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Waymo Safety Impact

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Re: Waymo Safety Impact

#331

Post by Dylan16807 »

rootusrootus wrote: post #177
1shooner wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On most US highways (i.e. multi-lane limited access roads), it's customary to leave a path in the left 'passing lane' for any traffic that wants/needs to go faster than you. If cars match speeds across lanes, it impedes faster traffic. The speed limit itself is a separate convention and regulation. In some places you can be cited for obstructing traffic by going the speed limit in the passing lane if you are matching…

> If cars match speeds across lanes, it impedes faster traffic. I think this undersells it a little. It does not just impede faster traffic, when the lanes are pacing each other it makes navigating harder -- simply switching lanes is more difficult. The highway moves so much more efficiently with a small but steady difference in speed between each lane.

That doesn't make sense to me. If you want to change lanes, and worst case scenario you're right next to someone, go 2mph slower for 20 seconds and they'll be shifted by 60 feet. I'm sure you can plan your lane changes on a freeway 20 seconds in advance.

Re: Waymo Safety Impact

#332

Post by haspok »

socalgal2 wrote: post #324
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…

Waymo supporting music services at all is stupid to me. They should just let you bluetooth your phone and play your own music. I don't want any of those services. I want my own music.

Why do you even want music?

There is a large group of people (maybe even the majority?) who, as soon as they get in a car, MUST immediately turn on the radio or some kind of extra noise source. Is this some kind of a Pavlovian reflex?

I'm always amazed by this, as my car is one of the few places where I have actual control over my environment (unlike on public transport, or at my workplace, or even in my home - neighbours can be noisy...). We are living in a sea of unwanted noise, bombarded by constant ads and "music", so it is nice to have a place of "quiet".

Re: Waymo Safety Impact

#333

Post by JumpCrisscross »

tjoff wrote: post #294
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> could just be, and seems to be in some cases at least, because Waymo doesn't behave like a human would, and people gets tripped up Driving conventions vary wildly across states and even within them. And foreign drivers are a thing. A human who gets tripped up by a Waymo acting unusually will also get confused by someone getting used to no turns on right in Manhattan, driving on the right side of the road if coming…

... no? That children, animals etc. acts differently everyone knows. But what about a self-driving car that looks the same as every other car? Anyway, it was Waymos own findings when they started out. They got into more accidents, none of which where their own fault, than expected and realized that they had to make it behave more like a human to not confuse human drivers.

> ... no?

Which part are you confused about?

> what about a self-driving car that looks the same as every other car?

My Aussie friends, when they visit America, don't put up a sign in their window saying they're Aussie and will occasionally try to turn left at a red.

> They got into more accidents, none of which where their own fault, than expected and realized that they had to make it behave more like a human to not confuse human drivers

Sure. I'm still filing this in the nothingburger file. If anything, it screams that we have a lot of people on the road who should not be.

Re: Waymo Safety Impact

#334

Post by rhizome »

MagicMoonlight wrote: post #325
socalgal2 wrote: post #324

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Waymo supporting music services at all is stupid to me. They should just let you bluetooth your phone and play your own music. I don't want any of those services. I want my own music.

But think of the shareholders and their tasty dividends

If the CEO isn't juicing market cap 110% of the time, the board will prosecute them and they will go to JAIL!

Re: Waymo Safety Impact

#335

Post by rhizome »

cco wrote: post #155
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…

Thankfully they've now shipped their own product, YouTube Music. And Google Pay, imagine my surprise back in 2021 when I signed up for Waymo and realized I had to manually type in my credit card. No Google Pay??? C'mon y'all, you're Alphabet!

Google only hires the best of the best.

Re: Waymo Safety Impact

#336

Post by Dylan16807 »

bitfilped wrote: post #258

Great, what's more concerning than crash rates though are impeding emergency vehicles, blocking roads, stalling when traffic lights are down, rolling past school buses with stop arms out, navigating in construction zones and lots of other issues that are left out of this report.

No, I think those are solidly less concerning than crash and injury rates.

Like, could you imagine yourself seeing a self driving car that's perfect in all the ways like that, no dumb quirks, but it crashes twice as often as a human, and saying "well it got the important stuff right"

Re: Waymo Safety Impact

#337

Post by rhizome »

jjmarr wrote: post #190
cucumber3732842 wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you're over-playing how decisively a Waymo will move and under-playing how decent the average human is. I've ridden in Waymos. They don't exactly slap on the blinker and move at the limit of traction like someone about to miss their exit. If cut off they absolutely will go full brake rather than perform any sort of spicy lane change or turn.

> If cut off they absolutely will go full brake rather than perform any sort of spicy lane change or turn. Essentially, a meat driver was waiting at a stop sign to make a turn onto the main road. I was in a Waymo driving on the main road and did not have a stop sign. When we were 10 meters away from the intersection, the meat driver suddenly started to enter the intersection. I have no idea why. Full brake would've h…

Pulling out randomly, I see it all the time. I beat the computer by a) anticipating; and b) assuming other drivers are idiots who don't see me. I don't have to calculate trajectories and whatnot, people aren't computers, and they can do some things better than a computer can, especially a solely-reactive one.

Re: Waymo Safety Impact

#338

Post by motbus3 »

thebigman433 wrote: post #139
motbus3 wrote: post #126

If someone drives badly they might go to jail if they hurt or kill someone. If a machine does it who pays? I want to see waymo and other CEO for decades for each mistake.

I feel like an important thing here is that we are very much not good at imprisoning bad drivers at all, even if they injure or kill multiple people. We rarely even take away their licenses! The only type of car crash that consistently gets some level of enforcement is drunk driving, basically everything else is written off as an accident

Maybe at your country. Not at mine. Driving irresponsibly might have consequences. If you race, advance red light on don't stop for pedestrians, if there is not enough evidence you couldn't do anything about it, you might go to jail.

Re: Waymo Safety Impact

#339

Post by mapleoin »

So how long until this is enshittified and how will it go? Will people ask for cars to be faster so they will take riskier decisions? Will a cheaper company with a worse training model capture the most market share? Pilot products are usually great, but that rarely lasts into their profitable period.

Re: Waymo Safety Impact

#340

Post by konschubert »

rao-v wrote: post #175
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…

Riding a motorcycle or even a bicycle around Waymos feels surprisingly safer. You can reliably predict so many things about how it will behave and to an extent even its traffic calming effect on other cars.

Yea. Cycling around self-driving cars is obviously much safer and many more people will be encouraged to do it.
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