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Tesla's FSD – A Useless Technology Demo

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Re: Tesla's FSD – A Useless Technology Demo

#101

Post by grumbelbart »

rvnx wrote: post #85
ClassyJacket wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But it's... out right now. You can literally use it today.

And it sort of works in limited cases. FSD is like ChatGPT, it works in many cases, it does some mistakes, but it is certainly not “useless”. It won’t replace full time humans yet (the same way that ChatGPT does not replace a developer) but can still work in some scenarios. To the investor, ChatGPT is sold as “AGI is just round the corner”.

But "works in limited cases" is absolutely not enough, given what it promises. It drove into static objects a couple of times, killing people. Recent videos still show behavior like speeding through stop signs: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MGOo06xzCeU&t=990s

Meaning that it's really not reliable enough to take your hands off the wheel.

Waymo shows that it is possible, with today's technology, to do much much better.

Re: Tesla's FSD – A Useless Technology Demo

#102

Post by arp242 »

nelsonic wrote: post #13

The author of this article doesn't understand how continuous improvement in software works ... Saying that it will "never" work is myopic. Never bet against Moores Law or Elon! As a Tesla M3 owner (in Europe where we don't have FSD yet) I cannot wait to have it for long road trips on highways where I want to relax and have a "copilot" do some of the "thinking" & driving for me. Yes, there are still some instances of…

> In December 2015, Musk predicted that "complete autonomy" would be implemented by 2018. At the end of 2016, Tesla expected to demonstrate full autonomy by the end of 2017, and in April 2017, Musk predicted that in around two years, drivers would be able to sleep in their vehicle while it drives itself. In 2018 Tesla revised the date to demonstrate full autonomy to be by the end of 2019.

And this goes on for a bit longer up to the present day.

After close to a decade of failed promise again and again and again I think we can safely dismiss the "perhaps a bit too optimistic" good-faith defence.

But hey, maybe this time it's just around the corner, cross my heart hope to die. And maybe the rapture will be upon us next year like that guy is preaching on the street corner (for real this time – last chance to repent sinners!)

Re: Tesla's FSD – A Useless Technology Demo

#103

Post by imtringued »

michaelt wrote: post #78
cess11 wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why? Because of shadows or does it operate on a 2D 'view' of the traffic situation?

IIRC it's an vision-only ML-based system. So the answer to "why" is probably "we don't know lol"

Image segmentation is almost a solved problem. There is no reason why it should get confused even with a vision only system. Their problem is most likely that they don't have enough compute to process a history of frames and instead process a single image at a time leading to jumps in the segmentation results and those random jumps cause unpredictable braking.

Re: Tesla's FSD – A Useless Technology Demo

#104

Post by imtringued »

choeger wrote: post #42

What everyone seems to be ignoring when it comes to autonomous cars is that the last 1% or 0.1% or whatever remains unsolvable for "AI" might not really matter. We can change roads, ffs! At the bare minimum, we could fence off difficult areas and force manual driving. Once many people own an autonomous car, there will be pressure to make roads safe and convenient for them. Phantom braking for instance, is only a safe…

Every time I see someone start a new planned community I am wondering why they haven't designed it with autonomous vehicles in mind. You could get away with much simpler systems.

Re: Tesla's FSD – A Useless Technology Demo

#105

Post by Animats »

Seen this discussion before.

Musk claims that Tesla will announce fully autonomous driverless taxi mode on August 8th.

That's "announce", not "ship". If this were anywhere near close to happening, there would be test vehicles all over the place, like Waymo and Cruise. There would be press reports. In reality, Tesla has an autonomous vehicle test license in California from the DMV and reports zero miles driven.

Re: Tesla's FSD – A Useless Technology Demo

#106

Post by tsimionescu »

choeger wrote: post #42

What everyone seems to be ignoring when it comes to autonomous cars is that the last 1% or 0.1% or whatever remains unsolvable for "AI" might not really matter. We can change roads, ffs! At the bare minimum, we could fence off difficult areas and force manual driving. Once many people own an autonomous car, there will be pressure to make roads safe and convenient for them. Phantom braking for instance, is only a safe…

You are severely underestimating how much of regular traffic problems are unsolved and far from being solvable with current tech. It's not 1% or 0.1%, it's probably closer to 5% or more if you include all year round conditions and countries with less car-friendly roads than the USA.

