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Andrej Karpathy leaves Tesla

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Re: Andrej Karpathy leaves Tesla

#91

Post by zmmmmm »

Twirrim wrote: post #83
function_seven wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I remain convinced that "real" self driving (as in: go ahead and sleep in the backseat) will never happen without changes to road infrastructure and possibly some sort of segregation between robot-driven cars and people-driven cars. Things like traffic signals that actively communicate their status to nearby robot cars (more than just a red lamp that can be occluded by weather, other vehicles, or mud on the camera le…

> Things like traffic signals that actively communicate their status to nearby robot cars (more than just a red lamp that can be occluded by weather, other vehicles, or mud on the camera lens). Or lane markings that are more than just reflective paint, but can be sensed via RF. Rules around temporary construction that dictate the manner of signage and cone placement that the robot cars can understand. The cones might…

> any of those could be forged / faked without some kind of way of securely validating the message

Any reason routine crypto methods would not solve this? Seems like one of the easier parts to me.

Re: Andrej Karpathy leaves Tesla

#92

Post by ra7 »

codechicago277 wrote: post #3

Tesla has bet the company on robotaxis, but their vision only tech stack doesn’t seem capable of solving it, which is a problem because Tesla has repeatedly promised FSD is right around the corner, or less than a year away. It’s hard to believe Karpathy would step down if he felt they were close to solving the problem anytime soon. This announcement comes after a 4 month sabbatical where Karpathy said he wanted to ta…

> This announcement comes after a 4 month sabbatical where Karpathy said he wanted to take some time off to “sharpen my technical edge,” which makes it sound like this is the result of frustration with the technical approach instead of burnout.

I think Karpathy realized (probably way back) that cheap sensors + no HD maps + their (reckless) public testing feedback loop doesn't advance towards L5 self driving and is bailing out. Karpathy has always backed Elon Musk whenever he talks about their technical approach, so it can't be frustration with the approach all of a sudden.

Re: Andrej Karpathy leaves Tesla

#93

Post by bhauer »

simonswords82 wrote: post #71

Can anybody give insights in to how key this guy is to Tesla. Is it a big deal? What’s his USP?

He was the director of AI at the company, an important position. Notably, however, the AI director position is distinct from the director of the Autopilot team. That position is held by Ashok Elluswamy.

Re: Andrej Karpathy leaves Tesla

#94

Post by TigeriusKirk »

melling wrote: post #2

That was the prediction when he took a “sabbatical” back in March. Why do people leave companies in this manner?

At some companies sabbaticals are an explicit part of the benefits package. Every X years, you'll get a paid sabbatical of Y months. If you're close to X, why not wait and get the Y before you leave?

Re: Andrej Karpathy leaves Tesla

#95

Post by hedora »

qaq wrote: post #73
Barrera wrote: post #65

The autopilot part of Tesla has never made much sense. Is Tesla the electric car company, or is it the luxury car company? Either way, why does the power train (EV or ICE) come into play at all? Not only that, but Tesla has played the Innovator's Dilemma game from the position of the upstart financially, but targeted the segment of the market that incumbents will defend to the death (luxury cars). Tesla could have go…

And yet Tesla is dominant player in luxury segments they have products in

Analysts suggest that, while they may still be the market leader in EVs, by 2025 they're looking at a decline from today's 70-75% market share to 11-20%:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/neilwinton/2022/07/11/ev-makers...

This meshes pretty well with them not having anything in the compact, pickup truck, offroading/camping segments (luxury, or not). They also don't have any commercial vehicles like delivery vans.

All of those segments are being filled in rapidly by competitors. Also, the first real non-Tesla luxury sedans have been on the market for what, under a year?

Re: Andrej Karpathy leaves Tesla

#96

Post by euske »

sonofhans wrote: post #37
impulser_ wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, but Google's vision + lidar tech also doesn't seem any better at solving it either. They have been working on this problem the longest and they aren't even confident enough to produce a product with it. Google is probably the leader in AI and AI research. They are also the leader in data and mapping. They have billions of cash to play with. Yet it seem like they haven't gotten any closer at solving this problem…

Driving is a social problem, not a technical one. It's functionally the same as walking down a crowded sidewalk. The car is just a tool, just an extension of our bodies. We can't build a robot which can walk down a sidewalk without running into people either. The sensor tech and mapping fidelity are red herrings. People drive well because only people are good at predicting human behavior.

