Tesla worker killed in fiery crash may be first 'Full Self-Driving' fatality • Hacker News Board

Re: Tesla worker killed in fiery crash may be first 'Full Self-Driving' fatality

#141

Post by judge2020 » Tue, Feb 13, 2024, 5:00 PM UTC

ceejayoz wrote: post #125

Kerbonut wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Normalizing the data to make a direct comparison is a hard problem. Do you know of any research done to try to do that?

It's a lot easier to tease out the impact of individual safety features. For example, there's quite a bit of evidence that lane departure warnings/assistance helps: https://www.consumerreports.org/car-safety/lane-departure-wa... Less indication backup cameras do anything: https://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-hy-back-up-cameras-20... Tesla's non-autopilot numbers likely reflect the fact that they're exclusively newe…

> Tesla's non-autopilot numbers likely reflect the fact that they're exclusively newer vehicles with safety features that aren't yet widely standard. You'd probably see similarly nice numbers for other $50k+ luxury vehicles with similar bells-and-whistles.

This is probably not possible since those automakers don't do constant data collection in the same way Tesla does. Tesla's telemetry logs actual data for the distance their cars are driving and whether AP is enabled. All we have for other brands is NHTSA's approximations.

Re: Tesla worker killed in fiery crash may be first 'Full Self-Driving' fatality

#142

Post by NoPedantsThanks » Tue, Feb 13, 2024, 5:01 PM UTC

kristjansson wrote: post #76

WirelessGigabit wrote: post #47

While I don't know how good Tesla's self-driving is, I do have experience with a limited keep-your-lane system in a BMW. The one that actually steers. It requires a lot of force to override it. And remember, it requires you to keep the hands on the wheel. But you are not expecting to have to fight it, so there are some delays there. Then you're fighting a system that you don't know how much force it takes to override…

> If you don't turn on your turn signal ... the car will literally steer back This kills me about BMW's lane-keep system. It doesn't just lane-keep in the absence of input, it actively fights driver input that would take it over the lane lines.

[dead]

Re: Tesla worker killed in fiery crash may be first 'Full Self-Driving' fatality

#143

Post by tshaddox » Tue, Feb 13, 2024, 5:01 PM UTC

ec109685 wrote: post #74

WirelessGigabit wrote: post #47

While I don't know how good Tesla's self-driving is, I do have experience with a limited keep-your-lane system in a BMW. The one that actually steers. It requires a lot of force to override it. And remember, it requires you to keep the hands on the wheel. But you are not expecting to have to fight it, so there are some delays there. Then you're fighting a system that you don't know how much force it takes to override…

Teslas don’t require much force at all to disengage.

I have a 2020 Subaru that requires very little force to move the steering wheel when lane centering is engaged. My Tesla Model 3 requires a bit more force, but it's still quite light.

Re: Tesla worker killed in fiery crash may be first 'Full Self-Driving' fatality

#144

Post by ajross » Tue, Feb 13, 2024, 5:01 PM UTC

ra7 wrote: post #34

ajross wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a supervised system as deployed. How much "blind faith" are you really seeing vs. what you think you're interpreting. None of us are taking naps in the cars. The system does continue to make mistakes, though virtually always of the "too conservative" variety. But it's also the most fun I've had in a vehicle in my whole life and an absolutely sale-maker for me personally. I simply won't buy a vehicle from another…

> So... I guess I repeat the question: where are you seeing "Tesla fans" using FSD unsupervised? One of the biggest Tesla influencers using FSD without his hands on the wheel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fFW4e0Pkz_Y This is explicitly disallowed by FSD terms and conditions. He does this all the time.

That seems like a bad faith argument. Do you genuinely feel that driving with your hands in your lap constitutes dangerous operation? The car asks for your hands on the wheel because that's the primary sensor it uses to monitor attention.

In particular, do you genuinely feel that driving an FSD car with your hands in your lap constitutes the kind of inattention we were actually talking about (driving with a .26 BAC!).

I mean, you don't freak out if you see someone using cruise control without their foot hovering over the brake, do you? Objectively and largely inarguably, braking control latency is more important to safety than steering latency.

Re: Tesla worker killed in fiery crash may be first 'Full Self-Driving' fatality

#145

Post by xenadu02 » Tue, Feb 13, 2024, 5:02 PM UTC

ra7 wrote: post #48

As I said in another comment, these two were idiots driving drunk. Let's get that out of the way. The bigger issue here is how this deniability is all too convenient for Tesla. The process goes like this: 1. Ship a clearly half baked system called "Full Self Driving". 2. Require driver's hands on the wheel at all times. 3. Be extremely non-transparent about your system's safety. Tesla's crash reports in the public NH…

Full disclosure: participated in Tesla's IPO, own a Tesla.

Tesla should be doing two things that would greatly reduce their liability while also keeping customers happy. Overall I think it wouldn't change the number of people buying into FSD anyway so there wouldn't be much downside for them.

1. Offer refunds for those for paid for FSD. Full refund until FSD has been enabled for a year and used more than N times, prorated after that based on usage. That gives existing customers a window to try it out and get their money back if they don't like it, with a full refund if they only tried it out or a partial refund even if they used the feature a lot.

2. Be clearer in their marketing and on the purchase page about the feature. Sell your vision of it but also be honest about the current state of it. IMHO it isn't that hard of a sell to most customers but you'd be setting accurate expectations. Tech-aware people or those of us into EV tech are aware of FSD's limits but you are only going to disappoint people if they think FSD really is capable of full unattended self driving right now. That only hurts your brand and erodes trust. You can't hide the details in 6-point lawyerese and expect customers to be happy with you.