Re: Tesla's FSD – A Useless Technology Demo

#107

Post by ascorbic »

roenxi wrote: post #41
Larrikin wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you aren't in the cult of personality, a lot of people need to justify it at this point. I have no interest in buying a Tesla unless he divests fully. Everyone else seems to be catching up without lying about their projected capabilities and I don't need an EV today. I don't want to give him any more money than he has.

How many CEOs & owners have you vetted when making purchases? CEOs are a pretty shady crew as a class of people; it attracts people who like power and they are the dangerous ones. Or people who are single-minded in their focus and they tend to come with a raft of unusual views and personalities. And even after vetting, you're probably just biasing your purchases in favour of CEOs who do image management rather than p…

When I see a Tesla, I think of Elon. When I see another car I don't think of whoever the CEO is, because I don't know who that is. For better or worse, Tesla=Elon in most people's eyes. He had made himself the figurehead, and is an extremely divisive figure. I didn't like feeling that I was implicitly supporting him whenever I got into my car.

Re: Tesla's FSD – A Useless Technology Demo

#108

Post by vachina »

tlonny wrote: post #95
rvnx wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And it sort of works in limited cases. FSD is like ChatGPT, it works in many cases, it does some mistakes, but it is certainly not “useless”. It won’t replace full time humans yet (the same way that ChatGPT does not replace a developer) but can still work in some scenarios. To the investor, ChatGPT is sold as “AGI is just round the corner”.

If ChatGPT emits a fragment of code that doesn’t compile, a developer can simply undo and try again. No such luxury is granted to the driver using FSD who has just collided with another vehicle.

Very low bar to have code that just compiles.

Re: Tesla's FSD – A Useless Technology Demo

#109

Post by deng »

bob1029 wrote: post #89
deng wrote: post #54

And please keep in mind that this is pretty much in the optimal settings for FSD: great weather, huge streets, everything is as "car friendly" as it gets. I'd like to see FSD navigating an old Italian city, there's just no way. Even in car-friendly Germany you very often have streets with side-parking, which are too narrow to fit two cars, you need to communicate with oncoming cars, for instance by waving or flashing…

My neighborhood has the effectively one-way street thing going on. FSD would be a total clown show in here. Tesla would have to add some way to determine the velocity of the oncoming traffic around a 90 degree bend while dealing with extremely limited visibility due to seasonal foliage. They would also have to add a way to factor in the historical behavior of these cars over time. For example, I know the guy who driv…

Yes, what is also important is that in many cities you often need to drive with a bit of... let's say "confidence", otherwise you will never leave your current spot. When you try to enter a busy street, you sometimes JUST NEED TO GO, trusting the oncoming traffic will slow down if needed. Sometimes a nice person will flash headlights to let you know it's OK, but I'm pretty sure FSD will not be able to notice that...

Also, even in rule-abiding Germany, some traffic laws are seen more relaxed than others. For instance, the law says that at a stop sign, you need to come to a full stop, but you will see that most drivers don't do that but just drive very slowly (if that...). Likewise, the law says to keep 1,50m distance from bikes and motorcycles, but in the above mentioned narrow streets, that would also often mean that you will not move at all for a long time. I would guess that FSD would need to abide by traffic laws just for regulatory purposes, and that would make you look like an idiot in many cities...

That's not even to speak of countries where traffic laws in general are more like suggestions...

Re: Tesla's FSD – A Useless Technology Demo

#110

Post by MissTake »

imtringued wrote: post #96
nomilk wrote: post #83

The article answers the wrong question of 'is FSD perfect?'. A better question is whether it's 'cost-benefit positive'. That's all that matters when users decide whether or not to use something. If FSD reduces fatigue and allows you to arrive to work fresher, it might be worth tolerating the odd wrong turn extending the drive time by 2 minutes.

Why would it take a wrong turn if it knows your commute?

Take the example in the article. What if the car had taken that first right turn it tried to but couldn’t then correct due to traffic.

The point has been made it makes incorrect choices - not all can be easily corrected.

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