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Mike Ey, Microsoft HoloLens designer, killed in hit and run

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Re: Mike Ey, Microsoft HoloLens designer, killed in hit and run

#171

Post by jimmyslim22 »

cromwellian wrote: post #167

Reminds me of Googler Steve Lacey, killed by a road rage driver ( http://www.kirklandreporter.com/news/138605969.html ) When trying to find this story, I googled "employee killed by driver" and it's just a non-stop parade of stories of drunks and ragers killing people. If you cause an accident either drunk or by rage, you should go to jail, period. The Netherlands has no tolerance for this kind of bullshit. Injure so…

This is where the troublesome nature of humans comes into play. I first want to say that as someone who works in robotics, I want the automation revolution to come as much as the next guy. As a matter of fact, you are probably going to be hard pressed to find a demographic on this site that thinks differently. However, our world is sometimes driven by the vocal minority and in this case it will be the luddites that VEHEMENTLY OPPOSE self-driving cars for short minded purposes.

Growing up in Nebraska and witnessing the reaction to technological influence there was very eye opening in that you realize that the common man/women thinks very much with their emotions and not with logic. You can beat them over the head with facts like this and they will argue for their old ways. They want to be in control of the situation. They want to have the right to drive their car themselves and they certainly don't trust a machine to do it for them. (I guarantee that you will hear arguements like "it's taking away jobs" and "look at this instance where it malfunctioned") this leaves some very tricky features that engineers must work into it. Is there a manual override? Are there regulations on what kind of sensing equipment is on board or is it left to the private company? What is the acceptable error range for a car at the end of the day?

I think we will move into a world dominated by self-driving cars and other tech conviences that make our life easier, but I think it will be slowed down considerably by those who are resistant to change. I think anything that cuts down on instances such as this is a good and much needed thing that cannot get here any faster.

Re: Mike Ey, Microsoft HoloLens designer, killed in hit and run

#172

Post by ethanhunt_ »

kyllo wrote: post #165
techsupporter wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in Seattle and work in Redmond and do both solely via public transit and walking. Redmond has a large number of bike lane miles (as does Seattle, and many of Seattle's are protected, separated bike lanes) along with fast, frequent, and long span-of-service transit to places like Seattle and Kirkland and Bellevue. Microsoft has even helped with that by funding things like Overlake Transit Center, a street and p…

Cycling on roads is extremely dangerous. Every single person I know who commutes by bicycle has been hit by a car at least once. One of my colleagues was killed cycling to work when he was hit by a semi truck. Another woman was recently killed by a box truck cycling to work a block from my office.

I thought this too, but after looking at data it doesn't really seem any more dangerous than driving a car. I think the reason it sounds dangerous is that when it happens everyone hears about it and talks about it a lot more than car accidents.

Mrmoneymustache did an analysis and if you define 'safety' as 'expected life span', cycling is actually safer than driving a car.

Re: Mike Ey, Microsoft HoloLens designer, killed in hit and run

#173

Post by ethanhunt_ »

Chevalier wrote: post #57
VLM wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This article is being flooded with weird anti-car hate. Yet, my car is perfectly safe and can only kill someone in a hit and run at 100 MPH if, and only if, I get drunk first. Given that I don't drink very much and then only at home (a sixer lasts me about a season, sometimes half a year) that means my car is incredibly safe and will almost certainly never kill anyone. Odd how there's no anti-alcohol hate here on HN,…

...dude. No, you don't have to be a drunk going 100mph before you kill someone with your car. That you "don't drink very much" doesn't mean that your "car is incredibly safe and will almost certainly never kill anyone." Your car is an extremely heavy, extremely fast machine that will crush anyone unlucky enough to be in its path. That includes not only incompetent/incapacitated/elderly drivers, but also dumb accident…

"because American structural design forces everyone to drive two-ton bullets to go anywhere, which inevitably results in lethal wrecks. Compare Denmark's road fatality rate of 3.0 per 100,000 inhabitants versus the US ratio of 11.6 per 100,000."

Check the per-vehicle-km rate. Denmark isn't safer because they drive less.

Re: Mike Ey, Microsoft HoloLens designer, killed in hit and run

#174

Post by PhasmaFelis »

CamperBob2 wrote: post #126
varelse wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We've created a national infrastructure that IMO nearly requires driving to be a civil right. That sucks. But I really don't have an answer to this problem when proposals to address this are either voted down or end up ridiculously over budget.

It's almost as if something that sucks for you doesn't suck for many other people.

So what? Segregation didn't suck, as long as you were white. We want the government to do what's best for everyone.

Re: Mike Ey, Microsoft HoloLens designer, killed in hit and run

#175

Post by gohrt »

aaronem wrote: post #137
munificent wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> About 10,000 people are killed each year in drunk driving accidents in the US. 30,000 a year die from falls. That number is highly biased towards the elderly. "Falls" are basically another kind of "died of old age". If you exclude people over 55, you get about: - ~6,700 deaths from drunk driving - 2,459 from falls If you look at all driving fatalities (because we fleshy humans can be impaired by more than alcohol a…

> Cars are deathtraps. The population of the US is roughly 310 million people. Using your figure for driving fatalities, 3.1x10^8 / 2.5x10^4 = 1/12400 chance of dying in a car accident. This tracks reasonably well with the admittedly outdated information in [1], which gives the odds of dying at home as 1/7875. By your reasoning, then, my apartment is about 33% more deathtrap-y than my car, and I should probably consi…

As noted elsewhere, if you are young, the risk of dying at home (esp from falling) is much lower than risk of dying in a car.

