5 ms·

In other news, statistics from 2014[1] suggest that since the autonomous car crash was reported yesterday (11:29pm EST, Mar24), 9 people were killed by human dr

by Mtinie 10y ago

In other news, statistics from 2014[1] suggest that since the autonomous car crash was reported yesterday (11:29pm EST, Mar24), 9 people were killed by human drivers under the influence of an intoxicant of some kind. Autonomous vehicles will have challenges that human drivers do not -- like software vulnerabilities -- but those are problems worth overcoming if it means that poor decision making by humans can be reduced. ---- [1] https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm6430a2.htm https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm6430a2.htm

nialv7 10y ago
This is not a fair comparison: there're a lot more human driver than autonomous cars.
- sodawater 10y ago
  Parent: "It's not fair to compare two things unless the sample sizes are exactly the same."
- agumonkey 10y ago
  One thing I just thought about, Musk said miles trains a better AI. Supposing this yields true valuable results. All SDV may become near perfect drivers. Humans will keep being spread along the spectrum of dangerous to safe driver. ps: thanks for reminding me that statistics are hard to get right.
  - chillingeffect 10y ago
    Anyone using ML knows there are points of diminishing returns. Otherwise I would be writing this from atop a pile of money.
- mertd 10y ago
  I think the point here is not that the self driving software is already beter than humans but rather that the upside of cars driving themselves is so big that it is worth pursuing until we get it right.
  - RodericDay 10y ago
    You can pursue that goal without simultaneously pursuing hype.
    - Mtinie 10y ago
      I agree completely with that statement. My fear is that irrational reporting and FUD on behalf of those with a vested interest in maintaining the status quo as long as possible will set back automation by a significant number of years. Some hype is useful, to be sure, but it is a delicate balance with avoiding a situation where the pace of innovation has been oversold.
    - invisible 10y ago
      What hype was even mentioned in the parent? I just don't get how you saw hype by the numbers being brought up.
- invisible 10y ago
  Seeing as nobody was seriously injured and that it wasn't the fault of the autonomous vehicle (reported by other news outlets) I think it's fair to bring it up. 0 deaths in the past six months vs 9 in the past 10 hours. That isn't even all vehicle deaths by humans in that timeframe either.
  - tylerhou 10y ago
    >0 deaths in the past six months vs 9 in the past 10 hours. But this is misleading because there are far more non-self-driving cars than self-driving cars.
    - lucb1e 10y ago
      I agree, but it's more misleading to have headlines about a self-driving car that crashed without mentioning it's not the self-driving car's fault (and without mentioning nobody was even injured).
      - danso 10y ago
        It's too early to know who is to blame, or even if blame can be assigned so cleanly. Meanwhile, we have Uber's own reports that say that human drivers have to physically intervene during autonomous operation at a rate of one intervention per mile http://www.recode.net/2017/3/16/14938116/uber-travis-kalanick-self-driving-internal-metrics-slow-progress http://www.recode.net/2017/3/16/14938116/uber-travis-kalanic...
        Fricken 10y ago
        Uber is pretty middle of the pack as far as the state of their progress developing this technology is concerned. One intervention per mile on average isn't any kind of scathing indictment of Uber's autonomous driving program. The sensationalism of Uber's leaked intervention report mostly just illustrates a disconnect between public perception about where the technology is at, and where it's really at. There are 23 other companies with permits to test autonomous vehicles in CA and they're all doing pretty much the same thing. Waymo is way out in front, Cruise/GM is doing well, but there are maybe a half dozen large, deeply invested players (including Tesla) not nearly as advanced as Uber.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
bunderbunder 10y ago
The much stronger defense in this case is to just cut to the chase and point out that, at least according to the police, the self-driving car was not the one at fault here - it was the driver of the other car blowing a yield sign.
prolly_a_moron 10y ago
>Autonomous vehicles will have challenges that human drivers do not Wait a minute: I don't think the argument is whether machines can drive better than humans. It's whether these companies that are desperate to make money (Uber, Tesla) are pushing potentially dangerous technology on to society before it's ready.
- hijra 10y ago
  The argument should be whether autonomous cars from Uber can drive better than humans. Because if the answer is yes we should get the dangerous technology off the roads ASAP -- namely humans. It's a good question whether society is ready to accept this, though.
  - prolly_a_moron 10y ago
    >It's a good question whether society is ready to accept this, though. Hah, "it" being ready as in the technology, not society. Poor writing on my part. But I guess either works.
  - falcolas 10y ago
    > The argument should be whether autonomous cars from Uber can drive better than humans. How much better? 1% over median? That means it's still worse than 49% of the drivers on the road. Statistically, the automated driver would be "better" for society at large, but it's still going to cause a lot of accidents and kill a lot of people. I also wonder if there might be even more accidents with an automated system which is still in the fat portion of the bell curve, since there will be no "good" drivers to reduce conditions ripe for an accident in the first place.
TenJack 10y ago
What about the ratio of human drivers to autonomous drivers since the crash? Not exactly 1:1...
madeofpalk 10y ago
Ahh yes. The "Tesla" defence.
- bogomipz 10y ago
  What's the "Tesla defense"?
- lucb1e 10y ago
  > Ahh yes. The "Tesla" defence. Is that the "BMW" defence to the "Tesla" defence?
bogomipz 10y ago
Wait, drunk driving is a willfully criminal act how is that comparable or relevant here? We already have things like taxis, Uber and Lyft and people still get drunk and drive under the influence of alcohol and kill people. Why would ride services with autonomous vehicles change that? If someone is going to get drunk and drive a car rather than calling an Uber with a human driving they are no more likely to get drunk and call Uber because Uber has driverless vehicles. The target for self driving cars is ride services not individuals.
- freeflight 10y ago
  >We already have things like taxis, Uber and Lyft and people still get drunk and drive under the influence of alcohol and kill people. Many reasons for that, from being cheap (I already own a car, I won't pay some random guy money!) to mere convenience. But such incidences are bound to get fewer once self-driving cars make up the majority of cars on the road and can take over from drunk drivers. >The target for self driving cars is ride services not individuals. In the short-term for Uber maybe, but not in the long-term for everybody else. I doubt that traditional car manufacturers, like BMW, Audi, Honda, Jaguar or Mercedes-Benz are pursuing self driving cars merely to offer ride sharing services, after all these companies are in the business of selling cars to individuals.
  - bogomipz 10y ago
    You have just made two contradictory statements: 1 )That we will see the demise of self-ownership of cars when you state: >"once self-driving cars make up the majority of cars on the road" 2) Car makers will continue to market car ownerships to individuals when you state: >"I doubt that traditional car manufacturers, like BMW, Audi, Honda, Jaguar or Mercedes-Benz are pursuing self driving cars merely to offer ride sharing services, after all these companies are in the business of selling cars to individuals" The problem with inebriation is that people don't exercise good judgement which is the reason they get behind the wheel and drive because they "think" they are OK. Someone who has a car that has a "self-driving mode" can just as easily get behind the wheel and operate the car in manual mode because in their impaired state they also "think" they are ok to drive. Self-driving cars don't solve the problem of impaired judgement.
mannykannot 10y ago
The real issue here - yet to be resolved at this time - is whether Uber is going about its development of autonomous cars responsibly, as Waymo, for example, appears to be doing. Generalities offer no answer to that question.
- scarmig 10y ago
  Well, a substantial portion of the technology Uber uses was developed by the exact same standards and processes as Waymo, at least ;)
snovv_crash 10y ago
Nobody was killed by nuclear weapons over the last 10 years, showing that they are at least as safe as self driving cars. /s Seriously, I get the point you're trying to make, but at least try to find some data that actually makes sense for a comparison.

