Live data from Hacker News

The first person to hack the iPhone is building a self-driving car

bloomberg.com

271–280 of 462 posts

Re: The first person to hack the iPhone is building a self-driving car

#271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, Hotz did state that, “The truth is that work as we know it in its modern form has not been around that long, and I kind of want to use AI to abolish it. I want to take everyone’s jobs. Most people would be happy with that, especially the ones who don’t like their jobs. Let’s free them of mental tedium and push that to machines. In the next 10 years, you’ll see a big segment of the human labor force fall away. I…

Yeah and the world will split in rich and poor people with poor starving.

Or nobody will ever have to work again.

Re: The first person to hack the iPhone is building a self-driving car

#272
post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yet few people would call an airplane with auto-pilot a "self-flying plane", even with advanced autopilot that can take off and land itself. Autopilot is understood to mean a limited computer assist that can help with routine tasks, but not expected to allow a plane to fly without a pilot.

What more would a plane need to be "self-flying" beyond taking off, navigating, and landing?

The ability to handle unusual emergency or unexpected conditions - the same thing that's needed to call a car "self-driving".

Re: The first person to hack the iPhone is building a self-driving car

#273
post #6

> “Frankly, I think you should just work at Tesla,” Musk wrote to Hotz in an e-mail. “I’m happy to work out a multimillion-dollar bonus with a longer time horizon that pays out as soon as we discontinue Mobileye.” > “I appreciate the offer,” Hotz replied, “but like I’ve said, I’m not looking for a job. I’ll ping you when I crush Mobileye.” > Musk simply answered, “OK.” I have to agree with Elon here, Hotz is such a g…

I'd be far more interested in a piece of software for my car put out by Hotz than either Google or Tesla. Because the latter two are almost certainly going to keep it proprietary as heck. (Tesla has notoriously actually called people to ask them to stop tinkering with their car when they detect the interface has been connected to.)

> "He says he’s come up with discoveries—most of which he refuses to disclose in detail"

Re: The first person to hack the iPhone is building a self-driving car

#274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm afraid this may be also the end, more or less. From this point onwards, things get so much harder and more labor-intensive, that doing everything alone seems impossible.

I don't see why it would. Once you get enough base data you can start simulating the data from what you have, inputting different scenarios without actually encountering them IRL. Faking sensor input and randomizing should get it most of the way there.

I have significant experience in faking sensor data (specifically radar), and can tell you from it that fake sensor data is terrible. There is way too much going on in the real world to accurately create sensor data without actually recording sensor data. That is, you can manufacture the situation for the sensor to capture much more effectively than you can manufacture the data from a model.

Even pseudo-faking like we were trying to do, wherein as generated signal is injected into actual, recorded background noise, is fraught with problems. Anybody who tries to develop a control system based solely on such data is in for a rude awakening when they try it for real for the first time.

Re: The first person to hack the iPhone is building a self-driving car

#275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I would totally agree with you IF this kid hadn't proven his chops with iPhone and PS3 hacks, not to mention building a self-driving car in his garage. Impressive as they are, his chops still don't support his claim to "know everything there is to know". The Dunning-Kruger effect is in full swing.

Sure, but that claim was made in the context of deep-learning networks. He went to work for an AI company, and realized that he knew -- from reading cutting-edge academic papers -- as much as the forefront of the field. He wasn't claiming to know everything there is to know in general, or even in software development, just that he can understand and implement machine learning with the best of them. Personally, I don'…

The field doesn't require a particularly extensive background either. A good grasp of linear algebra and multi-variable calculus basically has you set to understanding even the state of the art in the field. Of course, coming up with the papers would require a whole lot more work.

Re: The first person to hack the iPhone is building a self-driving car

#276
post #37

Prototypical case of the 80/20 rule. He has implemented the happy case. But that system is nothing people realistically would want to drive their cars. What he did is impressive. But the results are not that outlandish for a talented person. 1) Hook up a computer to the CAN-Bus network of the car [1] and attach a bunch of sensor peripherals. 2) Drive around for some time and record everything to disk. 3) Implement so…

With Neural Nets, training the AI to handle emergencies will be all about exposing as many emergency situations as possible. What's better about an AI powered by neural nets is that you could train an AI to go offroading. Get enough data and you've got a model for dealing with a given situation. Google's biggest strides with OCR, Voice recognition, Spam filters and other AI tech early on came from its ability to gath…

The trouble with using neural nets for safety-critical real-time systems is that it's really hard to do the necessary level of validation. You can't accurately predict how the system might react in totally novel or unexpected situations. Which isn't to say that human drivers handle those situations well, but most of the time they don't do something totally bizarre or dangerous.

Re: The first person to hack the iPhone is building a self-driving car

#278
post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I dont think there is anyway that Hotz's and Musk's personalities get along well in any type of working relationship. They are both difficult people to deal with (from an outsiders perspective).

That's the funny thing about INTJs; they don't seem to get along well with each other. (*cue the preemptive disclaimer about MBTI being for entertainment)

Hotz is an ENTP actually so the two of them would get along extraordinarily well, assuming ego's weren't in the way...

Re: The first person to hack the iPhone is building a self-driving car

#279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's pretty cool that it can be done on the cheap, though. I imagine a lot of people would be willing to pay a couple hundred dollars to retrofit their car to get autosteer alongside their cruise control feature. Small personal example: my family lives out in the suburbs. My dad works in a neighboring city. His commute is about a half hour, 20 minutes of which is a straight shot on a major highway. I'm sure he'd be w…

On the "cheap" relatively. The sensor he uses on the top of the car alone costs $8000. If you want to do it right, you'd also need a really nice IMU system to... I'm not sure what he's using but they can get very pricey.

Do you have a link for the best (commercial) IMUs around/how much they cost? I'm curious -- are they just clusters of MEMs like the ones on a phone or something more advanced, like interferometry based?

Re: The first person to hack the iPhone is building a self-driving car

#280
post #37

Prototypical case of the 80/20 rule. He has implemented the happy case. But that system is nothing people realistically would want to drive their cars. What he did is impressive. But the results are not that outlandish for a talented person. 1) Hook up a computer to the CAN-Bus network of the car [1] and attach a bunch of sensor peripherals. 2) Drive around for some time and record everything to disk. 3) Implement so…

It's pretty cool that it can be done on the cheap, though. I imagine a lot of people would be willing to pay a couple hundred dollars to retrofit their car to get autosteer alongside their cruise control feature. Small personal example: my family lives out in the suburbs. My dad works in a neighboring city. His commute is about a half hour, 20 minutes of which is a straight shot on a major highway. I'm sure he'd be w…

Even when the technology for self-driving cars is developed well enough for widespread use, it won't be practical or cost-effective to retrofit existing vehicles. By the time you strip everything down, cut holes, install sensors, run cables, etc it will be cheaper to just buy a new car.
Post reply on HN