Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Waymo Safety Impact

waymo.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

161–170 of 424 posts

Re: Waymo Safety Impact

#161

Post by taneq »

rootusrootus wrote: post #147
jjmarr wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Waymo saved my life in LA. When I visited LA, I rode in a Waymo going the speed limit in the right lane on a very busy street. The Waymo approached an intersection where it had the right of way, when suddenly a car ignored its stop sign and drove into the road. In less than a second, the Waymo moved into the left lane and kept going. I didn't even realize what was happening until after it was over. Most human drivers…

I hope you are misremembering. Swerving is most often the wrong choice, and I would be disappointed if Waymo were opting for that. By far the best option is to panic stop. Human or robot, physics is a harsh mistress and swerving is more likely to make you lose control and end up in a much more unforgiving wreck.

This depends a huge amount on car, driver and situation. It was the right advice for a learner driver in the 90s with no stability control, no experience and no side airbags, because if you’re going to hit something, hitting it front on is the least risky way. I’m not convinced it’s the right advice for a competent driver in a modern vehicle.

Re: Waymo Safety Impact

#162

Post by autoexec »

whyenot wrote: post #54
jedberg wrote: post #3

Anecdotally, both from riding in them and walking/driving next to/around them, this feels obvious. They never get distracted. Sure, they sometimes make mistakes, but the mistakes are never "I didn't see that". They see better than humans in all cases (where they operate). They react faster than humans. The one case where they hit a child, it was because the child jumped in front of the car. And they showed that they…

There is also a different kind of increased safety. There is no driver. No weird conversations about slaughtering goats, no sexual advances. No worrying that your driver is going to assault you or attempt to kidnap you. I know, it's all very far fetched, and Uber/Lyft drivers are almost always nice, courteous and professional, but I have experienced a few times when that hasn't been the case. With Waymo, it's not eve…

> There is also a different kind of increased safety. There is no driver. No weird conversations about slaughtering goats, no sexual advances. No worrying that your driver is going to assault you or attempt to kidnap you.

There are also new risks that weren't possible before. A software error can send you into oncoming traffic. Hackers can gain control of your vehicle either directly/remotely or by cleverly designed signage placed on the roadside. A disgruntled waymo contractor in the Philippines can remote drive you into a crowd of people. A flashing stoplight can leave you stranded at an intersection. The car may not see or react appropriately any number of uncommon hazards that human drivers would recognize and avoid. Only a relatively small number of these cars have been on the road, in limited conditions, and only for a small number years. There will be failures and risks we haven't even imagined yet.

Re: Waymo Safety Impact

#163

Post by bloppe »

motbus3 wrote: post #128
jedberg wrote: post #3

Anecdotally, both from riding in them and walking/driving next to/around them, this feels obvious. They never get distracted. Sure, they sometimes make mistakes, but the mistakes are never "I didn't see that". They see better than humans in all cases (where they operate). They react faster than humans. The one case where they hit a child, it was because the child jumped in front of the car. And they showed that they…

When it happens, who will go to jail?

Nobody will. In fact, most car fatalities that are caused by humans involve zero criminal charges for anybody involved. In America, everybody from the courts to the media to society at large is primed to think of car accidents as normal. If you want to murder somebody in the middle of town in broad daylight, you can actually get away with it, as long as you do it with your car.

At least with Waymo, it's much less frequent.

Re: Waymo Safety Impact

#164

Post by DetroitThrow »

whatever1 wrote: post #110
Taek wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Unfortunately, the Waymo only supported Spotify and did not work with my YouTube Music subscription, so I was listening to an advertisement at the time of my near-death experience. 4.5 stars overall. This detail sent me, it's crazy that we can pay $25 to have a life saving robot take us across the city yet Spotify is going to blast ads at us the whole time for the sake of making an extra $0.18 (yes that's the actua…

Imagine your last thing in your mind being an ad about mongoDB.

Thanks for that thought. Horrible.

Re: Waymo Safety Impact

#165

Post by whyenot »

dbt00 wrote: post #120
whyenot wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is also a different kind of increased safety. There is no driver. No weird conversations about slaughtering goats, no sexual advances. No worrying that your driver is going to assault you or attempt to kidnap you. I know, it's all very far fetched, and Uber/Lyft drivers are almost always nice, courteous and professional, but I have experienced a few times when that hasn't been the case. With Waymo, it's not eve…

This is like keeping your kids inside in case something bad happens to them. If your kids never leave the house, something bad definitely happens to them, they stay kids.

I realize it is hard to do this, but please understand that other people have different perspectives on personal safety. For example, try and image how things might be different if you were a woman alone in an Uber with a driver who starts saying weird things.

