7 ms·

> that view is now in question Does anyone else find it fascinating that for computers to be considered "safe" they must be as close to 100% as you can get, wh

by girvo 10y ago

> that view is now in question Does anyone else find it fascinating that for computers to be considered "safe" they must be as close to 100% as you can get, when the equivalent human drivers have fatal accidents every single day?

te_chris 10y ago
I find it more fascinating that you don't understand why people would expect that.
- victorhooi 10y ago
  Please explain why you would expect it then?
  - bnegreve 10y ago
    Systematic bugs in self driving cars would be disastrous. So if you see a Tesla car crashing on days with white sky, you want to know whether this can happens to you as well.
- girvo 10y ago
  I'd love to know your thoughts on the topic?
  - te_chris 10y ago
    I don't really have any,apart from that the adoption of autonomous vehicles is going to be slower and take longer than people anticipate. Human traffic systems are complicated and not easily modelled, and humans are not easily reassured when events like this happen. While statistically people may be safer with an agent driving, most people don't crash most of the time, so they're more confident when they're in control than when someone else is.
puranjay 10y ago
If you actually replace all human drivers with all computer drivers, I'm pretty sure we'd hit the 100% safety mark. I can't even imagine the resistance to self-driving cars once they're actually viable. Who even enjoys driving on city roads anymore? Or on highways? I drove on American freeways and it was mind-numbingly dull. Just acres of concrete all along the road with nothing interesting to see or do.
- kbart 10y ago
  "If you actually replace all human drivers with all computer drivers" I drive motorcycle (and enjoy that), I doubt autopilot will come to those anytime soon..
  - kagamine 10y ago
    There are many other vehicles on the road also needing a human to drive them, tractors, heavy machinery, buses (that are not part of a regular, pre-defined route) ++. In the future though, it will always be your fault, because you are one person trying to prove an accident was not your fault against a big-money company. Good luck.
    - kbart 10y ago
      "In the future though, it will always be your fault, because you are one person trying to prove an accident was not your fault against a big-money company." That's why I always wear videoregistrator on my helmet. It paid off for itself many times already.
    - leni536 10y ago
      >tractors I would expect that it's quite easy to autopilot a tractor on the road. They already use autopilot in the field.
      - kagamine 10y ago
        It will be decades before farm machinery is replaced by modern tech. Decades. I would like HN users to very much stop dismissing any discussion on the topic of automated vehicles with glib reactions devoid of thought.
madaxe_again 10y ago
I wouldn't say "fascinating" so much as "irritating", as this is more about journalists wanting to get a juicy story where there isn't one, rather than a lesson on human nature. Statistically, autopilot is orders of magnitude safer than humans. If there's a story here, it's about how the US doesn't require underrun protection on trucks, thus making them death traps, but that wouldn't be anywhere near as good for circulation as a "rise of the machines, they want to kill you" story.
- arghnoname 10y ago
  I don't think we can say statistically whether it is safer than humans right now or not.
  - madaxe_again 10y ago
    150,000,000 miles on autopilot, one fatality. Humans, it's 66,000,000 miles per fatality, in the US. Admittedly the sample is small, but still, it suggests an advantage over humans.
    - arghnoname 10y ago
      Apples and oranges. The statistic you cite is all cars and roads, as far as I'm aware. High end vehicles with comparable safety features on roads where autopilot is likely to be engaged is more comparable. I wouldn't be surprised if autopilot is safer, but I think it is overstating things to say this is a statistical fact.
- kctess5 10y ago
  "Statistically" Source? I hear that it is imperfect software.
- random_upvoter 10y ago
  One problem of automation is that when an algorithm fails it reverts to 100% stupid mode, without any fallback. In this particular case the program didn't understand there was a truck, so the car drove full speed into the truck. As a result, the outcome of accidents with AI driving, while rare, will probably tend to be rather gruesome and this might lead to some really bad reaction.
taneq 10y ago
What's really interesting is how, once accepted, the computer becomes 100% accurate by default and anything conflicting with it is automatically wrong.
kagamine 10y ago
Likewise, human drivers manage to avoid accidents every single day by paying attention, reading traffic signals and reacting to a situation. Computers have to be 100% safe because self-driving cars take control away from the user. And where does the blame lie in an accident? With the owner of the vehicle, the 'operator' at the time of the accident, the 3rd party developers who were contracted by Tesla/Nissan/BMW, or the car company themselves? Getting customer service and a dealership to admit responsibility for parts failure as it is today is near impossible. It's fine for people to be be pro self-driving cars but it is wrong to dismiss any and every criticism of an emerging technology on that basis alone.
- jakobegger 10y ago
  Where the blame lies is a question that can probably only be answered on a case by case basis in the courts.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
chriswarbo 10y ago
That quote's taken from the tl;dr-equivalent at the start of the article. It seems to be summarising the following, from further down, which I think is perfectly reasonable: > Karl Brauer, an analyst with the auto research firm Kelley Blue Book, said the accident served as a signal that the technology might not be as advanced and ready for the market as some proponents have suggested. > "This is a bit of a wake-up call," Mr. Brauer said. "People who were maybe too aggressive in taking the position that we're almost there, this technology is going to be in the market very soon, maybe need to reassess that." I think that's perfectly reasonable, e.g. it may take 5 or 10 years to reach some kind of approved minimum safety level, especially since such safety approval standards/processes are still being developed. Just because Tesla's cars already have an "auto-pilot mode" doesn't mean the technology's ready for widespread deployment. Regarding "as close to 100% as you can get", that's not stated in the article. Instead, it says: > The federal traffic safety agency is nearing the release of a new set of guidelines and regulations regarding the testing of self-driving vehicles on public roads. They are expected to be released in July. > At a recent technology conference in Novi, Mich., the agency's leader, Mark Rosekind, said self-driving cars should at least be twice as safe as human drivers to result in a significant reduction in roadway deaths. "We need to start with two times better," Mr. Rosekind said. "We need to set a higher bar if we expect safety to actually be a benefit here." Again, I think that's reasonable. While a fully-automated road system would probably be safer than human drivers, we're not going to get an overnight switch; the harder problem is the transition, with manually- and autonomously-driven cars coexisting. It's not just a case of swapping out more and more cars, since self-driving cars will behave and interact in different ways (as an obvious example, looking at the occupants won't give you any information about intentions/gestures/etc.); hence it's worth waiting until a threshold higher than break-even is reached before beginning the transition.

