Waymo robotaxi hits a child near an elementary school in Santa Monica

Post by ghthor » Fri, Jan 30, 2026, 5:42 AM UTC

ra7 wrote: post #425

moktonar wrote: post #397

The Waymo driver tech is impressive. That said an experienced driver might have recognized the pattern where a stopped big vehicle occludes a part of the road leading to such situation, and might have stopped or slowed down almost to a halt before passing. The Waymo driver reacts faster but is not able to predict such scenarios by filling the gaps, simulating the world to inform decisions. Chapeau to Waymo anyways

There have been many instances of Waymo preventing a collision by predicting pedestrians emerging from occlusion. This isn’t new information at all for them. Some accidents are simply physically impossible to prevent. I don’t know for sure if this one was one of those, but I’m fairly confident it couldn’t have been from prediction failure. See past examples: https://youtube.com/watch?v=hubWIuuz-e4 — first save is a c…

Post by Marsymars » Fri, Jan 30, 2026, 5:42 AM UTC

Dylan16807 wrote: post #646

Marsymars wrote: post #599

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suspect you could step up enforcement in ways that don’t involve prison time simply by taking away people’s licenses, and then having a fast feedback loop to catch people driving without a license.

Taking away licenses is a bad way to enforce driving rules because so many people have to be able to drive or their life collapses. The problems of aggressive license revocation are similar to the problems of aggressive prison time.

Post by shwaj » Fri, Jan 30, 2026, 5:43 AM UTC

recursive wrote: post #568

elzbardico wrote: post #488

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Humans are supposed to deal with this kind of ambiguity. Actually, that's one of our nicest abilities. I hate when people pretend to be smarter than everyone else by pointing this kind of utterance and insisting that someone, somehow, will parse those statements in the most literal and stupid manner. Then there are the ignorant misanthropes that can't waste a chance to repeat their reductionist speculations about hum…

Sorry I made you mad. I wasn't trying to seem smarter than everyone. Maybe dumber.

Post by jondwillis » Fri, Jan 30, 2026, 5:50 AM UTC

lillecarl wrote: post #428

jjav wrote: post #398

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There aren't infinitely many scenarios to consider, but even if that's a figure of speech, there aren't thousands or even hundreds. If there's ten kids nearby, that's basically ten path scenarios, and that might be reduced if you have great visibility into some of them. > My brain might be able to quickly assess a handful, but certainly not all. What would you do if you can't assess all of them? Just keep driving sam…

It should be trivial for Waymo to implement a "drive carefully near schools" feature, and if really spicy "drive REALLY carefully near schools at these times" feature. Safe driving starts with speed, lowering speed and informing the passengers seems like a no-brainer.

Post by Dylan16807 » Fri, Jan 30, 2026, 5:55 AM UTC

recursive wrote: post #231

gruez wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I don't know the implementation details, but success would be not hitting pedestrians. So by that logic, if we cured cancer but the treatment came with terrible side effects it wouldn't be considered a "success"? Does everything have to perfect to be a success?

If you clearly define your goals in advance, then you can make success whatever you want. What are Waymo's goals?