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It's refreshing to see an article like this among the many other articles predicting self-driving cars will be here in ~2 years. Volvo has committed to selling

It's refreshing to see an article like this among the many other articles predicting self-driving cars will be here in ~2 years. Volvo has committed to selling level 4 vehicles by the end of this year (in limited locations) - I'd love for them to follow through and see how good their technology really is. I suspect the transition will be far more gradual than most people are willing to admit, and take decades instead of years. Keep in mind, serious research into self-driving cars started in the 80's, and then there was a huge increase in interest in the 2000's because of the DARPA challenges. After that Google took interest, and recently the major automakers have become serious about it as well. But it's worth noting that originally Chris Urmson had predicted Google would be selling fully autonomous cars today, and instead Google lost a lot of their talent in the last year including Urmson and there is no public deadline for selling a product. I think progress is great and self-driving cars are awesome, but I don't believe they're just around the corner.

imh 10y ago
My great worry with self-driving cars is that they shouldn't be right around the corner, but they might be anyways. Marketing departments might move faster than engineering, smooth-talking the buyers into taking uninformed risks in order to expand the company's training data.
- woofyman 10y ago
  If NHSTA does its job, this shouldn't be an issue in the USA at least.
  - imh 10y ago
    I know they can deal with the risks, but what about the "informed" part? My pet peeve with Tesla's marketing dept is that there are tons of Tesla drivers who seem to think the autopilot is more capable than it is: https://youtu.be/qnZHRupjl5E https://youtu.be/qnZHRupjl5E Those people are surely not aware of the risks they are taking, so I'd bet even the more responsible users aren't aware of its limits.
    - unityByFreedom 10y ago
      OMG that video. I thought people learned their lesson after the FL man's death. The culture is even worse now! Cars led to more deaths than people had on horseback. I'm starting to feel autonomous vehicles will be the same sort of innovation. More elderly/younger people could use them, and ultimately more deaths will result as people's carelessness increases. Tesla is still cashing in while resisting safety features like requiring hands on the wheel. Meanwhile, accidents like the death in Hong Kong go mostly unnoticed in the US.
      - woofyman 10y ago
        Wow morons, I don't mind them killing themselves, but I do mind them killing someone else.
        deleted 10y ago
        [deleted]
    - jlarocco 10y ago
      Wow, that is a scary video. I'm surprised the NHTSA doesn't have a rule saying auto-pilot should be 100% autonomous, in control, and capable of driving in the current conditions, or it should pull over, turn itself off, and put the car in manual control mode. Counting on drivers to understand when auto-pilot can and can't handle driving conditions seems like a completely stupid idea and a recipe for disaster.
    - felippee 10y ago
      Holy crap. In some sense it is really surprising there's only been one fatality. Just as well tomorrow there might be 10 more if people really do such stuff...
      - imh 10y ago
        There have been more than just the one fatality. I know of at least one other, but who knows if that's the extent. And there have probably been plenty of crashes and injuries.
  - threeseed 10y ago
    The Trump administration stated today that they will remove 75% of all regulations currently in place. Given that self driving cars are a potential job creator you might find those regulations removed.
    - function_seven 10y ago
      > Given that self driving cars are a potential job creator This is the first time I’ve seen someone refer to automated cars as a job creator. It’s almost always presented as the thing that will kill the trucking and taxi jobs by the millions.
      - threeseed 10y ago
        In the next 5-10 years (maybe longer ?) it will be a net job creator. And then a massive job destroyer. Of truly scary proportions.
    - woofyman 10y ago
      I fear that myself. Stake holders in the autonomous car business should lobby against that because in the end it's in they're own best interests.
      - jbigelow76 10y ago
        I literally just came to HN after browsing slate.com for a bit, currently on their front page is an article about a railroad company that sent 86% of their lobbying money to Trump and GOP PACs this last election cycle. Half of this company's revenue is based in pesos and susceptible to dollar/peso fluctuations and its core business is related to moving goods back and forth between the US and Mexico. Trump took dead aim at free trade, and NAFTA in particular on the campaign trail. Self interest seems to play no part in who people (and companies, thank you Citizens United) choose to support. http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2017/01/23/kansas_city_southern_railroad_company_relies_on_nafta_supported_gop_oops.html http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2017/01/23/kansas_city_s... Edit: expanded on why a for profit company being pro-Republican would be against its own self interest.