I was aware of the limits of FSD when we bought the car and considered it an investment in the future... but I don't use it often and told my spouse not to either. It is a beta feature and must be used with care.

Re: Tesla worker killed in fiery crash may be first 'Full Self-Driving' fatality

#146

Post by amluto » Tue, Feb 13, 2024, 5:02 PM UTC

cptcobalt wrote: post #81

This is a sensationalized hit piece against Tesla Autopilot. It is definitely unfortunate the drunk employee operating the car was involved in a crash, that at least from the wp reporting sounds avoidable—Autopilot active or not. Any death is unfortunate, and an opportunity to improve vehicle safety. Tesla's Q4 2023 stats should speak for themselves: > In the 4th quarter, we recorded one crash for every 5.39 million…

> Tesla's Q4 2023 stats should speak for themselves:

When stats speak for themselves, they’re quite likely misleading.

> > In the 4th quarter, we recorded one crash for every 5.39 million miles driven in which drivers were using Autopilot technology. For drivers who were not using Autopilot technology, we recorded one crash for every 1.00 million miles driven. By comparison, the most recent data available from NHTSA and FHWA (from 2022) shows that in the United States there was an automobile crash approximately every 670,000 miles.

Let’s start with the obvious: what about crashes that occurred within, say, 10 seconds of autopilot turning off?

And the slightly more subtle: the distributions of roads and conditions driven on autopilot is surely very different than the distribution driven manually. One could try to control for this by identifying segment of road driven on autopilot in, say 10 minute intervals. Then normalize the analysis in the autopilot and manual groups to weight each (road segment, time segment) equally in each groups.

As a concrete example of the latter issue, consider I-80 through Donner Pass. In good conditions, it’s a very nice freeway. In snow, it’s not so nice. I would expect the general accident rate to by far more than 5.39x higher in snow. But, in snow, autopilot will get rather less use. (And I bet autopilot is very likely to disengage, by itself or by driver override, if the car loses traction.)

Re: Tesla worker killed in fiery crash may be first 'Full Self-Driving' fatality

#147

Post by cjensen » Tue, Feb 13, 2024, 5:03 PM UTC

cptcobalt wrote: post #81

This is a sensationalized hit piece against Tesla Autopilot. It is definitely unfortunate the drunk employee operating the car was involved in a crash, that at least from the wp reporting sounds avoidable—Autopilot active or not. Any death is unfortunate, and an opportunity to improve vehicle safety. Tesla's Q4 2023 stats should speak for themselves: > In the 4th quarter, we recorded one crash for every 5.39 million…

Crashes generally have multiple factors. For the moment, let's set aside the multiple driver errors (not just drunkenness) and focus on issues Tesla has control of which contributed to the death:

* FSD was wildly insufficient for this road and required constant driver input

* Despite being insufficient for the road, FSD could be enabled on the road

* Despite needing constant correction, the FSD stayed enabled

* FSD can be enabled at speeds and conditions where the driver would need to correct with very little notice

All of these are completely self-inflicted issues caused by Tesla management arrogantly insisting on having the FSD attempt much more than it is capable of. Compare this to Ford and GM where they carefully geofence their systems to highways where they are absolutely certain their driving aids will work.

Re: Tesla worker killed in fiery crash may be first 'Full Self-Driving' fatality

#148

Post by ra7 » Tue, Feb 13, 2024, 5:03 PM UTC

ajross wrote: post #137

paulryanrogers wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We don't have apples-to-apples data in the public.

That's not a license to believe whatever anecdotes you want, though. I'm just saying that if anecdotes are sufficient, autopilot wins the argument . If they're not, we need data and shouldn't be freaking out over the one drunk driving incident in the linked article.

We're not responsible for that data, Tesla is. You should be calling for them to be transparent and not just settle for misleading "safety reports" because it has a narrative you want to believe.

Re: Tesla worker killed in fiery crash may be first 'Full Self-Driving' fatality

#149

Post by soco » Tue, Feb 13, 2024, 5:04 PM UTC

azinman2 wrote: post #117

ec109685 wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Teslas don’t require much force at all to disengage.

I don’t know what BMW is like but it requires more force than I think is safe.

My 10yo VW only nudges you gently, no force required to steer it your way. Even that nudge is annoying to some, but it's definitely not dangerous.

Re: Tesla worker killed in fiery crash may be first 'Full Self-Driving' fatality

#150

Post by bluGill » Tue, Feb 13, 2024, 5:04 PM UTC

cjbprime wrote: post #99

simion314 wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>evidence suggests that the bar is very low There is no real evidence (not biased or cherry picked) that replacing all drivers with Tesla's would actually be better/ I am aware of Tesla's numbers but those are invalid statistics , not comparing apples to apples. We would need something like how many miles does a car drive before a driver takes over, not comparing number of accidents since those are comparing human vs…

Why is it invalid to compare which of human vs. computer+human will save more lives?

I don't drink alcohol at all. It is possible that because of that I'm better than computer+human while the humans overall are worse.

I sometimes must drive on icy roads where the computer won't engage and all - these are more dangerous conditions and by refusing to do anything they ensure the computer does work. It is possible for humans to be better than computers+humans in all situations that computers work, but because of those situations where the computers don't work end up overall worse.

The above are just two issues that I can think of, and I'm not even a researcher who would know all of those special cases. Which is why everyone wants transparent data: someone independent needs enough information to account for factors like the above and allow us to have a real debate.