends this data back to Tesla for further learning.

Which it doesn't, as this article states. Those drivers are "it's okay if I run the occasional stop sign because it'll help my Tesla stop at the next one", "it's okay if I do XYZ..." when it won't do anything except put others (and themselves) at risk.

Re: Tesla's 2M car Autopilot recall is now under federal scrutiny

#27

Post by kbenson »

psunavy03 wrote: post #11
vasco wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Just hammer the people who abuse them with reckless driving charges. That surely helps the now dead people they crash into. The manufacturer can prevent deaths by adding safety features, so it should to a reasonable extent.

So we are also going to require breathalyzer interlocks on everyone's car as well?

Why are we even going there when the article, and the NHTSA report note some very easy first steps?

As Ars has noted time and again, Tesla's Autopilot system has a more permissive operational design domain than any comparable driver-assistance system that still requires the driver to keep their hands on the wheel and their eyes on the road, and NHTSA's report adds that "Autopilot invited greater driver confidence via its higher control authority and ease of engagement."

Re: Tesla's 2M car Autopilot recall is now under federal scrutiny

#29

Post by stetrain »

loudmax wrote: post #7

If Tesla hadn't named their driver assistance system "Autopilot" they would have saved so much trouble (not to mention lives).

The underlying issue isn't the name, it's the mismatch between marketing claims, actual performance, and what it lets you "get away" with.

They released a system that will engage on almost any road and provides a firm steering force that will steer without driver interaction.

Unlike some competing systems, they did not include dedicated hardware for monitoring driver attention, or restrict operation to separated highways.

Ever since, they have been trying to layer on increasingly annoying nags to jiggle the wheel, or use the low res interior camera to try to determine driver attention, to try to work backwards from the fact that they didn't provide for proper driver monitoring to begin with or build a system that discourages zoning out.

Re: Tesla's 2M car Autopilot recall is now under federal scrutiny

#30

Post by tgma »

FireBeyond wrote: post #24
tgma wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can see you can potentially argue (unsuccessfully IMHO) that it is marketing fraud in inducing purchases of the vehicle, but I don't buy it that a single person who actually owns the vehicle and have driven on Autopilot for more than a week is confused by the abilities of the system because the name is Autopilot. People text and drive _all the time_ on their ICE carriages without Autopilot too. Thus the claim that…

Yeah, except of those people who have bought (at a significant price) those features, and understand that they're nowhere near their "aspirational" goals (When Tesla has been called out by the SEC and DMVs for some of Musk's more absurd statements, the company has quietly whispered to them "these are aspirational goals", and in one case, to the California DMV, "Musk's visionary statements are not reflective of engine…

The aspirational claims are not about Autopilot, but FSD (and I agree that having people pay for FSD in 2015 is borderline fraudulent. It is a consumer protection matter, not a safety matter.)

Again, the statements to California DMV or SEC or Congress is one thing. Whether the owner is confused by the abilities of their vehicle post purchase and driving for a week is a distinct matter.

> Those drivers are "it's okay if I run the occasional stop sign because it'll help my Tesla stop at the next one

I think this is simply a made-up and ridiculous characterization. People break traffic laws all the time because they are selfish and it is convenient for themselves. Tesla drivers are no different. Have you seen a single consumer, not an employee, who does this for training data for Tesla?

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