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Volvo admits its self-driving cars are confused by kangaroos

theguardian.com

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Re: Volvo admits its self-driving cars are confused by kangaroos

#51

Post by gonzo41 »

Avshalom wrote: post #26
joombaga wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's the general feeling about taking the meat after a collision? Where I grew up, people would butcher the animal if it's not terribly destroyed. Around here there's a wild hog problem, which are edible but not very tasty, so the local wildlife agency picks them up and they're used in soup kitchens to feed the homeless.

Not being Australian: would it be legal? I grew up in Alaska and when you ran into a moose you weren't allowed to keep it. Instead there was a volunteer crew that was called to clean it up, compensated with the corpse (which is how I grew up on moose).

It wouldn't be illegal, but its not like hitting a dear or moose in the snow. It's really hot where kangaroos are in Australia, so keeping the meat fresh is the biggest issue.

Also you can get kangaroo meat cheaply at most butchers. It's just like venison.

Re: Volvo admits its self-driving cars are confused by kangaroos

#52

Post by sdwisely »

cptn_brittish wrote: post #45
skybrian wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But apparently humans get confused by kangaroos too, based on the number of collisions.

It's not confusion as other Australians here have said they really do not behave like any other animal and appear out of no where at speed. A actual collision with one normally takes out the car and not just the kangaroo as well.

They're hard to see because of their coat, move quickly and erratically and they're pretty much all muscle.

I'm not surprised they get hit as often as they do particularly at night.

Re: Volvo admits its self-driving cars are confused by kangaroos

#53

Post by 0xbear »

And therein lies the problem no one talks about: all these autonomous vehicle technologies have only been tested in non-adversarial situations. Machine learning algorithms do not generalize the way humans do, and it has been shown that they’re fairly easy to fool. This is an active area of research at the moment, and no one really knows how to fix this, at least not without deploying an ensemble of networks with different architectures.

Re: Volvo admits its self-driving cars are confused by kangaroos

#54

Post by pasta »

This is the first time I hear about animal detection in self driving cars. Do other brands also do this?

Most demo's only show human interaction.

Edit: and what about flying trash, leaves and so on? Thinking about it there are a lot of object types we interact with. Leaves for example mean nothing to us because they won't harm us. And we know crows will fly away. But pigeons on the other hand..

Re: Volvo admits its self-driving cars are confused by kangaroos

#55

Post by amag »

kalleboo wrote: post #29
ClassyJacket wrote: post #23

I'm kind of worried by the fact that the system judges depth based on visual cues (like a human with one eye closed does) instead of actual depth sensing hardware, to the point that the system needs to recognise kangaroos specifically. Shouldn't the car stop for any obstacle, even ones it doesn't recognise? They surely can't expect to train it on every possible type of debris.

It doesn't sound like the problem is it's detecting specific animals, but in how it's detecting the distance -using the ground as a reference for things that aren't standing on the ground. I wonder how it it handles low-flying birds.

When I learned t drive I was instructed not to mind smaller critters as the avoidance maneuver (steering away one way or the other or heavy breaking) is more likely to cause a serious accident than the collision with the small critter.

Re: Volvo admits its self-driving cars are confused by kangaroos

#57

Post by kalleboo »

amag wrote: post #55
kalleboo wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't sound like the problem is it's detecting specific animals, but in how it's detecting the distance -using the ground as a reference for things that aren't standing on the ground. I wonder how it it handles low-flying birds.

When I learned t drive I was instructed not to mind smaller critters as the avoidance maneuver (steering away one way or the other or heavy breaking) is more likely to cause a serious accident than the collision with the small critter.

True. You also don't want it avoiding a plastic bag that's floating across the road

Re: Volvo admits its self-driving cars are confused by kangaroos

#59

Post by lb1lf »

amag wrote: post #55
kalleboo wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't sound like the problem is it's detecting specific animals, but in how it's detecting the distance -using the ground as a reference for things that aren't standing on the ground. I wonder how it it handles low-flying birds.

When I learned t drive I was instructed not to mind smaller critters as the avoidance maneuver (steering away one way or the other or heavy breaking) is more likely to cause a serious accident than the collision with the small critter.

Unless, of course, you are the small critter.

(When in driving school, I was taught to ignore anything smaller than a reindeer - but assure whoever showed up in distress after I'd put a set of tire marks over their pet's back that I'd tried my best to avoid it.)

Re: Volvo admits its self-driving cars are confused by kangaroos

#60

Post by jfries »

danieltillett wrote: post #42
cyberferret wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having had plenty of wallabies (smaller version of Kangaroos) jump out in front of me at dawn/dusk, I concur. The hopping movement makes it incredibly difficult to judge their speed and direction. They actually cover horizontal space at a far greater clip than they seem to, and also means they can make snap changes in their direction of travel VERY quickly, making any avoidance manoeuvre a bit of a wild guess.

They are extremely unpredictable in their change in direction and they will often get panicked by the sound of the car and jump in front rather than away from the car like most other animals. Unpredictable motion is ideal for evading upright preditors with spears, but no so good for collision avoidance with fast moving metal objects.

Put in another way, unpredictable motion is good for avoiding what's trying to hit you. Not good for avoiding what's trying to miss you.
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