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Waymo updates 3,800 robotaxis after they 'drive into standing water'

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Re: Waymo updates 3,800 robotaxis after they 'drive into standing water'

#91

Post by Aaronstotle »

Animats wrote: post #2

That's a tough problem - distinguishing wet pavement from deep water. Humans make that mistake frequently. Autonomous vehicles should probably be equipped with a water sensor. (We did that in our DARPA Grand Challenge vehicle back in 2005). Then they can enter water very cautiously and see if it's too deep. This may make them too cautious about shallow puddles on roads, though.

This is also why they recommend not to use polarized while cycling, it can obscure slicks or water in certain sections. I still use mine but I know it's not as ideal as photo chromatic lenses.

Re: Waymo updates 3,800 robotaxis after they 'drive into standing water'

#92

Post by gpm »

Animats wrote: post #2

That's a tough problem - distinguishing wet pavement from deep water. Humans make that mistake frequently. Autonomous vehicles should probably be equipped with a water sensor. (We did that in our DARPA Grand Challenge vehicle back in 2005). Then they can enter water very cautiously and see if it's too deep. This may make them too cautious about shallow puddles on roads, though.

If they've mapped the surface of the water relative to themselves... couldn't they slowly wade in and just calculate the depth based on that 3d model without extra sensors.

Assumes there's no abrupt cliff to fall off... but short of the ability to make a 3d map underwater that seems inevitable.

Re: Waymo updates 3,800 robotaxis after they 'drive into standing water'

#93

Post by cpgxiii »

tintor wrote: post #13
srameshc wrote: post #5

Does anyone with a better understanding about LIDAR vs camera approach to autonomous drivng explain how would Tesla handle such situation ?

LIDAR isn't helpful for water. Standing water behaves like a mirror on LIDAR.

Not necessarily. Depending on angle and water depth, multi-return LIDAR can give you returns from both water surface and the road surface beneath, in the same way multi-return LIDAR can produce returns from vegetation and the ground beneath.

Re: Waymo updates 3,800 robotaxis after they 'drive into standing water'

#94

Post by AnimalMuppet »

eraGq wrote: post #88
Animats wrote: post #2

That's a tough problem - distinguishing wet pavement from deep water. Humans make that mistake frequently. Autonomous vehicles should probably be equipped with a water sensor. (We did that in our DARPA Grand Challenge vehicle back in 2005). Then they can enter water very cautiously and see if it's too deep. This may make them too cautious about shallow puddles on roads, though.

Any human can distinguish wet pavement from a flooded street. Some voluntarily drive into the flooded street. And that is the difference. In a Waymo you are a prisoner, in your own car you can turn around.

Any human can't necessarily tell the difference between an inch of water, which is perfectly safe to drive on (if slow enough that you don't hydroplane), and a flooded street. They can tell the difference between an inch of water and wet pavement, though.

Re: Waymo updates 3,800 robotaxis after they 'drive into standing water'

#95

Post by gjm11 »

giacomoforte wrote: post #54
alex1138 wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

About what

That you need world models to sensibly deploy "thinking" machines in the real world. Else they do stupid shit like drive straight into water. You can bruteforce some semblance of thinking by training on literally all knowledge that can be digitized but even that is proving to not be quite enough.

This seems like an odd take. Don't existing self-driving cars already have rather a lot of world-model? It's not like they're just hooking the driving apparatus to the output of an LLM or something.

(Of course there is also scope for debate about how much world model today's LLMs have; it seems like it's more than none even though it has to be built out of token-shuffling parts. But that's not relevant here.)

Re: Waymo updates 3,800 robotaxis after they 'drive into standing water'

#96

Post by michaelt »

reaperducer wrote: post #82
drob518 wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a particularly hard problem in Texas. We get torrential rains and the landscape is relatively flat. Couple that with shallow soil over lots of limestone and it means flooding is really common. We also have roads that have a “low water crossing,” where a road crosses a creekbed that is normally dry but which will flood. There are often water depth signs there (basically a vertical ruler with feet marks so you can…

Texas has it easy. I've seen several places in England (and at least one in the western United States) where they have fords. For those not familiar, water runs over the road full-time, and people are expected to just drive through it like it's no big deal. Except for right after a storm, when it is a big deal. It's essentially the intersection of a road and a stream where a bridge should be, but nobody ever built on…

For example: https://maps.app.goo.gl/eqjHKqDxGxFNz47D7 complete with the google streetview car (presumably) driving through it

And a collection of videos https://www.youtube.com/@jawalton2001/videos - it goes without saying, these aren't major thoroughfares.

Re: Waymo updates 3,800 robotaxis after they 'drive into standing water'

#97

Post by cucumber3732842 »

eraGq wrote: post #88
Animats wrote: post #2

That's a tough problem - distinguishing wet pavement from deep water. Humans make that mistake frequently. Autonomous vehicles should probably be equipped with a water sensor. (We did that in our DARPA Grand Challenge vehicle back in 2005). Then they can enter water very cautiously and see if it's too deep. This may make them too cautious about shallow puddles on roads, though.

Any human can distinguish wet pavement from a flooded street. Some voluntarily drive into the flooded street. And that is the difference. In a Waymo you are a prisoner, in your own car you can turn around.

This is the naive "if you can't stop you're following too close" circular definition based take. Makes for good rightthink points on reddit and communities of similar quality membership but you're not actually gonna build anything useful thinking like that.

In order to drive reasonably humans need to drive through water that is 6-12in deep on occasion. That's just how it is. Near me it's whenever the storm drain at the bottom of the hill clogs.

Re: Waymo updates 3,800 robotaxis after they 'drive into standing water'

#98

Post by alexnewman »

Animats wrote: post #2

That's a tough problem - distinguishing wet pavement from deep water. Humans make that mistake frequently. Autonomous vehicles should probably be equipped with a water sensor. (We did that in our DARPA Grand Challenge vehicle back in 2005). Then they can enter water very cautiously and see if it's too deep. This may make them too cautious about shallow puddles on roads, though.

My commaai can do this. I'm pretty sure tesla can as well

Re: Waymo updates 3,800 robotaxis after they 'drive into standing water'

#99

Post by dzhiurgis »

Aaronstotle wrote: post #91
Animats wrote: post #2

That's a tough problem - distinguishing wet pavement from deep water. Humans make that mistake frequently. Autonomous vehicles should probably be equipped with a water sensor. (We did that in our DARPA Grand Challenge vehicle back in 2005). Then they can enter water very cautiously and see if it's too deep. This may make them too cautious about shallow puddles on roads, though.

This is also why they recommend not to use polarized while cycling, it can obscure slicks or water in certain sections. I still use mine but I know it's not as ideal as photo chromatic lenses.

This is how I got my shoes wet climbing around rock pools last weekend.

Re: Waymo updates 3,800 robotaxis after they 'drive into standing water'

#100

Post by alexnewman »

Animats wrote: post #2

That's a tough problem - distinguishing wet pavement from deep water. Humans make that mistake frequently. Autonomous vehicles should probably be equipped with a water sensor. (We did that in our DARPA Grand Challenge vehicle back in 2005). Then they can enter water very cautiously and see if it's too deep. This may make them too cautious about shallow puddles on roads, though.

Do they make this mistake frequently? How frequently? I've seen people overestimate things, but I don't think this is as hard as one might think
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