Posted on 06/08/2020 4:51:13 PM PDT by RomanSoldier19
Initiate an auto destruct.
And forget the days of high performance custom cars, custom paint jobs etc...You’d have to be a moron to do that to a car you don’t even drive. Eventually they’ll all be the same color, and max speed will be something like 55 mph. Self driving cars will be a very boring activity. The new generations will have no clue about the freedoms and what it use to be like.
I had the Willys jeep hitch done.
It looked like it was made yesterday.
“Nappa leather seats. Just wipes right off.”
Only if the surface is protected. Nappa leather stains easily. That is how. it. is colored.
Bump for tomorrow. I work in this area professionally. I’ve been a rare voice in my industry telling people that “a little at a time” is fraught with lethal risks and is a recipe for disaster.
Give me vinyl seats and seat covers based on Herb Tarlek’s suits.
“In short, they only need to a bit better than the average driver.”
I think you are discounting that 90% of the drivers think they are better than average.
In addition, when the self driving car gets into an accident, the driver is going to say they would have avoided it.
“all those toys are useless in snow”
nor in driving rain, hail, sleet, blizzards, heavy fog, tornadoes, hurricanes, etc.
seriously, how well would all of those sensors work at night in driving rain, hail, sleet blizzards, or heavy fog?
the whole idea of self-driving cars is complete nonsense ... flying an airplane from airport A to airport B is a FAR, FAR less complex task computationally than driving a car from any point A in the U.S. to any point B in the U.S. on any arbitrary set of paved or unpaved roads in all weather conditions encountered during an average 365 days, and yet how many passengers would be willing to fly in a commercial drone?
Here is a scenario to ponder:
Your car is in traffic behind other cars. In your rear-view mirror you see a large truck rapidly approaching your car and it seems unable to stop. Meanwhile, you notice that the right side of the lane is open but your car may hit gravel and dirt. I would hit the accelerator and quickly steer right so the truck won't hit my car.
Would the self-driving car do that?
It very well might.
A human is limited to a lifetime of experience. Self-driving cars will have access to thousands, then millions of lifetimes of experience from other self driving cars.
Here is the concept from the Air Force Research Lab:
“Our human pilots, the really good ones, have a couple thousand hours of experience,” Rogers told Inside Defense. “What happens if I can augment their ability with a system that can have literally millions of hours of training time? … How can I make myself a tactical autopilot so in an air-to-air fight, this system could help make decisions on a timeline that humans can’t even begin to think about?”
I experienced almost precisely the scenario you posit on a Texas freeway where the lanes were coated with ice from freezing rain.
I took the correct evasive action, and moved over to the right, one lane, and stopped, just as the semi slid by me in the left lane, just where I had been.
I was lucky. If I had not reflexively glanced into the rear view mirror, and failed to see the truck crest the slight hill behind me, I would not have performed the evasive manuever. If it had happened a couple of seconds later, and I had not checked the rear view in those two seconds, I would have been hit and likely killed.
A self-driving car's sensors are on much more than humans are. They cover greater ranges of the spectrum, with several different sensors.
Are they perfect? Nothing is. Are they potentially much better than a human's sensors? Yes, without a doubt.
A human can outperform them, in some circumstances, now.
But the computer systems lack the inherent biological limitations of humans, so they can be improved faster and more permanently.
The reason for this is simple: The more automated the car gets, the more comfortable the driver gets operating it carelessly. A 99%-automated car is a recipe for a disaster, for it will function in a manner that leaves the driver completely unprepared for that 1% of the time when he MUST be fully alert. It's an invitation to drive in a highly distracted state of mind.
This also exposes an underlying flaw in the economics of a partially-automated vehicle. Why would I pay thousands of dollars more for a vehicle that is "mostly automated" if I still have to sit in it and operate it as if it isn't automated at all?
This is the basis for my professional opinion that automation outside some limited functions such as cruise control and low-speed operations like automatic braking and "parking assist" is both dangerous and uneconomical. Vehicle automation really is one of those things that works best largely in an "all or nothing" model.
See Post #52!
Add “human” to driver for that extra touch of stupidity.
My new Subaru Outback is a good example of a 5% automated car. It allows me in cruise control mode to set the distance of the car in front of me and to allow the car to "steer" itself so that you stay in your lane. I find the latter option not too practical because if you take your hands off the wheel, the car beeps at you but if the car is steering itself, you find yourself inadvertently fighting against it when the car is trying to steer and your hand is on the wheel.
It's got other features I like such as warning you if you put your blinker on to shift lanes and somebody is in your blind spot. Annoying is the feature that beeps everytime you cross over a painted center line. On side roads, I'm constantly doing that on purpose to go around pedestrians and bicyclists on side of road.
Also has a stop/start feature which I've gotten used to as well as automatic hold feature when you are stopped, so you don't inadvertently roll into the person in front or in back of you while you are stopped on a hill and checking your text messages!
With all these things going on (and there are others), I actually have to pay more attention to my driving than if I was totally in control of things.
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