by girvo 10y ago

te_chris 10y ago

I find it more fascinating that you don't understand why people would expect that.

victorhooi 10y ago
Please explain why you would expect it then?
- bnegreve 10y ago
  Systematic bugs in self driving cars would be disastrous. So if you see a Tesla car crashing on days with white sky, you want to know whether this can happens to you as well.
girvo 10y ago
I'd love to know your thoughts on the topic?
- te_chris 10y ago
  I don't really have any,apart from that the adoption of autonomous vehicles is going to be slower and take longer than people anticipate. Human traffic systems are complicated and not easily modelled, and humans are not easily reassured when events like this happen. While statistically people may be safer with an agent driving, most people don't crash most of the time, so they're more confident when they're in control than when someone else is.

puranjay 10y ago

If you actually replace all human drivers with all computer drivers, I'm pretty sure we'd hit the 100% safety mark. I can't even imagine the resistance to self-driving cars once they're actually viable. Who even enjoys driving on city roads anymore? Or on highways? I drove on American freeways and it was mind-numbingly dull. Just acres of concrete all along the road with nothing interesting to see or do.

kbart 10y ago
"If you actually replace all human drivers with all computer drivers" I drive motorcycle (and enjoy that), I doubt autopilot will come to those anytime soon..
- kagamine 10y ago
  There are many other vehicles on the road also needing a human to drive them, tractors, heavy machinery, buses (that are not part of a regular, pre-defined route) ++. In the future though, it will always be your fault, because you are one person trying to prove an accident was not your fault against a big-money company. Good luck.
  - kbart 10y ago
    "In the future though, it will always be your fault, because you are one person trying to prove an accident was not your fault against a big-money company." That's why I always wear videoregistrator on my helmet. It paid off for itself many times already.
  - leni536 10y ago
    >tractors I would expect that it's quite easy to autopilot a tractor on the road. They already use autopilot in the field.
    - kagamine 10y ago
      It will be decades before farm machinery is replaced by modern tech. Decades. I would like HN users to very much stop dismissing any discussion on the topic of automated vehicles with glib reactions devoid of thought.

