Posted on 10/13/2019 7:14:49 AM PDT by rickmichaels
I actually believe it does take a village to raise a child. But it sure as hell doesn’t take my village for you to test your self-driving car.
No, I’m still not over Uber testing its self-driving technology in Tempe, Arizona in March of 2018. With the so-called safety driver behind the wheel as the car ferried itself around the city, a woman crossing the street with, not on, her bicycle was killed.
The vehicle never even slowed. “Uber had disabled Volvo’s automatic emergency braking system in order to ‘reduce potential for erratic vehicle behavior,’” according to The Verge. The safety driver was watching The Voice on her phone, and Uber had previously cut the number of safety drivers in their experiments from two to one.
Hey, Uber? How do I hate thee, let me count the ways.
I was recently with Honda at their testing facility in Ohio, and part of their Honda Sensing safety systems is a pedestrian detection and collision mitigating braking system that stood that car on its hood to avoid hitting a pop-up fake pedestrian. My notebook flew off the seat.
Most manufacturers have a version of this now, and there is no excuse for a company like Uber to disable something like that, especially when they’re testing the accuracy of their mapping skills and hiring people who would rather be home on their couches voting for their favourite singer in some contest.
I’ve long been ired by Tesla installing something called Autopilot in its vehicles. The fine print always says “driver must remain able to take control of the car at all times blah blah blah” but you tell me what something called “Autopilot” means to average people.
You may think we love running video after video of morons literally asleep at the wheel. We don’t. People die. One driver, the fourth killed in similar circumstances, had Autopilot engaged and died when a large truck crossed his Tesla’s path. “Good enough” is not enough.
It is deeply irresponsible to not take into account how your new product will be received and used by the general public. I remember (and I’m dating myself) when we had to pull lawn darts from the shelves of the Consumers Distributing I worked at because a handful of people had managed to impale themselves with the metal shafts. In hindsight, they really were a little violent, to be honest, but at least everybody in the yard knew they were flinging them around.
Dumping self-driving cars on the public roadways to test your tech and your theories? That’s just a lawn dart that comes out of nowhere.
Watch this week’s videos of people remotely telling their Teslas to meet them across a parking lot, only to have the cars filmed looking like they’re in a bumper car midway game. And that’s not the Autopilot feature, just one using an application called Smart Summon. If I’m in a parking lot and a Tesla, sans driver, is headed toward me and shows no signs of stopping, prepare for a showdown, both physical and legal.
Maybe it’s the media’s fault for the screaming headlines about autonomous cars, and the wave of the future being here right now. It’s not. Autonomous features, now that’s a discussion worth having. Lane departure correction, front collision avoidance, parking assist, trailer back-up: these types of systems are about safety.
Will they one day form the basis for autonomous cars? Sure they will. But having the technology does not mean having the right to inflict it on the unwilling and the unknowing; other drivers on our roads are not your guinea pigs to perfect your technological skill set.
In some parts of the world, new drivers have a prominent sign or symbol on their car to warn those around them that a newbie is behind the wheel, and to keep some distance and cut them some slack. If you want to toss a vehicle onto the roads in my city to test your autonomous technology, it better be lit up like a Christmas tree so I can decide if I want to take my chances stepping off a curb near it, or entering a lane of traffic.
You don’t have to take my Luddite word for it. Read this Washington Post article about Silicon Valley residents with expertise in this very area not wanting these cars in their community. The proliferation of Waymo self-driving cars has them nervous — even as they understand the only way to advance the technology is to try it in the real world. They just don’t necessarily want it in their world. Neither do I.
Years and years ago, a rep from Mercedes-Benz told me at a facility in Germany it used for testing just such safety features, the cars were performing very well. Until at an intersection, one of the vehicles stopped, allowing a pedestrian to cross as per traffic rules. The pedestrian waved the car onward.
The car was confused and didn’t know what to do.
You can factor in all the code you like, but let me know when you’ve cracked the human one.
