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I don't have any problem with self-driving cars as a concept, I want them on the road and believe they offer a ton of benefits to humanity. What I do have a pr

I don't have any problem with self-driving cars as a concept, I want them on the road and believe they offer a ton of benefits to humanity. What I do have a problem with is companies like Uber, Comma.ai, and to a certain extent Tesla who seem to not understand/appreciate how much work has to go into proving these things are safe before shipping them.

CoryG89 10y ago
It's never going to be 100℅ safe. But that's not necessarily needed. You just need to be safer than the human drivers currently filling our roadways.
- dboreham 10y ago
  There's no way this is true. What court is going to allow a self driving car to kill a human "because accidents happen"?
- agildehaus 10y ago
  It needs to be well safer than that. Humans have a higher level of tolerance for mistakes by humans than mistakes by robots made by humans. Every death and injury from self-driving cars is going to be on the news and public perception is everything to this technology. Fair? Probably not. But safety must be top priority here. We can't look like we're throwing this technology out there and hoping for the best. And I don't think you can say Tesla's Autopilot 2.0 has been shown to be safer than humans.
  - Nomentatus 10y ago
    Safer statistical in the mostly human driving environment is meant, and that already takes humans better understanding/prediction of other humans into acccount. If you keep safer (robot) drivers off the road, you're killing people to cover your ass.
    - agildehaus 10y ago
      Engineers won't have the say here. The public will. And the public does not care about statistics.
      - Nomentatus 10y ago
        If the public truly didn't care about statistics - even those they themselves observed - or their own convenience, then we'd still have flagpersons on foot preceding all automobiles. The history of the modern elevator is also very instructive in this regard: that device seemed infinitely dangerous to the public initially, but the statistics - almost no injuries - did decide the case in favor of elevators and their safety-springs rather quickly.
monochromatic 10y ago
> companies like Uber, Comma.ai, and to a certain extent Tesla who seem to not understand/appreciate how much work has to go into proving these things are safe before shipping them Is there anyone who understands it better than the companies who are actually making them?
- catdog 10y ago
  > Is there anyone who understands it better than the companies who are actually making them? The engineers building the stuff probably yes but there are managers under high pressure to ship something, better be yesterday and costs should better be low. Chances are high that the second group decides to go for it in the very moment the first group says it's kind of ready. If you have a company like Uber who generally push their products into the market with as much force as possible using hands full of VC money while ignoring all damage it may cause and always with full risk, this may even be worse. Also profit oriented companies not really caring about their impact to the general public (security,safety,health) is really not that uncommon.
eximius 10y ago
I think you underestimate their understanding. Their goal is to be the first to market and swallow the relatively minor public image loss garnered from these accidents which, by their calculation, will be few. These losses will ultimately be offset by being a pioneer in the field and capturing a huge market share. They might even intend to fix these problems, but they are by no means show stoppers. Companies do not have morals. They only have balance sheets and single digit number of lives barely even register.
- agildehaus 10y ago
  Which is why I included the word "appreciate". I know full-well why they're doing it.
  - eximius 10y ago
    Fair.
- user5994461 10y ago
  > relatively minor public image loss "Uber car drifts in front of a school and kills 3 children." -- 5 more in the hospital. A witness captured the scene on his smartphone see video. The first manufacturer to market half-assed will be the first to die. Don't under estimate how much the public value their life and their limbs ;)

CoryG89 10y ago

It's never going to be 100℅ safe. But that's not necessarily needed. You just need to be safer than the human drivers currently filling our roadways.

dboreham 10y ago
There's no way this is true. What court is going to allow a self driving car to kill a human "because accidents happen"?
agildehaus 10y ago
It needs to be well safer than that. Humans have a higher level of tolerance for mistakes by humans than mistakes by robots made by humans. Every death and injury from self-driving cars is going to be on the news and public perception is everything to this technology. Fair? Probably not. But safety must be top priority here. We can't look like we're throwing this technology out there and hoping for the best. And I don't think you can say Tesla's Autopilot 2.0 has been shown to be safer than humans.
- Nomentatus 10y ago
  Safer statistical in the mostly human driving environment is meant, and that already takes humans better understanding/prediction of other humans into acccount. If you keep safer (robot) drivers off the road, you're killing people to cover your ass.
  - agildehaus 10y ago
    Engineers won't have the say here. The public will. And the public does not care about statistics.
    - Nomentatus 10y ago
      If the public truly didn't care about statistics - even those they themselves observed - or their own convenience, then we'd still have flagpersons on foot preceding all automobiles. The history of the modern elevator is also very instructive in this regard: that device seemed infinitely dangerous to the public initially, but the statistics - almost no injuries - did decide the case in favor of elevators and their safety-springs rather quickly.

monochromatic 10y ago

> companies like Uber, Comma.ai, and to a certain extent Tesla who seem to not understand/appreciate how much work has to go into proving these things are safe before shipping them Is there anyone who understands it better than the companies who are actually making them?

catdog 10y ago
> Is there anyone who understands it better than the companies who are actually making them? The engineers building the stuff probably yes but there are managers under high pressure to ship something, better be yesterday and costs should better be low. Chances are high that the second group decides to go for it in the very moment the first group says it's kind of ready. If you have a company like Uber who generally push their products into the market with as much force as possible using hands full of VC money while ignoring all damage it may cause and always with full risk, this may even be worse. Also profit oriented companies not really caring about their impact to the general public (security,safety,health) is really not that uncommon.

eximius 10y ago

I think you underestimate their understanding. Their goal is to be the first to market and swallow the relatively minor public image loss garnered from these accidents which, by their calculation, will be few. These losses will ultimately be offset by being a pioneer in the field and capturing a huge market share. They might even intend to fix these problems, but they are by no means show stoppers. Companies do not have morals. They only have balance sheets and single digit number of lives barely even register.

agildehaus 10y ago
Which is why I included the word "appreciate". I know full-well why they're doing it.
- eximius 10y ago
  Fair.
user5994461 10y ago
> relatively minor public image loss "Uber car drifts in front of a school and kills 3 children." -- 5 more in the hospital. A witness captured the scene on his smartphone see video. The first manufacturer to market half-assed will be the first to die. Don't under estimate how much the public value their life and their limbs ;)