6 ms·

The video footage being presented is beyond useless because it is misleading. The important data to determine wether the system misbehaved would look like this:

The video footage being presented is beyond useless because it is misleading. The important data to determine wether the system misbehaved would look like this: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/video/2017/mar/16/google-waymo-self-driving-car-video-woman-bird https://www.theguardian.com/technology/video/2017/mar/16/goo... Waymo cars are capable of sensing vehicles and pedestrians at least half a block away in every directions. I was reserving any judgement on wether this collision could have been prevented, but seeing the video tells me that 1) a human driver might have hit the victim regardless, and 2) I'm very surprised that the LIDAR sensor didn't cause the car to stop to a halt much, much earlier. This is exactly the kind of situation that I would expect self-driving cars to be better than human drivers.

sitkack 9y ago
The human driver didn't have their eyes on the road the majority of the the time. And yes, the video footage is _nearly_ useless. Maybe the outcome will be that thermal infrared will be mandated on all sensor packs?
- Tempest1981 9y ago
  Any chance the backup driver was looking at a driving-related computer screen? (Speedometer/Video of road/LIDAR/IR camera)
  - sesqu 9y ago
    That screen is mounted high in Uber's cars. The driver was looking low.
- wiz21c 9y ago
  This 100%. When I drive, I watch the road. I don't watch my mobile phone, I don't watch the kids behind, I don't watch my wife. I don't watch the sky. I don't watch the GPS. I just watch the road in front of me. My idea is that the car has been behaving well for a long time and consequently the driver lowered is vigilance. Big mistake.
  - TomMarius 9y ago
    > I just watch the road in front of me. Unlike many others, sadly - even when they don't have any self-driving tech at all
danso 9y ago
I agree that dashcam/external cam footage is going to be limited and possibly misleading, and I would think/hope such footage isn't the primary factor in evaluating accident cases. But I do think there's value to it. I shouldn't have said that it is the "main" way for us to process a scene, but the most accessible/relatable way. What you posted looks pretty cool, I don't know enough about it to understand what I should be prioritizing focus on, but we can chalk that up to ignorance. The benefit that driver-view footage has is that it is a viewpoint all of us are familiar with. If you ask me to watch dashcam footage to assess some kind of traffic thing, there's a general expectation of where I keep my eyes and what I notice. This normal-human-view mode is probably going to be necessary in AV cases in which we determine whether the car's AI did the right thing. Presumably, as AV becomes mainstream and extremely safe, these accidents will involve edge cases and outliers which are poorly interpreted by sensors/non-human-vision. Seeing the scene as a human driver does might be a necessary starting place? But the Uber case in AZ, IMO, proves your point. The Tempe police quickly made a judgement call based on what seems to be inadequate video. Everyone who can now view the video will also be inclined to think how impossible it would be to avoid hitting the victim, even if the actual scene in-person has much more light. And of course, we don't want to judge AV solely on whether it performs as well as normal humans.
- thaumasiotes 9y ago
  > we don't want to judge AV solely on whether it performs as well as normal humans You don't think performing as well as normal humans should be sufficient to allow them on the road? Or are you saying they should be allowed even if their performance is worse than human? (...as long as some other criterion is met?)
- pfisch 9y ago
  j-walking, at night, no reflectors, in the dark. Even if the camera was brighter uber isn't at fault anyway....
  - daveevad 9y ago
    The bike probably had a reflector on its pedals. I would be very interested to learn whether or not the car's autonomous system identified a bicycle at any point prior to the collision.
emodendroket 9y ago
A fully attentive human driver might have hit this person regardless. Would they have hit them while taking no evasive action whatsoever? No swerving, no brakes?
- Piskvorrr 9y ago
  I don't think so: the dash cam video is misleading. I had multiple ninjas jump at me before, and although I did notice and avoid them, they were not visible on the dashcam until the very last moment. Surely Uber would not release data to intentionally mislead the public?
  - emodendroket 9y ago
    Well, right, I think even if the camera isn't at all misleading you could have hit the brakes and hit the person at a lower speed.

sitkack 9y ago

The human driver didn't have their eyes on the road the majority of the the time. And yes, the video footage is _nearly_ useless. Maybe the outcome will be that thermal infrared will be mandated on all sensor packs?

Tempest1981 9y ago
Any chance the backup driver was looking at a driving-related computer screen? (Speedometer/Video of road/LIDAR/IR camera)
- sesqu 9y ago
  That screen is mounted high in Uber's cars. The driver was looking low.
wiz21c 9y ago
This 100%. When I drive, I watch the road. I don't watch my mobile phone, I don't watch the kids behind, I don't watch my wife. I don't watch the sky. I don't watch the GPS. I just watch the road in front of me. My idea is that the car has been behaving well for a long time and consequently the driver lowered is vigilance. Big mistake.
- TomMarius 9y ago
  > I just watch the road in front of me. Unlike many others, sadly - even when they don't have any self-driving tech at all

danso 9y ago

I agree that dashcam/external cam footage is going to be limited and possibly misleading, and I would think/hope such footage isn't the primary factor in evaluating accident cases. But I do think there's value to it. I shouldn't have said that it is the "main" way for us to process a scene, but the most accessible/relatable way. What you posted looks pretty cool, I don't know enough about it to understand what I should be prioritizing focus on, but we can chalk that up to ignorance. The benefit that driver-view footage has is that it is a viewpoint all of us are familiar with. If you ask me to watch dashcam footage to assess some kind of traffic thing, there's a general expectation of where I keep my eyes and what I notice. This normal-human-view mode is probably going to be necessary in AV cases in which we determine whether the car's AI did the right thing. Presumably, as AV becomes mainstream and extremely safe, these accidents will involve edge cases and outliers which are poorly interpreted by sensors/non-human-vision. Seeing the scene as a human driver does might be a necessary starting place? But the Uber case in AZ, IMO, proves your point. The Tempe police quickly made a judgement call based on what seems to be inadequate video. Everyone who can now view the video will also be inclined to think how impossible it would be to avoid hitting the victim, even if the actual scene in-person has much more light. And of course, we don't want to judge AV solely on whether it performs as well as normal humans.

thaumasiotes 9y ago
> we don't want to judge AV solely on whether it performs as well as normal humans You don't think performing as well as normal humans should be sufficient to allow them on the road? Or are you saying they should be allowed even if their performance is worse than human? (...as long as some other criterion is met?)
pfisch 9y ago
j-walking, at night, no reflectors, in the dark. Even if the camera was brighter uber isn't at fault anyway....
- daveevad 9y ago
  The bike probably had a reflector on its pedals. I would be very interested to learn whether or not the car's autonomous system identified a bicycle at any point prior to the collision.

emodendroket 9y ago

A fully attentive human driver might have hit this person regardless. Would they have hit them while taking no evasive action whatsoever? No swerving, no brakes?

Piskvorrr 9y ago
I don't think so: the dash cam video is misleading. I had multiple ninjas jump at me before, and although I did notice and avoid them, they were not visible on the dashcam until the very last moment. Surely Uber would not release data to intentionally mislead the public?
- emodendroket 9y ago
  Well, right, I think even if the camera isn't at all misleading you could have hit the brakes and hit the person at a lower speed.