I don’t see myself as ever wanting to own a self driving car. I’m curious to read the opinions of the people here as to what type of person would like to own one of these vehicles. Putting aside possible commercial business applications, what’s the motivation for buying a self driving car as your personal vehicle?
Why would I be the one to get back to you?
Of course, we never had a motor vehicle deliver a bomb before.
Always is right. They are in a self driving car so they can do something else with the time/effort they would normally spend driving.
Seriously. If the so-called “self-driving” car is not going to free up my time/effort for other activities including sleeping, why am I in one to start with?
You stated that they were coming on fast. There are very fundamental issues that need to be resolved before SDV’s can be put into daily use in large numbers. They even fail if the roadway has degraded striping.
Self-driving cars = For people who don’t know how to drive
To lazy to drive call a taxi
I’d do a lot more concerts in Phoenix if I didn’t have to either drive back at midnight or rent a hotel room. Really if you think about it they’re the best of private ownership and public transit. You have total control on schedule and go door to door, just like driving, but you can (in theory, when the tech gets there) just relax and read and do whatever, just like public transit.
When cars were first introduced, there would usually be someone running in front, waving a red flag to warn everyone of the potential danger. I propose something similar; when a vehicle is being actively controlled by software it should prominently display (on the roof) a large flashing light and alongside it, a loudspeaker that proclaims that no-one is driving.
Thus alerted to the potential life-altering device hurtling toward them, the pedestrian can take appropriate action such as running away, or preferably, shooting out the tires.
It will never be there.
If autonomous vehicles was not feasible or still distant in the future, the shareholders of these companies would be raising holy hell.
This is why I think it's going to happen quicker than most of us think.
Also, there is not going to be much "in-between". Once the change starts, it will be very rapid.
It's scary to some people and for good reason.
But imagine taking somebody from say the 1890s - just 120 years ago - and putting them in the passenger seat of a modern SUV doing 80mph down I-95. Something that most of us do every day They would literally lose control of their bowels - they would be so frightened.
Better yet, take that same person from the 1890s to JFK airport and put them on a commercial jetliner. Tell them they will shortly be 8 miles over the Atlantic Ocean and will be in London in just a few hours time. They will similarly lose control of their bowels.
Technology is frightening. Until we get used to it.
My horses are smarter than these new cars.
Love Weird Al.
Pull out any Popular Science or Popular Mechanics from the 1950s and they were talking about flying cars and self driving cars being around the corner. Dreamers are always out there and needed but these types of things still take longer than ever dreamed to implement satisfactorily and reliably.
We are finding out that complex software needs significant debug time and testing, and it has now become susceptible to hacking. When public safety is involved it is most important. Boeing probably tried to shortcut the process.
Article is not accurate. Braking system was not turned off.
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/aug/29/coding-algorithms-frankenalgos-program-danger
I want to see what the commute either way on I495 between Long Island and the BQE is with all self driving vehicles. I’m expecting it to be FAST. If it isn’t then there’s no damn reason for the tech.
Correct but back then they were projecting those in the much more distant future. More importantly, you did not have Fortune 500 companies at that time investing billions of dollars in R&D and developing prototypes of those flying cars.
That's the difference between then and now. Serious money - shareholder money - is being poured into this technology and prototypes are not only built but actively being tested.
This tells me not only that autonomous cars are on the horizon but will soon be ready for market. Those shareholders are going to want to see a return on these investments - which as I stated is in the many billions of dollars per year.
In other words, this is real technology. Not science fiction fantasy.
Yes, that IS the real point of the exercise.
No need to track everyone when they have to be authorized and every move programmed from Central Planning.
All of which makes implementing the Agenda 21 mandate so much simpler.
Of course the master class will be exempt, or at least much more so than the serf’s.
She’s so right. I’ve had GPS on my vehicles ever since it was adapted to cars. It till sometimes makes mistakes and sends me in wrong directions.
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