- greggman 10y ago
  Hmmm, so as cars get cheaper (no driver needed) maybe we'll see mobile billboards by the thousands. I wonder how many other possible unintended consequences there will be
  - ehnto 10y ago
    What a horrible waste of work that would be. In the sense that the energy and time taken from other road uses just for a little advertising would be obnoxious. Adverts only continue to exist because they ultimately find the sweetspot between inconvenience and payoff. A road mobile billboard is inconveniencing everyone and the payoff is nil. In contrast to a YouTube advert where the payoff is the youtube video, a mobile billboard has no payoff.
  - gregpilling 10y ago
    So like the trucks going up and down the Las Vegas strip, but hundreds and hundreds of them . Moving billboards everywhere. Unintended consequences indeed.
stale2002 10y ago
Level 5 is a long way off, but level 4 really is right around the corner. The article was talking about level 5.
- unityByFreedom 10y ago
  > level 4 really is right around the corner I disagree. Level 4 does not require driver attention. That is still a long way off. From Wikipedia [1]: Level 4: The automated system can control the vehicle in all but a few environments such as severe weather. The driver must enable the automated system only when it is safe to do so. When enabled, driver attention is not required. Level 5: Other than setting the destination and starting the system, no human intervention is required. The automatic system can drive to any location where it is legal to drive and make its own decision. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autonomous_car https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autonomous_car
  - _delirium 10y ago
    Yes, so far at least, I don't think any company is even proposing anything past Level 3 on their near-future roadmap.
  - jessriedel 10y ago
    By my reading of the article, stale2002 is correct. Pratt is clearly talking about the difference between Level 4 and Level 5 in his first two answers. Level 4 doesn't require driver attention, it just requires the driver to be (instantly?) available if the system has a problem, and this change-over is the situation that Pratt worries about in his fourth answer. (NB: When he says "The article was talking about level 5", it's clear from context that stale2002 means that the article was talking about level 5 in terms of technological difficulty and timelines.)
    - function_seven 10y ago
      > Level 4 doesn't require driver attention, it just requires the driver to be (instantly?) available if the system has a problem Sincerely asking. Doesn’t that mean it requires driver attention?
felippee 10y ago
I took the liberty to draw a few situations which AI would have likely no clue what to do, even if it detected the danger. I'll be adding some more as every day on the freeway brings me new ideas (in fact I'm editing one right now). Something like a "Winograd Schema for self driving cars": http://blog.piekniewski.info/2017/01/19/what-would-an-autonomous-car-do/ http://blog.piekniewski.info/2017/01/19/what-would-an-autono...
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- medion 10y ago
  Love the artwork!
- nopinsight 10y ago
  Nice work! Some of the situations in the drawings imply that the car needs human-level commonsense to perform properly. For certain things like 'fire in a tunnel' or 'tornado crossing the road', there could be sufficient time to warn humans to take control or at least give verbal instructions, while the car is slowing down drastically or even turning away as a safety-first precaution. The challenge for the autonomous car would be "how to know that it doesn't really know". I wonder if some existing philosophy or theories are applicable for such a purpose in the real world. Does anyone have pointers?
- nmjohn 10y ago
  Your artwork is great! I'm not sure #1 would really be a problem as that situation never should occur and is totally preventable (there always should be traffic cones/barricades surrounding the cover, something the car easily could detect). In the rare case it does happen, the utility company would/should be at fault for leaving a manhole open like that. I can also think of a few ways to prevent number 2 (basically, a combination of GPS + knowing where all intersections occur + road data from thousands of other connected cars = knowledge of where every stop sign is. Certainly not foolproof, but I think ultimately it is a problem that has possible solutions) The rest of your examples are fantastic though, #3 being quite terrifying actually. They are all very intriguing thought-experiments and I look forward to seeing your future additions!
danmaz74 10y ago
I always thought that the first real application for level 4 would be highways. Aren't we really close to that? They should be much easier than urban driving.