madaxe_again 10y ago

I wouldn't say "fascinating" so much as "irritating", as this is more about journalists wanting to get a juicy story where there isn't one, rather than a lesson on human nature. Statistically, autopilot is orders of magnitude safer than humans. If there's a story here, it's about how the US doesn't require underrun protection on trucks, thus making them death traps, but that wouldn't be anywhere near as good for circulation as a "rise of the machines, they want to kill you" story.

arghnoname 10y ago
I don't think we can say statistically whether it is safer than humans right now or not.
- madaxe_again 10y ago
  150,000,000 miles on autopilot, one fatality. Humans, it's 66,000,000 miles per fatality, in the US. Admittedly the sample is small, but still, it suggests an advantage over humans.
  - arghnoname 10y ago
    Apples and oranges. The statistic you cite is all cars and roads, as far as I'm aware. High end vehicles with comparable safety features on roads where autopilot is likely to be engaged is more comparable. I wouldn't be surprised if autopilot is safer, but I think it is overstating things to say this is a statistical fact.
kctess5 10y ago
"Statistically" Source? I hear that it is imperfect software.
random_upvoter 10y ago
One problem of automation is that when an algorithm fails it reverts to 100% stupid mode, without any fallback. In this particular case the program didn't understand there was a truck, so the car drove full speed into the truck. As a result, the outcome of accidents with AI driving, while rare, will probably tend to be rather gruesome and this might lead to some really bad reaction.

taneq 10y ago

What's really interesting is how, once accepted, the computer becomes 100% accurate by default and anything conflicting with it is automatically wrong.

kagamine 10y ago

Likewise, human drivers manage to avoid accidents every single day by paying attention, reading traffic signals and reacting to a situation. Computers have to be 100% safe because self-driving cars take control away from the user. And where does the blame lie in an accident? With the owner of the vehicle, the 'operator' at the time of the accident, the 3rd party developers who were contracted by Tesla/Nissan/BMW, or the car company themselves? Getting customer service and a dealership to admit responsibility for parts failure as it is today is near impossible. It's fine for people to be be pro self-driving cars but it is wrong to dismiss any and every criticism of an emerging technology on that basis alone.

jakobegger 10y ago
Where the blame lies is a question that can probably only be answered on a case by case basis in the courts.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

chriswarbo 10y ago

That quote's taken from the tl;dr-equivalent at the start of the article. It seems to be summarising the following, from further down, which I think is perfectly reasonable: > Karl Brauer, an analyst with the auto research firm Kelley Blue Book, said the accident served as a signal that the technology might not be as advanced and ready for the market as some proponents have suggested. > "This is a bit of a wake-up call," Mr. Brauer said. "People who were maybe too aggressive in taking the position that we're almost there, this technology is going to be in the market very soon, maybe need to reassess that." I think that's perfectly reasonable, e.g. it may take 5 or 10 years to reach some kind of approved minimum safety level, especially since such safety approval standards/processes are still being developed. Just because Tesla's cars already have an "auto-pilot mode" doesn't mean the technology's ready for widespread deployment. Regarding "as close to 100% as you can get", that's not stated in the article. Instead, it says: > The federal traffic safety agency is nearing the release of a new set of guidelines and regulations regarding the testing of self-driving vehicles on public roads. They are expected to be released in July. > At a recent technology conference in Novi, Mich., the agency's leader, Mark Rosekind, said self-driving cars should at least be twice as safe as human drivers to result in a significant reduction in roadway deaths. "We need to start with two times better," Mr. Rosekind said. "We need to set a higher bar if we expect safety to actually be a benefit here." Again, I think that's reasonable. While a fully-automated road system would probably be safer than human drivers, we're not going to get an overnight switch; the harder problem is the transition, with manually- and autonomously-driven cars coexisting. It's not just a case of swapping out more and more cars, since self-driving cars will behave and interact in different ways (as an obvious example, looking at the occupants won't give you any information about intentions/gestures/etc.); hence it's worth waiting until a threshold higher than break-even is reached before beginning the transition.