And almost everyone has a home every day, whereas people who drive/ride cars more are at mich higher risk of car dying than less-frequet riders

Re: Mike Ey, Microsoft HoloLens designer, killed in hit and run

#176

Post by gohrt »

lfam wrote: post #166
kabdib wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a motorcyclist, I have used bursts of speed to get out of sticky situations. The car that crashed into the guard rail behind me would have taken me out if I had slowed down. It's easy to second-guess.

As another motorcyclist, I want to give my support to this view. I have no desire to ride fast (I rather enjoy doing 40 mph on a park drive), but I need my bike to be able to go 100 mph so that when the person next to me going 55 mph starts to merge into my lane, I have the choice of slowing down or very rapidly accelerating out of danger. It's the same with cars. Having the "headroom" means you can speed up quickly…

You don't go more than ~70 to execute that maneuver. By the time you've accelerated to +15mph more than your obstacle, you aren't near it anymore.

Re: Mike Ey, Microsoft HoloLens designer, killed in hit and run

#177

Post by gohrt »

drzaiusapelord wrote: post #24
codemac wrote: post #9

Unfortunate how many humans we have driving cars at various levels of impairment. It's killing so many people. Drunk driving in suburban areas is rampant and feels almost inherent without real public transportation options at last call. I think most of Seattle's public transit options stop right around midnight.

Cars are pretty safe, but I'm always a little shocked that we don't have governors built into cars with sane limits. How is it even possible to do 100mph and why should that speed be allowed? Cars should top off at 75. Not to mention, why are cars dumb machines? If someone is going crazy fast in an area where there is no safe way to decelerate, then the car should not allow that speed to be reached. Freeway speeds sh…

Luxury cars and some other cars have these collision avoidance features.

Re: Mike Ey, Microsoft HoloLens designer, killed in hit and run

#178

Post by sithu »

joesmo wrote: post #128
DiabloD3 wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually agree with this response. Because of Microsoft, Seattle has become Silicon Valley North, just the same as NYC has become the Silicon Alley and Chicago is... whatever they're calling Chicago now. All of them are similar, heavy car usage, not enough walking, and no safety for humans. Google is trying to solve it by making smarter cars. How about we solve it by making our communities smarter instead?

Actually, self-driving cars are the only proposed solution to automobile accidents and related deaths that seems like it might work. Laws don't work, education doesn't work, and even the safest, most careful drivers can and do have accidents. Let's be clear. In the US, at least, cars are not going anywhere unless costs become as prohibitive everywhere as they are in NYC. Even then, they're still not going anywhere (N…

Generally he means addressing the problems "heavy car usage, not enough walking, and no safety for humans". Optimizing city design for people, and not for vehicles. This is generally done by increasing density, and requiring mixed-use buildings with commerce on ground level, and more public spaces and wider side walks, and dedicated lanes for bikes and public transportation.

Cars aren't going anywhere anytime soon in the US because sadly you can't function without one in the vast majority of places. It's far easier to implement this design philosophy for a growing city[1], but really hard to change the layout of a mature one, though it can be done thoughtfully [2].

[1]https://www.ted.com/talks/enrique_penalosa_why_buses_represe... [2]https://www.ted.com/talks/amanda_burden_how_public_spaces_ma...

Re: Mike Ey, Microsoft HoloLens designer, killed in hit and run

#179

Post by [deleted] »

cthalupa wrote: post #43
drzaiusapelord wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cars are pretty safe, but I'm always a little shocked that we don't have governors built into cars with sane limits. How is it even possible to do 100mph and why should that speed be allowed? Cars should top off at 75. Not to mention, why are cars dumb machines? If someone is going crazy fast in an area where there is no safe way to decelerate, then the car should not allow that speed to be reached. Freeway speeds sh…

>Cars are pretty safe, but I'm always a little shocked that we don't have governors built into cars with sane limits. How is it even possible to do 100mph and why should that speed be allowed? Cars should top off at 75. Why is it even possible? Because a car that can't do 100mph is going to have terrible performance 0-75 There's long stretches of highways in rural areas with speed limits higher than 75 >Not to mentio…

[deleted]

Re: Mike Ey, Microsoft HoloLens designer, killed in hit and run

#180

Post by reilly3000 »

Geee wrote: post #42
wavefunction wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Oculus guy was killed by some gangsters on the run from police, so your theory is unlikely.

Yep, somehow I assumed that the perpetrators haven't been caught and commented without reading the article.

Still, its not too tin foil to think that maybe somebody has an interest in VR not happening, or not in this way. It wouldn't shock me in the least of some wing-nut thinks that AR/VR is the antichrist.
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