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Or perhaps us fingers-in-ears Musk fans don't expect the AP to be perfect. Especially considering how new the fields are. Autopilot doesn't need to be perfect,

by d0lph 8y ago

Or perhaps us fingers-in-ears Musk fans don't expect the AP to be perfect. Especially considering how new the fields are. Autopilot doesn't need to be perfect, just better than humans.

ckastner 8y ago
It must also never be worse than humans. In this case, it very clearly was.
- stetrain 8y ago
  So human drivers wouldn't crash here? Or a good, attentive, best-case human driver wouldn't crash here? Because those are not the same set, and it seems the former set has crashed into this particular barrier multiple times. I don't think it's acceptible that a vehicle with adaptive cruise, lane keeping, and emergency braking would hit this barrier without any mitigating braking or action, but the actual state of drivers on the roads and human traffic fatalities is pretty grim as-is.
  - FireBeyond 8y ago
    I think it's "rather unlikely" to the point of implausibility, that even the human drivers who have crashed into that barrier: 1) _aimed directly at it_ rather than glancing blows/swerving at the last moment, etc., and 2) _accelerated beyond the speed limit as they did_, rather than applying any form of braking, let alone AEB.
    - Robotbeat 8y ago
      > I think it's "rather unlikely" to the point of implausibility, that even the human drivers who have crashed into that barrier. So implausible that the barrier was destroyed just weeks earlier by a human driver?
      - FireBeyond 8y ago
        I find it equally implausible that you willfully ignored the context of my quotes. To the extent that you literally changed the colon that lead to the context of those quotes into a period to make it sound like that was the extent of my statement. Yes, human drivers crash into crash barriers, as noted. Now, how many of those human drivers "actively aimed at the barrier", as the NTSB stated? And how many of those human drivers, having aimed at the barrier, "then accelerated in excess of the speed limit" as they did so? And if you do reply, try not to take sentence fragments as an excuse to change quotes to misrepresent someone's statements.
        Robotbeat 8y ago
        I ignored it intentionally because that is a mischaracterization of what the NTSB report said. That is what clickbait headlines said (misleadingly). The autopilot was following the lines, which looked a lot like a lane. Human drivers make similar mistakes, and it is quite likely that’s what happened earlier and why the barrier was destroyed beforehand. The lines are about the same size as a lane and lead you straight into the barrier.
  - ckastner 8y ago
    > So human drivers wouldn't crash here? Or a good, attentive, best-case human driver wouldn't crash here? I'd argue that a Reasonable Person [1] wouldn't crash here. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reasonable_person https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reasonable_person
    - stetrain 8y ago
      I think that's actually a really good method to apply in these cases, and I agree. However I also think that the roads are currently occupied by many people who fall below that standard. Should a car with assistive technologies only be a success if it is as good as a reasonable person, or if it is better than a typical person? Obviously the former is prefereable to the latter, but people seem much more content with the idea of driving themselves into walls (or another typical person on the road might crash into them and cause that outcome) than with the idea that a computer might do that same. See also fear of flying vs driving even though flying is demonstrably safer, but feels much more out of the hands of the flyer.