This. I'm always amazed by a skilled taxi driver maneuvering their car at a busy street in Tokyo with bustling pedestrians and bikes, some of them are old and slow and others ignoring traffic lights, just passing them by centimeters. It's like as if the car is a part of their body and they're threading though a crowd. They have to anticipate everyone else's move. The cars really look like people here and others treat them as ones.

Re: Andrej Karpathy leaves Tesla

#97

Post by coenhyde »

Barrera wrote: post #65

The autopilot part of Tesla has never made much sense. Is Tesla the electric car company, or is it the luxury car company? Either way, why does the power train (EV or ICE) come into play at all? Not only that, but Tesla has played the Innovator's Dilemma game from the position of the upstart financially, but targeted the segment of the market that incumbents will defend to the death (luxury cars). Tesla could have go…

The incumbents will defend that market segment to their death indeed. Tesla is pulling a 30% gross margin on their EV's, while legacy auto looses money on their EV's. I don't see legacy auto being capable of refactoring their cars, manufacturing processes and business models fast enough to survive.

The fall can cascade quickly, as the incumbents are stuffed with debt. When sales of ICE fall due to the growing EV segment they will have a hard time seeking the funding necessary to transition. IMO it's all a bit late. But good luck to them. From my observation only Ford and VW really appreciate the situation they are in, and they are trying hard to navigate out. Hopefully they survive. GM is screwed.

Re: Andrej Karpathy leaves Tesla

#98

Post by TigeriusKirk »

TheAlchemist wrote: post #4

Well, Musk said recently that the value of Tesla is 0 without FSD. Does anybody seriously think Karpathy would step down if FSD was really close to be released ?? It really starts to feel like Tesla is a huge fraud which is about to be uncovered.

Devil's Advocate- Maybe Karpathy thinks all the fun parts of FSD are done and it's just drudge work from this point.

Re: Andrej Karpathy leaves Tesla

#99

Post by zmmmmm »

function_seven wrote: post #57
dreamcompiler wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because self-driving has a bunch of tricky edge cases and most of them will kill people. Problems with hundreds of important edge cases cannot be solved by simply throwing more training data at the problem; that's how you solve AI problems in a "dumb" manner, and it works for lots of problems (like recognizing dogs in images) -- but not for self-driving. To solve the self-driving problem we need "smart" A.I., which m…

I remain convinced that "real" self driving (as in: go ahead and sleep in the backseat) will never happen without changes to road infrastructure and possibly some sort of segregation between robot-driven cars and people-driven cars. Things like traffic signals that actively communicate their status to nearby robot cars (more than just a red lamp that can be occluded by weather, other vehicles, or mud on the camera le…

I wonder if all the "hype" from the Ubers and Googles about imminent self-driving is not actively harmful in that it is probably sucking out the oxygen from any perceived need to implement these things.

Re: Andrej Karpathy leaves Tesla

#100

Post by TheDong »

Twirrim wrote: post #83
function_seven wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I remain convinced that "real" self driving (as in: go ahead and sleep in the backseat) will never happen without changes to road infrastructure and possibly some sort of segregation between robot-driven cars and people-driven cars. Things like traffic signals that actively communicate their status to nearby robot cars (more than just a red lamp that can be occluded by weather, other vehicles, or mud on the camera le…

> Things like traffic signals that actively communicate their status to nearby robot cars (more than just a red lamp that can be occluded by weather, other vehicles, or mud on the camera lens). Or lane markings that are more than just reflective paint, but can be sensed via RF. Rules around temporary construction that dictate the manner of signage and cone placement that the robot cars can understand. The cones might…

> You could cause absolute chaos by driving down the road broadcasting false messages

Even without self-driving cars, an "attacker" can go into a theater and yell "fire" and cause a stampede.

They can get a high-viz vest and clipboard, and stand in intersections directing cars to take detours they don't need and holding up traffic.

My point here is that society has a lot of trust baked in. We trust people don't just yell "fire" without reason. Just because it's FSD cars doesn't mean people will start broadcasting the equivalent of "fire" constantly. It's already easy to cause accidents.

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