Re: Waymo Safety Impact

#166

Post by themafia »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #88

13X is way more impressive than it seems at first glance. Let's take a simplistic model of accidents: that the average driver is at fault in an accident 50% of the time. So a perfect driver would only halve the number of accidents -- they only eliminate the accidents where they would otherwise have been at fault. But Waymo's numbers are better than the "perfect" driver above. How is that possible? Because in most acc…

> You can avoid a lot of accidents

More than 1/2 of roadway fatalities involve alcohol or drugs. An oversized fraction of fatalities are represented by young men under 24. 1/6 of all fatalities are motorcycles. 1/6 of all fatalities are pedestrians being struck by a vehicle.

Re: Waymo Safety Impact

#167

Post by cush »

jjmarr wrote: post #53
jedberg wrote: post #3

Anecdotally, both from riding in them and walking/driving next to/around them, this feels obvious. They never get distracted. Sure, they sometimes make mistakes, but the mistakes are never "I didn't see that". They see better than humans in all cases (where they operate). They react faster than humans. The one case where they hit a child, it was because the child jumped in front of the car. And they showed that they…

Waymo saved my life in LA. When I visited LA, I rode in a Waymo going the speed limit in the right lane on a very busy street. The Waymo approached an intersection where it had the right of way, when suddenly a car ignored its stop sign and drove into the road. In less than a second, the Waymo moved into the left lane and kept going. I didn't even realize what was happening until after it was over. Most human drivers…

> Waymo saved my life... Unfortunately the Waymo only supported Spotify

I chuckled

Re: Waymo Safety Impact

#168

Post by rootusrootus »

worldsayshi wrote: post #153
rootusrootus wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hope you are misremembering. Swerving is most often the wrong choice, and I would be disappointed if Waymo were opting for that. By far the best option is to panic stop. Human or robot, physics is a harsh mistress and swerving is more likely to make you lose control and end up in a much more unforgiving wreck.

> swerving is more likely to make you lose control Even if you're not a panicky human but a optimally regulated control system?

The optimally regulated system doesn't know the road conditions that well. When the road surface is more slippery, it has the most profound effect on lateral friction, way more than braking.

Re: Waymo Safety Impact

#169

Post by amelius »

Taek wrote: post #85
jjmarr wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Waymo saved my life in LA. When I visited LA, I rode in a Waymo going the speed limit in the right lane on a very busy street. The Waymo approached an intersection where it had the right of way, when suddenly a car ignored its stop sign and drove into the road. In less than a second, the Waymo moved into the left lane and kept going. I didn't even realize what was happening until after it was over. Most human drivers…

> Unfortunately, the Waymo only supported Spotify and did not work with my YouTube Music subscription, so I was listening to an advertisement at the time of my near-death experience. 4.5 stars overall. This detail sent me, it's crazy that we can pay $25 to have a life saving robot take us across the city yet Spotify is going to blast ads at us the whole time for the sake of making an extra $0.18 (yes that's the actua…

> it's crazy that we can pay $25 to have a life saving robot take us across the city yet Spotify is going to blast ads at us the whole time for the sake of making an extra $0.18 (yes that's the actual number) per hour of listening time.

Oh, the self driving car business will get there, believe me. This is just the first iteration. Designed to get everybody on board with the idea.

Re: Waymo Safety Impact

#170

Post by uv-depression »

freetime2 wrote: post #148
uv-depression wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Americans will vehemently deny this, but you're absolutely right. Decades of car industry propaganda has convinced people that the ability to drive anywhere is true freedom, and they can't see that the freedom not to need a car (all the time) is better for everyone; cities are quieter, more comfortable, and less polluted with fewer cars (no, electric cars don't fix this). It leads to other absurdities, like US cities…

Yes, this debate comes up every time someone mentions the word "car" on the internet, and there are crazies on both sides. But I don't think it's fair to frame either side of the debate by what the crazies are saying. Or to assume that just because someone disagrees with you they have fallen victim to propaganda. I think most Americans just like their cars and are reasonably happy with the status quo. They can be rec…

But it objectively makes cities worse. People love visiting Europe in part because they don't do this to nearly the same extent (obviously this varies by country/city). People aren't entitled to not having their opinions be proven wrong, nor are they entitled to ignore negative externalities (pollution, noise, danger, unpleasant city centres, and so on).

> are reasonably happy with the status quo.

They're not, except for the having a car part. Road maintenance, especially in the suburbs, is hideously expensive and is falling further and further behind. Cars are the least efficient mode of transit, so traffic gets worse and worse. "Just one more lane" always makes it worse (induced demand), but that's the only solution being tried. The only way to make traffic better is to get significant numbers of people to switch to other modes, and you're simply not going to do that with "incremental improvements" because the status quo is so abysmal for anything other than a car. Cars themselves are horribly expensive and yet are required in most US cities; most are in effect paying a tax to car companies to participate in society.

> being told they are wrong for liking their car.

Who said this?

Post reply on HN