imh 10y ago

My great worry with self-driving cars is that they shouldn't be right around the corner, but they might be anyways. Marketing departments might move faster than engineering, smooth-talking the buyers into taking uninformed risks in order to expand the company's training data.

woofyman 10y ago
If NHSTA does its job, this shouldn't be an issue in the USA at least.
- imh 10y ago
  I know they can deal with the risks, but what about the "informed" part? My pet peeve with Tesla's marketing dept is that there are tons of Tesla drivers who seem to think the autopilot is more capable than it is: https://youtu.be/qnZHRupjl5E https://youtu.be/qnZHRupjl5E Those people are surely not aware of the risks they are taking, so I'd bet even the more responsible users aren't aware of its limits.
  - unityByFreedom 10y ago
    OMG that video. I thought people learned their lesson after the FL man's death. The culture is even worse now! Cars led to more deaths than people had on horseback. I'm starting to feel autonomous vehicles will be the same sort of innovation. More elderly/younger people could use them, and ultimately more deaths will result as people's carelessness increases. Tesla is still cashing in while resisting safety features like requiring hands on the wheel. Meanwhile, accidents like the death in Hong Kong go mostly unnoticed in the US.
    - woofyman 10y ago
      Wow morons, I don't mind them killing themselves, but I do mind them killing someone else.
      - deleted 10y ago
        [deleted]
  - jlarocco 10y ago
    Wow, that is a scary video. I'm surprised the NHTSA doesn't have a rule saying auto-pilot should be 100% autonomous, in control, and capable of driving in the current conditions, or it should pull over, turn itself off, and put the car in manual control mode. Counting on drivers to understand when auto-pilot can and can't handle driving conditions seems like a completely stupid idea and a recipe for disaster.
  - felippee 10y ago
    Holy crap. In some sense it is really surprising there's only been one fatality. Just as well tomorrow there might be 10 more if people really do such stuff...
    - imh 10y ago
      There have been more than just the one fatality. I know of at least one other, but who knows if that's the extent. And there have probably been plenty of crashes and injuries.
- threeseed 10y ago
  The Trump administration stated today that they will remove 75% of all regulations currently in place. Given that self driving cars are a potential job creator you might find those regulations removed.
  - function_seven 10y ago
    > Given that self driving cars are a potential job creator This is the first time I’ve seen someone refer to automated cars as a job creator. It’s almost always presented as the thing that will kill the trucking and taxi jobs by the millions.
    - threeseed 10y ago
      In the next 5-10 years (maybe longer ?) it will be a net job creator. And then a massive job destroyer. Of truly scary proportions.
  - woofyman 10y ago
    I fear that myself. Stake holders in the autonomous car business should lobby against that because in the end it's in they're own best interests.
    - jbigelow76 10y ago
      I literally just came to HN after browsing slate.com for a bit, currently on their front page is an article about a railroad company that sent 86% of their lobbying money to Trump and GOP PACs this last election cycle. Half of this company's revenue is based in pesos and susceptible to dollar/peso fluctuations and its core business is related to moving goods back and forth between the US and Mexico. Trump took dead aim at free trade, and NAFTA in particular on the campaign trail. Self interest seems to play no part in who people (and companies, thank you Citizens United) choose to support. http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2017/01/23/kansas_city_southern_railroad_company_relies_on_nafta_supported_gop_oops.html http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2017/01/23/kansas_city_s... Edit: expanded on why a for profit company being pro-Republican would be against its own self interest.
greggman 10y ago
Hmmm, so as cars get cheaper (no driver needed) maybe we'll see mobile billboards by the thousands. I wonder how many other possible unintended consequences there will be
- ehnto 10y ago
  What a horrible waste of work that would be. In the sense that the energy and time taken from other road uses just for a little advertising would be obnoxious. Adverts only continue to exist because they ultimately find the sweetspot between inconvenience and payoff. A road mobile billboard is inconveniencing everyone and the payoff is nil. In contrast to a YouTube advert where the payoff is the youtube video, a mobile billboard has no payoff.
- gregpilling 10y ago
  So like the trucks going up and down the Las Vegas strip, but hundreds and hundreds of them . Moving billboards everywhere. Unintended consequences indeed.

