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It's not just about Tesla though. They have to defend autopilot not only to protect the brand but to protect the public's perception of autonomous vehicles in

by angusb 10y ago

It's not just about Tesla though. They have to defend autopilot not only to protect the brand but to protect the public's perception of autonomous vehicles in general. Self driving tech is poised to save many many lives. So from a utilitarian perspective, it's probably justified to take extraordinary measures to make sure reactionary media and public whim doesn't kill it off, however uncomfortable that might seem in the short term. Whilst this case is incredibly sad (and I don't want to downplay that in any way), if you're trying to minimise the overall amount of fatal crashes, exonerating the tech is the priority (if it is truly not at fault).

vkou 10y ago
They could defend the public's perception of autonomous vehicles in general by not rushing to market a beta that is less technically capable then other autonomous systems being worked on by their competitors.
- angusb 10y ago
  Are you saying that just based on the fact that they've been developing it for less time than Google, or is there a more in depth case for that somewhere? I would be very interested to read about that if there is.
  - vkou 10y ago
    1. Tesla makes it clear that Autopilot is a beta. 2. From the rest of this thread, it sounds like their long-range cameras/radar has very limited FOV.
    - bdamm 10y ago
      The "white truck against the bright sky" seems to imply that the exposure depth and dynamic range of the camera may also have played a role.
CaptSpify 10y ago
I can already hear a lot of people that I know: "See! I told you them automagic cars were the devil!" I personally can't wait for fully self-driving cars, but it's going to be a big PR battle in the US
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
a3n 10y ago
> It's not just about Tesla though. > They have to defend autopilot not only to protect the brand but to protect the public's perception of autonomous vehicles in general. They could have done that in two separate posts. This was tone deaf at best.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
dragontamer 10y ago
> They have to defend autopilot not only to protect the brand but to protect the public's perception of autonomous vehicles in general. Why? Why not just build the cars people want? (including cars that people want but don't realize they want yet) There shouldn't be a political agenda associated with engineering. Build what is needed. Build what people want. Build what people will need. But never "defend my reputation and the reputation of this device that I'm making" EDIT: I mean, I get why Public Relations are important and so forth. So Tesla is certainly free to do what they want here. But lets not pretend that this carefully crafted "condolence" piece that has come out roughly one and a half months late is anything but damage control for this company.
ars 10y ago
> Self driving tech is poised to save many many lives. The computer would have to be 99.99999% reliable to do that. The accident rate is around 74 per 100 million miles (and fatalities is 1.13). It's unclear exactly how to turn that into a percentage, but no matter how you do it it's quite high. Say an accident takes 5 minutes, and people drive 30 miles/hour. Then that works out to 99.999% for humans. If you use the numbers for fatalities then it's 99.99999%. I.e. 99.99999% of the time, as whole across all [US] humans, people drive in a way that does not cause a fatality. That's the bar computers have to cross in order to save any lives at all.
- emitstop 10y ago
  This is the first fatality collision after 130 million miles of tesla's autopilot, so it's already above that bar. Additionally, 92 people are killed in fatal car accidents in the US every day. So it's not as though this is some uncommon occurrence that autonomous vehicles would be unlikely to improve.
  - ars 10y ago
    > This is the first fatality collision after 130 million miles of tesla's autopilot, so it's already above that bar. It most definitely is not above that bar! The autopilot is combined with a human operating the car. How many accidents were avoided by the human rather than the autopilot? I suspect a ton of accidents (i.e. the autopilot has a high error rate). How many did the autopilot avoid that the human would not have? Probably not that many, if any. > Additionally, 92 people are killed in fatal car accidents in the US every day. So it's not as though this is some uncommon occurrence that autonomous vehicles would be unlikely to improve. Do the math. I did. 0.00001% seems pretty uncommon to me. There is a lot of driving in the US, so even that low of a number is visible, but it's still a low number. Remember every single computer must be all but perfect to reduce the error rate. Have you ever seen a computer to be that good? At even something as simple as not crashing? Never mind driving a car.
    - ec109685 10y ago
      "How many did the autopilot avoid that the human would not have? Probably not that many, if any." Or probably it avoided 100,000 accidents! Unfortunately, we are both just guessing. So please keep your math out of this.
YeGoblynQueenne 10y ago
>> Self driving tech is poised to save many many lives. Based on what?
- pacificmint 10y ago
  > Based on what? Human drivers are very bad. We kill over 32,000 people a year (and that's a 60 year low, just a few years ago it was over 40,000). So if self driving cars are just a little better than humans, they will save many lives. If they are a lot better than us, they will save many more.
  - droopyEyelids 10y ago
    You have to make a comparison if you want to pass a judgement that something is "bad". Bad compared to what?
    - pacificmint 10y ago
      > Bad compared to what? Bad compared to pretty much every other form of transportation that humans employ.
  - vacri 10y ago
    If they are just a little worse than humans, they will cost many lives. If they are a lot worse than us, they will cost many more.
  - YeGoblynQueenne 10y ago
    >> if self driving cars are (...) That's a hypothetical. You say autonomous cars are "poised" to save many lives -not even avoid many deaths, actively "save". That's very strong language to use based on an "if" that nobody yet knows the answer to with any certainty. That is, unless you are privy to some information that the rest of us are not? Are you? What is it that you base your assertion on? Do you base it on anything or is it just a pretty turn of phrase you thought sounded cool?
    - 10y ago

by angusb 10y ago

vkou 10y ago

They could defend the public's perception of autonomous vehicles in general by not rushing to market a beta that is less technically capable then other autonomous systems being worked on by their competitors.