by Mtinie 10y ago

nialv7 10y ago

This is not a fair comparison: there're a lot more human driver than autonomous cars.

sodawater 10y ago
Parent: "It's not fair to compare two things unless the sample sizes are exactly the same."
agumonkey 10y ago
One thing I just thought about, Musk said miles trains a better AI. Supposing this yields true valuable results. All SDV may become near perfect drivers. Humans will keep being spread along the spectrum of dangerous to safe driver. ps: thanks for reminding me that statistics are hard to get right.
- chillingeffect 10y ago
  Anyone using ML knows there are points of diminishing returns. Otherwise I would be writing this from atop a pile of money.
mertd 10y ago
I think the point here is not that the self driving software is already beter than humans but rather that the upside of cars driving themselves is so big that it is worth pursuing until we get it right.
- RodericDay 10y ago
  You can pursue that goal without simultaneously pursuing hype.
  - Mtinie 10y ago
    I agree completely with that statement. My fear is that irrational reporting and FUD on behalf of those with a vested interest in maintaining the status quo as long as possible will set back automation by a significant number of years. Some hype is useful, to be sure, but it is a delicate balance with avoiding a situation where the pace of innovation has been oversold.
  - invisible 10y ago
    What hype was even mentioned in the parent? I just don't get how you saw hype by the numbers being brought up.
invisible 10y ago
Seeing as nobody was seriously injured and that it wasn't the fault of the autonomous vehicle (reported by other news outlets) I think it's fair to bring it up. 0 deaths in the past six months vs 9 in the past 10 hours. That isn't even all vehicle deaths by humans in that timeframe either.
- tylerhou 10y ago
  >0 deaths in the past six months vs 9 in the past 10 hours. But this is misleading because there are far more non-self-driving cars than self-driving cars.
  - lucb1e 10y ago
    I agree, but it's more misleading to have headlines about a self-driving car that crashed without mentioning it's not the self-driving car's fault (and without mentioning nobody was even injured).
    - danso 10y ago
      It's too early to know who is to blame, or even if blame can be assigned so cleanly. Meanwhile, we have Uber's own reports that say that human drivers have to physically intervene during autonomous operation at a rate of one intervention per mile http://www.recode.net/2017/3/16/14938116/uber-travis-kalanick-self-driving-internal-metrics-slow-progress http://www.recode.net/2017/3/16/14938116/uber-travis-kalanic...
      - Fricken 10y ago
        Uber is pretty middle of the pack as far as the state of their progress developing this technology is concerned. One intervention per mile on average isn't any kind of scathing indictment of Uber's autonomous driving program. The sensationalism of Uber's leaked intervention report mostly just illustrates a disconnect between public perception about where the technology is at, and where it's really at. There are 23 other companies with permits to test autonomous vehicles in CA and they're all doing pretty much the same thing. Waymo is way out in front, Cruise/GM is doing well, but there are maybe a half dozen large, deeply invested players (including Tesla) not nearly as advanced as Uber.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