stale2002 10y ago

Level 5 is a long way off, but level 4 really is right around the corner. The article was talking about level 5.

unityByFreedom 10y ago
> level 4 really is right around the corner I disagree. Level 4 does not require driver attention. That is still a long way off. From Wikipedia [1]: Level 4: The automated system can control the vehicle in all but a few environments such as severe weather. The driver must enable the automated system only when it is safe to do so. When enabled, driver attention is not required. Level 5: Other than setting the destination and starting the system, no human intervention is required. The automatic system can drive to any location where it is legal to drive and make its own decision. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autonomous_car https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autonomous_car
- _delirium 10y ago
  Yes, so far at least, I don't think any company is even proposing anything past Level 3 on their near-future roadmap.
- jessriedel 10y ago
  By my reading of the article, stale2002 is correct. Pratt is clearly talking about the difference between Level 4 and Level 5 in his first two answers. Level 4 doesn't require driver attention, it just requires the driver to be (instantly?) available if the system has a problem, and this change-over is the situation that Pratt worries about in his fourth answer. (NB: When he says "The article was talking about level 5", it's clear from context that stale2002 means that the article was talking about level 5 in terms of technological difficulty and timelines.)
  - function_seven 10y ago
    > Level 4 doesn't require driver attention, it just requires the driver to be (instantly?) available if the system has a problem Sincerely asking. Doesn’t that mean it requires driver attention?

felippee 10y ago

I took the liberty to draw a few situations which AI would have likely no clue what to do, even if it detected the danger. I'll be adding some more as every day on the freeway brings me new ideas (in fact I'm editing one right now). Something like a "Winograd Schema for self driving cars": http://blog.piekniewski.info/2017/01/19/what-would-an-autonomous-car-do/ http://blog.piekniewski.info/2017/01/19/what-would-an-autono...

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
medion 10y ago
Love the artwork!
nopinsight 10y ago
Nice work! Some of the situations in the drawings imply that the car needs human-level commonsense to perform properly. For certain things like 'fire in a tunnel' or 'tornado crossing the road', there could be sufficient time to warn humans to take control or at least give verbal instructions, while the car is slowing down drastically or even turning away as a safety-first precaution. The challenge for the autonomous car would be "how to know that it doesn't really know". I wonder if some existing philosophy or theories are applicable for such a purpose in the real world. Does anyone have pointers?
nmjohn 10y ago
Your artwork is great! I'm not sure #1 would really be a problem as that situation never should occur and is totally preventable (there always should be traffic cones/barricades surrounding the cover, something the car easily could detect). In the rare case it does happen, the utility company would/should be at fault for leaving a manhole open like that. I can also think of a few ways to prevent number 2 (basically, a combination of GPS + knowing where all intersections occur + road data from thousands of other connected cars = knowledge of where every stop sign is. Certainly not foolproof, but I think ultimately it is a problem that has possible solutions) The rest of your examples are fantastic though, #3 being quite terrifying actually. They are all very intriguing thought-experiments and I look forward to seeing your future additions!

danmaz74 10y ago

I always thought that the first real application for level 4 would be highways. Aren't we really close to that? They should be much easier than urban driving.