- ytpete 8y ago
  Except a human driver had just recently crashed in the exact same spot - that's why the divider's crash bumper was damaged at the time of the Tesla accident. I think there's no excuse for shipping an "autopilot" system that can't detect massive, stationary objects in broad daylight, but humans also do crash in those exact circumstances all the time.
  - cfadvan 8y ago
    It needs to be better than a sober, awake, human of the type who typically buys a Tesla. That would be the fair comparison, not just a random member of the public with a 20 year old car. Better than a drunk human driver, or a 90 year old is not a standard reasonable people care about when they say “better than a human.”
- JeffL 8y ago
  A human driver crashed in that same exact spot one week earlier, so you can't really say AP is necessarily worse because of this accident.
  - oldgradstudent 8y ago
    Teslas are a tiny minority of the cars driving on the road. Even if a car crashed into that barrier once a week (it's way less than that), a single Tesla crash in all of Tesla's history so far is an order of magnitude worse. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16720848 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16720848
ocdtrekkie 8y ago
I think the issue is, if you read https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17256900 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17256900 is that Autopilot is not better than humans.
- d0lph 8y ago
  I did, unimpressive, he doesn't have any relevant data. My reply to the post though: Obviously someone shaping stats to their own biases. They want to compare Tesla and Mercedes Benz crash rates because they are in a similar price range? Mind you he has no data on automated driving crashes. Ridiculous and short-sighted, the goal (IMO) is for all cars to be automated. And he assumes that just because lidar is expensive now, that it will be in the future, which is just naive.
  - d0lph 8y ago
    Really, no comments from the down voters?
TheForumTroll 8y ago
The thing is that the problem isn't just the Autopilot driving over white lines. Even cheap VW Up's and other micro cars would have applied the brakes automatically when an object was in the way. It is a huge failure that a Tesla can do both without stopping. Two huge fails.
- d0lph 8y ago
  You're right, it was a failure, a terrible failure, but it will be improved.
jumelles 8y ago
So because the field is new, it's okay that a human being is dead?
- ThrowawayIP 8y ago
  Thomas Edison would agree with your stance. Alternating Current is not safe and therefore should never have been implemented. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_of_the_currents#Edison's_anti-AC_stance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_of_the_currents#Edison's_a...
- d0lph 8y ago
  If human beings dying weren't at least somewhat ok, we wouldn't drive cars.
- Robotbeat 8y ago
  It's not just that the field is new, it's that 1) SO MANY people die constantly in cars, and this is the start of trying to change that permanently but it cannot be perfect out of the gate, 2) nor should we wait until it's perfect if waiting that long means more people die. Ultimately, we cannot rely on mere anecdotes. We need statistics that show it is worse. If it's as bad as the media coverage claims it is, it should be easy to demonstrate such statistics.
cfadvan 8y ago
Only fingers-in-ears Musk fans cannot see that. Speak of the devil... It’s amazing that given the slander Tesla has been passing off as PR in this case, that anyone could defend them in this, yet here we go.