angusb 10y ago
Are you saying that just based on the fact that they've been developing it for less time than Google, or is there a more in depth case for that somewhere? I would be very interested to read about that if there is.
- vkou 10y ago
  1. Tesla makes it clear that Autopilot is a beta. 2. From the rest of this thread, it sounds like their long-range cameras/radar has very limited FOV.
  - bdamm 10y ago
    The "white truck against the bright sky" seems to imply that the exposure depth and dynamic range of the camera may also have played a role.

CaptSpify 10y ago

I can already hear a lot of people that I know: "See! I told you them automagic cars were the devil!" I personally can't wait for fully self-driving cars, but it's going to be a big PR battle in the US

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]

a3n 10y ago

> It's not just about Tesla though. > They have to defend autopilot not only to protect the brand but to protect the public's perception of autonomous vehicles in general. They could have done that in two separate posts. This was tone deaf at best.

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]

dragontamer 10y ago

> They have to defend autopilot not only to protect the brand but to protect the public's perception of autonomous vehicles in general. Why? Why not just build the cars people want? (including cars that people want but don't realize they want yet) There shouldn't be a political agenda associated with engineering. Build what is needed. Build what people want. Build what people will need. But never "defend my reputation and the reputation of this device that I'm making" EDIT: I mean, I get why Public Relations are important and so forth. So Tesla is certainly free to do what they want here. But lets not pretend that this carefully crafted "condolence" piece that has come out roughly one and a half months late is anything but damage control for this company.

ars 10y ago

> Self driving tech is poised to save many many lives. The computer would have to be 99.99999% reliable to do that. The accident rate is around 74 per 100 million miles (and fatalities is 1.13). It's unclear exactly how to turn that into a percentage, but no matter how you do it it's quite high. Say an accident takes 5 minutes, and people drive 30 miles/hour. Then that works out to 99.999% for humans. If you use the numbers for fatalities then it's 99.99999%. I.e. 99.99999% of the time, as whole across all [US] humans, people drive in a way that does not cause a fatality. That's the bar computers have to cross in order to save any lives at all.

emitstop 10y ago
This is the first fatality collision after 130 million miles of tesla's autopilot, so it's already above that bar. Additionally, 92 people are killed in fatal car accidents in the US every day. So it's not as though this is some uncommon occurrence that autonomous vehicles would be unlikely to improve.
- ars 10y ago
  > This is the first fatality collision after 130 million miles of tesla's autopilot, so it's already above that bar. It most definitely is not above that bar! The autopilot is combined with a human operating the car. How many accidents were avoided by the human rather than the autopilot? I suspect a ton of accidents (i.e. the autopilot has a high error rate). How many did the autopilot avoid that the human would not have? Probably not that many, if any. > Additionally, 92 people are killed in fatal car accidents in the US every day. So it's not as though this is some uncommon occurrence that autonomous vehicles would be unlikely to improve. Do the math. I did. 0.00001% seems pretty uncommon to me. There is a lot of driving in the US, so even that low of a number is visible, but it's still a low number. Remember every single computer must be all but perfect to reduce the error rate. Have you ever seen a computer to be that good? At even something as simple as not crashing? Never mind driving a car.
  - ec109685 10y ago
    "How many did the autopilot avoid that the human would not have? Probably not that many, if any." Or probably it avoided 100,000 accidents! Unfortunately, we are both just guessing. So please keep your math out of this.

YeGoblynQueenne 10y ago

>> Self driving tech is poised to save many many lives. Based on what?

pacificmint 10y ago
> Based on what? Human drivers are very bad. We kill over 32,000 people a year (and that's a 60 year low, just a few years ago it was over 40,000). So if self driving cars are just a little better than humans, they will save many lives. If they are a lot better than us, they will save many more.
- droopyEyelids 10y ago
  You have to make a comparison if you want to pass a judgement that something is "bad". Bad compared to what?
  - pacificmint 10y ago
    > Bad compared to what? Bad compared to pretty much every other form of transportation that humans employ.
- vacri 10y ago
  If they are just a little worse than humans, they will cost many lives. If they are a lot worse than us, they will cost many more.
- YeGoblynQueenne 10y ago
  >> if self driving cars are (...) That's a hypothetical. You say autonomous cars are "poised" to save many lives -not even avoid many deaths, actively "save". That's very strong language to use based on an "if" that nobody yet knows the answer to with any certainty. That is, unless you are privy to some information that the rest of us are not? Are you? What is it that you base your assertion on? Do you base it on anything or is it just a pretty turn of phrase you thought sounded cool?
  - 10y ago