bunderbunder 10y ago

The much stronger defense in this case is to just cut to the chase and point out that, at least according to the police, the self-driving car was not the one at fault here - it was the driver of the other car blowing a yield sign.

prolly_a_moron 10y ago

>Autonomous vehicles will have challenges that human drivers do not Wait a minute: I don't think the argument is whether machines can drive better than humans. It's whether these companies that are desperate to make money (Uber, Tesla) are pushing potentially dangerous technology on to society before it's ready.

hijra 10y ago
The argument should be whether autonomous cars from Uber can drive better than humans. Because if the answer is yes we should get the dangerous technology off the roads ASAP -- namely humans. It's a good question whether society is ready to accept this, though.
- prolly_a_moron 10y ago
  >It's a good question whether society is ready to accept this, though. Hah, "it" being ready as in the technology, not society. Poor writing on my part. But I guess either works.
- falcolas 10y ago
  > The argument should be whether autonomous cars from Uber can drive better than humans. How much better? 1% over median? That means it's still worse than 49% of the drivers on the road. Statistically, the automated driver would be "better" for society at large, but it's still going to cause a lot of accidents and kill a lot of people. I also wonder if there might be even more accidents with an automated system which is still in the fat portion of the bell curve, since there will be no "good" drivers to reduce conditions ripe for an accident in the first place.

TenJack 10y ago

What about the ratio of human drivers to autonomous drivers since the crash? Not exactly 1:1...

madeofpalk 10y ago

Ahh yes. The "Tesla" defence.

bogomipz 10y ago
What's the "Tesla defense"?
lucb1e 10y ago
> Ahh yes. The "Tesla" defence. Is that the "BMW" defence to the "Tesla" defence?

bogomipz 10y ago

Wait, drunk driving is a willfully criminal act how is that comparable or relevant here? We already have things like taxis, Uber and Lyft and people still get drunk and drive under the influence of alcohol and kill people. Why would ride services with autonomous vehicles change that? If someone is going to get drunk and drive a car rather than calling an Uber with a human driving they are no more likely to get drunk and call Uber because Uber has driverless vehicles. The target for self driving cars is ride services not individuals.

freeflight 10y ago
>We already have things like taxis, Uber and Lyft and people still get drunk and drive under the influence of alcohol and kill people. Many reasons for that, from being cheap (I already own a car, I won't pay some random guy money!) to mere convenience. But such incidences are bound to get fewer once self-driving cars make up the majority of cars on the road and can take over from drunk drivers. >The target for self driving cars is ride services not individuals. In the short-term for Uber maybe, but not in the long-term for everybody else. I doubt that traditional car manufacturers, like BMW, Audi, Honda, Jaguar or Mercedes-Benz are pursuing self driving cars merely to offer ride sharing services, after all these companies are in the business of selling cars to individuals.
- bogomipz 10y ago
  You have just made two contradictory statements: 1 )That we will see the demise of self-ownership of cars when you state: >"once self-driving cars make up the majority of cars on the road" 2) Car makers will continue to market car ownerships to individuals when you state: >"I doubt that traditional car manufacturers, like BMW, Audi, Honda, Jaguar or Mercedes-Benz are pursuing self driving cars merely to offer ride sharing services, after all these companies are in the business of selling cars to individuals" The problem with inebriation is that people don't exercise good judgement which is the reason they get behind the wheel and drive because they "think" they are OK. Someone who has a car that has a "self-driving mode" can just as easily get behind the wheel and operate the car in manual mode because in their impaired state they also "think" they are ok to drive. Self-driving cars don't solve the problem of impaired judgement.

mannykannot 10y ago

The real issue here - yet to be resolved at this time - is whether Uber is going about its development of autonomous cars responsibly, as Waymo, for example, appears to be doing. Generalities offer no answer to that question.

scarmig 10y ago
Well, a substantial portion of the technology Uber uses was developed by the exact same standards and processes as Waymo, at least ;)

snovv_crash 10y ago

Nobody was killed by nuclear weapons over the last 10 years, showing that they are at least as safe as self driving cars. /s Seriously, I get the point you're trying to make, but at least try to find some data that actually makes sense for a comparison.