by d0lph 8y ago

Or perhaps us fingers-in-ears Musk fans don't expect the AP to be perfect. Especially considering how new the fields are. Autopilot doesn't need to be perfect, just better than humans.

ckastner 8y ago

It must also never be worse than humans. In this case, it very clearly was.

stetrain 8y ago
So human drivers wouldn't crash here? Or a good, attentive, best-case human driver wouldn't crash here? Because those are not the same set, and it seems the former set has crashed into this particular barrier multiple times. I don't think it's acceptible that a vehicle with adaptive cruise, lane keeping, and emergency braking would hit this barrier without any mitigating braking or action, but the actual state of drivers on the roads and human traffic fatalities is pretty grim as-is.
- FireBeyond 8y ago
  I think it's "rather unlikely" to the point of implausibility, that even the human drivers who have crashed into that barrier: 1) _aimed directly at it_ rather than glancing blows/swerving at the last moment, etc., and 2) _accelerated beyond the speed limit as they did_, rather than applying any form of braking, let alone AEB.
  - Robotbeat 8y ago
    > I think it's "rather unlikely" to the point of implausibility, that even the human drivers who have crashed into that barrier. So implausible that the barrier was destroyed just weeks earlier by a human driver?
    - FireBeyond 8y ago
      I find it equally implausible that you willfully ignored the context of my quotes. To the extent that you literally changed the colon that lead to the context of those quotes into a period to make it sound like that was the extent of my statement. Yes, human drivers crash into crash barriers, as noted. Now, how many of those human drivers "actively aimed at the barrier", as the NTSB stated? And how many of those human drivers, having aimed at the barrier, "then accelerated in excess of the speed limit" as they did so? And if you do reply, try not to take sentence fragments as an excuse to change quotes to misrepresent someone's statements.
      - Robotbeat 8y ago
        I ignored it intentionally because that is a mischaracterization of what the NTSB report said. That is what clickbait headlines said (misleadingly). The autopilot was following the lines, which looked a lot like a lane. Human drivers make similar mistakes, and it is quite likely that’s what happened earlier and why the barrier was destroyed beforehand. The lines are about the same size as a lane and lead you straight into the barrier.
- ckastner 8y ago
  > So human drivers wouldn't crash here? Or a good, attentive, best-case human driver wouldn't crash here? I'd argue that a Reasonable Person [1] wouldn't crash here. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reasonable_person https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reasonable_person
  - stetrain 8y ago
    I think that's actually a really good method to apply in these cases, and I agree. However I also think that the roads are currently occupied by many people who fall below that standard. Should a car with assistive technologies only be a success if it is as good as a reasonable person, or if it is better than a typical person? Obviously the former is prefereable to the latter, but people seem much more content with the idea of driving themselves into walls (or another typical person on the road might crash into them and cause that outcome) than with the idea that a computer might do that same. See also fear of flying vs driving even though flying is demonstrably safer, but feels much more out of the hands of the flyer.
ytpete 8y ago
Except a human driver had just recently crashed in the exact same spot - that's why the divider's crash bumper was damaged at the time of the Tesla accident. I think there's no excuse for shipping an "autopilot" system that can't detect massive, stationary objects in broad daylight, but humans also do crash in those exact circumstances all the time.
- cfadvan 8y ago
  It needs to be better than a sober, awake, human of the type who typically buys a Tesla. That would be the fair comparison, not just a random member of the public with a 20 year old car. Better than a drunk human driver, or a 90 year old is not a standard reasonable people care about when they say “better than a human.”
JeffL 8y ago
A human driver crashed in that same exact spot one week earlier, so you can't really say AP is necessarily worse because of this accident.
- oldgradstudent 8y ago
  Teslas are a tiny minority of the cars driving on the road. Even if a car crashed into that barrier once a week (it's way less than that), a single Tesla crash in all of Tesla's history so far is an order of magnitude worse. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16720848 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16720848

ocdtrekkie 8y ago

I think the issue is, if you read https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17256900 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17256900 is that Autopilot is not better than humans.

d0lph 8y ago
I did, unimpressive, he doesn't have any relevant data. My reply to the post though: Obviously someone shaping stats to their own biases. They want to compare Tesla and Mercedes Benz crash rates because they are in a similar price range? Mind you he has no data on automated driving crashes. Ridiculous and short-sighted, the goal (IMO) is for all cars to be automated. And he assumes that just because lidar is expensive now, that it will be in the future, which is just naive.
- d0lph 8y ago
  Really, no comments from the down voters?

TheForumTroll 8y ago

The thing is that the problem isn't just the Autopilot driving over white lines. Even cheap VW Up's and other micro cars would have applied the brakes automatically when an object was in the way. It is a huge failure that a Tesla can do both without stopping. Two huge fails.

d0lph 8y ago
You're right, it was a failure, a terrible failure, but it will be improved.

jumelles 8y ago

So because the field is new, it's okay that a human being is dead?

ThrowawayIP 8y ago
Thomas Edison would agree with your stance. Alternating Current is not safe and therefore should never have been implemented. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_of_the_currents#Edison's_anti-AC_stance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_of_the_currents#Edison's_a...
d0lph 8y ago
If human beings dying weren't at least somewhat ok, we wouldn't drive cars.
Robotbeat 8y ago
It's not just that the field is new, it's that 1) SO MANY people die constantly in cars, and this is the start of trying to change that permanently but it cannot be perfect out of the gate, 2) nor should we wait until it's perfect if waiting that long means more people die. Ultimately, we cannot rely on mere anecdotes. We need statistics that show it is worse. If it's as bad as the media coverage claims it is, it should be easy to demonstrate such statistics.

cfadvan 8y ago

Only fingers-in-ears Musk fans cannot see that. Speak of the devil... It’s amazing that given the slander Tesla has been passing off as PR in this case, that anyone could defend them in this, yet here we go.