5 ms·

What are you (or anyone in the space) doing to advance the public's perception of the viability of self-driving cars? Whenever I speak to laypeople about self-

by Denzel 10y ago

What are you (or anyone in the space) doing to advance the public's perception of the viability of self-driving cars? Whenever I speak to laypeople about self-driving cars their mind immediately shoots to the 1 million+ ways that things can go terribly wrong, or even slightly wrong. Therefore, they have no interest in self-driving cars. It'd be helpful if we could see when self-driving cars get there. Like crash-safety tests soothe people's nerves, a battery of self-driving tests -- visual, visceral -- would silence objections. Something to point to... something tangible. A way to score the playing field. Because between Google, Tesla, Uber, Cruise, Voyage, and whoever else, it's insanely difficult to see through the fog.

olivercameron 10y ago
Great question! I think the biggest help would be statistical significance. We (as in the tech community) realize that machines can exceed humans in efficiency and safety, but the data that this is unarguably true does not yet exist. Waymo drives 1 million miles per year, but this is obviously dwarfed by humans driving. A self-driving car company needs to be doing hundreds of millions of physical miles in order to quieten these fears, and it's only a matter of time before this is happening. This is one of the reason I think autonomous taxis are the perfect vehicle (pun intended) to bring autonomy to the world, since the business gets stronger the more miles you do.
- Denzel 10y ago
  Thanks for answering Oliver. I understand the statistical point of view (as a member of the tech community). However, I think that argument is falling upon deaf ears across the general population. You still get a "yeah, but..." with an uneasy shrug. People don't like the idea of losing agency when things go sideways. While people may agree with the premise of a computer being better in extraordinary situations, it's hard getting over an unknown unknown. They don't trust the system. They trust themselves. Elon Musk fundamentally understands that you must "capture the imagination" of the general public to advance a field. [1] He's done it consistently through SpaceX and Tesla, and I witnessed it first-hand on two separate occasions with two very different people. For years, I would tell my father -- an older American muscle-car loving guy -- about Tesla and their cars. All the logical arguments. But his heart was set upon the Dodge Hellcat: one of the fastest street-legal cars ever released. That was, until the day the Tesla Model S beat the Dodge Hellcat in a drag race. From then on, he started talking about Tesla, calling me when he saw one, and talking with the owners. Tesla captured his imagination with a visual, visceral experience. And so it was with my girlfriend -- a young, 20-something, not really interested in cars. I'd point out Tesla cars while we were driving and tell her all about them. The logic behind electric cars didn't interest her. Until one day, she called me, screaming into the phone, "Babe! Babe! I just saw this car... it... the doors, I don't know, they like went up like a bird! But it was an SUV!" She was over the moon excited. To which I responded, "That's the Tesla Model X." From then on, her dream car is the Model X. Tesla captured her imagination with a visual, visceral experience. My gut feeling is that the company to win will be the one with statistical significance and a way to capture the public's imagination. P.S. This is all assuming that you're trying to win as a consumer company. If your mission is just to succeed as a supplier, then disregard. [1]: https://youtu.be/xmOt5OZGvhw?t=3m24s https://youtu.be/xmOt5OZGvhw?t=3m24s
  - gregpilling 10y ago
    and if you wanted a little history to back up your thoughts, Henry Ford had the 999 racecar before the Ford Motor Company was founded, and Soichiro Honda was crazy about racing as well and almost bankrupted the company in pursuit of it (some dispute the closeness of it). Both felt that racing captured the hearts and minds of the public, and gave the newspapers something to write about.
    - Denzel 10y ago
      Thank you for that! That does indeed lend more credence to the hypothesis... especially since Musk is known to have studied Henry Ford's life.
  - PhantomGremlin 10y ago
    You're quite right about imagination. But you didn't do your dad any favors with the Tesla vs Dodge Hellcat comparison. The speed of the Tesla is really a parlor trick. I'd bet on the Hellcat every time I needed to do more than a few laps on any decent race track. Here are the sad details as reported by Car and Driver. The Hellcat smoked the Tesla: http://www.caranddriver.com/features/tesla-model-s-p85d-at-lightning-lap-2016-feature http://www.caranddriver.com/features/tesla-model-s-p85d-at-l...
    - Denzel 10y ago
      Thing is, I didn't show my dad the comparison (I didn't even know it existed until he told me). He came across an article independently and watched the video for himself. He's also much more concerned with acceleration -- the feeling of being pinned back in your seat -- than distance. So the quarter mile was enough for him.
visarga 10y ago
> Whenever I speak to laypeople about self driving cars their mind immediately shoots to the 1 million+ ways that things can go terribly wrong, or even slightly wrong. When I raved about self driving cars to my wife, she said to me: look, Google Maps is messing up on a continuous basis (GPS errors, software errors, bad routes, mapping inconsistencies, underestimated ETA). If they can't make a decent GPS app, how could they make a self driving car? I had no way to counter that. It's true, GPS is an old tech purposefully dumbed down for non-military applications. But how can we convince people of progress when it is so lacking?
- riffraff 10y ago
  regarding GPS errors, is it GPS which is the issue, or just phones with sub-par sensors and set ups? I ask this cause my wife's previous phone had consistently crappy GPS performance, losing satellite connection very often, getting stuck etc. I never had such issues with mine, nor with her new one.
  - yanma 10y ago
    Sensors quality does have something to do with it, but regardless, you won't be able to get the accuracy and consistency from GPS you need for localizing a self driving vehicle. Unless you get a DGPS unit (super expensive and require 3k subcription from satellites) you get north of 1m accuracy.
- bitwiseand 10y ago
  A self-driving car, as proposed by Waymo and many others, in no way relies just on GPS. These beasts have fusion of many sensors with built in redundancy. Technology improves and evolves. If it didn't you wouldn't be so reliant on Google Maps. We convince people of progress by a safe track record. Google maps may fail occasionally but more often than not it gets you to your destination at the estimated time. Yes self-driving cars can't be "more often than not" safe. But starting with smaller areas and showing the difference it makes on people's lives and the environment can be a good start.

