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New Study: Waymo is reducing serious crashes and making streets safer

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Re: New Study: Waymo is reducing serious crashes and making streets safer

#291

Post by Ukv »

ringeryless wrote: post #280

i am suspicious of all the anti-human-driver comments and all the dismissal of any concerns about Waymo in the comments here. I am not convinced that public testing of such services is safe, let alone commercial service. One cannot punish a self driving vehicle in any meaningful sense. Corporate incentives vs the public commons, is a general concern that cannot be sweettalked away. The metaphors about human drivers r…

> i am suspicious of all the anti-human-driver comments [...] I am not convinced that public testing of such services is safe

There are currently over a million fatalities from road traffic crashes every year, being the leading cause of death for the 5-29 year age group[0].

I'd claim that inaction is unacceptably dangerous/deadly here and that, to minimize deaths, we need to be aggressive in trying out and pushing forward potential solutions.

> One cannot punish a self driving vehicle in any meaningful sense.

The goal of punishment for driving offenses is, in my eyes, largely about reducing unsafe behavior - not just to make someone suffer. Fines/incentives for manufacturers and fine-tuning of models based on incident data should fulfill this purpose.

[0]: https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/road-traffi...

Re: New Study: Waymo is reducing serious crashes and making streets safer

#292

Post by sneak »

squigz wrote: post #289
sneak wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On most roads, speeding isn’t a safety issue and shouldn’t be discouraged, as road throughput is important. Speed limits are usually set too low due to standardized inflexible policies or desire for revenue. On some roads, however, it is a massive safety issue, and everyone is driving unsafely because the road is designed badly for its intended purpose. (So-called “stroads” are the canonical example.)

I would expect "most roads" to be comprised of residential roads, and I find it hard to believe speeding on those roads is not a safety issue.

The speed limits on most residential roads are too low from a variety of factors, including tradition, policies, and desire for revenue or to generate PC to pull over drivers.

You don't drive 25 on residential roads, because you know this to be true. Neither do I, nor does anyone else.

Re: New Study: Waymo is reducing serious crashes and making streets safer

#293

Post by sneak »

Mawr wrote: post #272
sneak wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On most roads, speeding isn’t a safety issue and shouldn’t be discouraged, as road throughput is important. Speed limits are usually set too low due to standardized inflexible policies or desire for revenue. On some roads, however, it is a massive safety issue, and everyone is driving unsafely because the road is designed badly for its intended purpose. (So-called “stroads” are the canonical example.)

Yeah and we should definitely leave deciding the appropriate speed to the drivers. Because, uh, throughput is important, got it. Is safety important? Who knows, but throughput definitely is!

That is what happens now. Most drivers do not cause accidents from speed most of the time. This is a red herring.

Re: New Study: Waymo is reducing serious crashes and making streets safer

#296

Post by saagarjha »

mitthrowaway2 wrote: post #213
dylan604 wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

man, the Googs already has a library of images of you. If there's anything about you that the Googs doesn't already know, I'd be shocked. the Googs probably knows you better than your therapist, because you've only shared with your therapist what you wanted. the Googs gets data about you from places you know nothing about. being concerned that a Waymo car took your picture isn't invalid, but man is it a tear drop in…

If "the Googs" knows so much about me, why do they keep showing me ads for products I not only have zero interest in, I'm also not even the target demographic for?

Because someone is paying Google to show those to you.

Re: New Study: Waymo is reducing serious crashes and making streets safer

#297

Post by jillesvangurp »

indigodaddy wrote: post #34

How do AI cars fare with those instinctual "decide which way to swerve in a split-second" scenarios that come up maybe once every 10-20 years over the course of a driver's history?? It's happened to me about 2-3 times and I've always made the "(assumedly) correct" split second swerve decision. Wondering if that is a "human/instinctual" skill and if AI cars do just as well or better, or perhaps not as good? I don't ha…

Far quicker and with better situational awareness probably.

Those instinctual human responses can be wrong/misguided as well and can have pretty serious ripple effects (e.g. most chain collisions after somebody panics and steps on the breaks). And even when those instincts work correctly, they rely on driver focus and attention; which to put it mildly is not very reliable. The lack of that is a well known root cause of many accidents. People get tired, distracted, etc. or become otherwise unfocused from driving safely. And of course some drivers are simply not that competent, barely know traffic rules or how to drive safely. The barrier for getting a drivers license is pretty low. And all that is before you consider road rage, drunk drivers, elderly drivers with cognitive and visual impairments, and all the other people who really shouldn't be driving a car.

If you rank AIs against most drivers, they probably hit the top percentile in terms of safety and consistency. Even if you are in that percentile (and most drivers would likely overestimate their abilities), most human drivers around you aren't and never will be.

Traffic deaths in the U.S. are staggering — annually far exceeding the fatalities of most U.S. military conflicts since World War II, including the peak years of the Vietnam war. It's hard to do worse than that for AI drivers. The status quo isn't very safe. Most of that is human instincts not working as advertised. People really suck at driving.

Re: New Study: Waymo is reducing serious crashes and making streets safer

#298

Post by RandomBacon »

GavinMcG wrote: post #288
rlue wrote: post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The one time I ever rode in a waymo (in Los Angeles), I had a contradictory experience. My Waymo was attempting to make a right turn at a red light. We were stopped behind a human driver who was waiting for pedestrians to finish crossing before proceeding to make the turn. This was a college campus (UCLA), so there were lots of pedestrians. After a few seconds of waiting, the Waymo decided that the driver ahead of us…

That mistake might induce human error—which is absolutely a source of danger—but it undoubtedly had a clear path to pull around the “stopped” vehicle, and as you said, you can generally trust Wayno not to plow into pedestrians. So what made it “lucky” that no one was hurt?

If the "stopped" vehicle made the turn as the Waymo made the presumably-illegal turn into the "stopped" vehicle that was now moving?

Re: New Study: Waymo is reducing serious crashes and making streets safer

#299

Post by im3w1l »

netsharc wrote: post #190
decimalenough wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Waymo can drive cars but it can't magick new roads into existence. If car usage goes through the roof, so will traffic jams.

Probably not, if they're all computer-controlled, and can communicate with each other. I posit traffic jams is mostly caused by idiot and reckless drivers...

The throughput of a road is car density * speed. So from a pure throughput perspective, the ideal driver is a tailgating speed demon. To maximize time spent at high speed you should also floor it when the light turns green, and slam the brakes at the last possible moment when it goes red.

Re: New Study: Waymo is reducing serious crashes and making streets safer

#300

Post by bluGill »

mitthrowaway2 wrote: post #213
dylan604 wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

man, the Googs already has a library of images of you. If there's anything about you that the Googs doesn't already know, I'd be shocked. the Googs probably knows you better than your therapist, because you've only shared with your therapist what you wanted. the Googs gets data about you from places you know nothing about. being concerned that a Waymo car took your picture isn't invalid, but man is it a tear drop in…

If "the Googs" knows so much about me, why do they keep showing me ads for products I not only have zero interest in, I'm also not even the target demographic for?

Because they need to hide some of what they know about you. There have been cases where they (in this case target not google) knew a 14 year old was pregnant - but the ads for things she needed are sensitive. So the industry has learned everyone gets a few ads that don't apply just to give cover for those that do but someone doesn't admit to.

also some ads really are to everyone. You may not be in a place where you would think about a car, but car makers don't want you to forget you could just in case your situation changes. They also want you to think of some goods as luxuries so you are impressed when you see someone who does have it.

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