by Denzel 10y ago

olivercameron 10y ago

Great question! I think the biggest help would be statistical significance. We (as in the tech community) realize that machines can exceed humans in efficiency and safety, but the data that this is unarguably true does not yet exist. Waymo drives 1 million miles per year, but this is obviously dwarfed by humans driving. A self-driving car company needs to be doing hundreds of millions of physical miles in order to quieten these fears, and it's only a matter of time before this is happening. This is one of the reason I think autonomous taxis are the perfect vehicle (pun intended) to bring autonomy to the world, since the business gets stronger the more miles you do.

Denzel 10y ago
Thanks for answering Oliver. I understand the statistical point of view (as a member of the tech community). However, I think that argument is falling upon deaf ears across the general population. You still get a "yeah, but..." with an uneasy shrug. People don't like the idea of losing agency when things go sideways. While people may agree with the premise of a computer being better in extraordinary situations, it's hard getting over an unknown unknown. They don't trust the system. They trust themselves. Elon Musk fundamentally understands that you must "capture the imagination" of the general public to advance a field. [1] He's done it consistently through SpaceX and Tesla, and I witnessed it first-hand on two separate occasions with two very different people. For years, I would tell my father -- an older American muscle-car loving guy -- about Tesla and their cars. All the logical arguments. But his heart was set upon the Dodge Hellcat: one of the fastest street-legal cars ever released. That was, until the day the Tesla Model S beat the Dodge Hellcat in a drag race. From then on, he started talking about Tesla, calling me when he saw one, and talking with the owners. Tesla captured his imagination with a visual, visceral experience. And so it was with my girlfriend -- a young, 20-something, not really interested in cars. I'd point out Tesla cars while we were driving and tell her all about them. The logic behind electric cars didn't interest her. Until one day, she called me, screaming into the phone, "Babe! Babe! I just saw this car... it... the doors, I don't know, they like went up like a bird! But it was an SUV!" She was over the moon excited. To which I responded, "That's the Tesla Model X." From then on, her dream car is the Model X. Tesla captured her imagination with a visual, visceral experience. My gut feeling is that the company to win will be the one with statistical significance and a way to capture the public's imagination. P.S. This is all assuming that you're trying to win as a consumer company. If your mission is just to succeed as a supplier, then disregard. [1]: https://youtu.be/xmOt5OZGvhw?t=3m24s https://youtu.be/xmOt5OZGvhw?t=3m24s
- gregpilling 10y ago
  and if you wanted a little history to back up your thoughts, Henry Ford had the 999 racecar before the Ford Motor Company was founded, and Soichiro Honda was crazy about racing as well and almost bankrupted the company in pursuit of it (some dispute the closeness of it). Both felt that racing captured the hearts and minds of the public, and gave the newspapers something to write about.
  - Denzel 10y ago
    Thank you for that! That does indeed lend more credence to the hypothesis... especially since Musk is known to have studied Henry Ford's life.
- PhantomGremlin 10y ago
  You're quite right about imagination. But you didn't do your dad any favors with the Tesla vs Dodge Hellcat comparison. The speed of the Tesla is really a parlor trick. I'd bet on the Hellcat every time I needed to do more than a few laps on any decent race track. Here are the sad details as reported by Car and Driver. The Hellcat smoked the Tesla: http://www.caranddriver.com/features/tesla-model-s-p85d-at-lightning-lap-2016-feature http://www.caranddriver.com/features/tesla-model-s-p85d-at-l...
  - Denzel 10y ago
    Thing is, I didn't show my dad the comparison (I didn't even know it existed until he told me). He came across an article independently and watched the video for himself. He's also much more concerned with acceleration -- the feeling of being pinned back in your seat -- than distance. So the quarter mile was enough for him.

visarga 10y ago

> Whenever I speak to laypeople about self driving cars their mind immediately shoots to the 1 million+ ways that things can go terribly wrong, or even slightly wrong. When I raved about self driving cars to my wife, she said to me: look, Google Maps is messing up on a continuous basis (GPS errors, software errors, bad routes, mapping inconsistencies, underestimated ETA). If they can't make a decent GPS app, how could they make a self driving car? I had no way to counter that. It's true, GPS is an old tech purposefully dumbed down for non-military applications. But how can we convince people of progress when it is so lacking?

riffraff 10y ago
regarding GPS errors, is it GPS which is the issue, or just phones with sub-par sensors and set ups? I ask this cause my wife's previous phone had consistently crappy GPS performance, losing satellite connection very often, getting stuck etc. I never had such issues with mine, nor with her new one.
- yanma 10y ago
  Sensors quality does have something to do with it, but regardless, you won't be able to get the accuracy and consistency from GPS you need for localizing a self driving vehicle. Unless you get a DGPS unit (super expensive and require 3k subcription from satellites) you get north of 1m accuracy.
bitwiseand 10y ago
A self-driving car, as proposed by Waymo and many others, in no way relies just on GPS. These beasts have fusion of many sensors with built in redundancy. Technology improves and evolves. If it didn't you wouldn't be so reliant on Google Maps. We convince people of progress by a safe track record. Google maps may fail occasionally but more often than not it gets you to your destination at the estimated time. Yes self-driving cars can't be "more often than not" safe. But starting with smaller areas and showing the difference it makes on people's lives and the environment can be a good start.