5 ms·

If a company is this blatantly evil while still in a growing phase, I can only imagine what they would do once they are a established major player...

megablast 8y ago
It is a car company. Their products directly kill over a million people every year. The injure 10x as many. Their pollution causes a similar number of deaths. They are responsible for so many horrible side effects, including dangerous city and suburbs to people taking up more and more space. You think this one crash makes them evil?
- buvanshak 8y ago
  No, it is not the crash that makes the evil. It is how they handle it. And how they put blatantly misleading marketing out there, along with poorly researched features that may or may not have lead to overconfidence from the drivers along with half baked tech, that resulted in crashes such as these.
  - megablast 8y ago
    You just ignored every one of my points.
  - JoshCole 8y ago
    There haven't even been five deaths yet in the entire history of Tesla autopilot car accidents, but there are more than three thousand deaths a day due to car accidents. Tesla's safety record actually is such that if scaled up, their would be a massive drop in the number of deaths per day. Their marketing reflects this. So does their communication on the topic. I know it can sound offensive when they say that a driver died without his hands on the wheel in the six seconds leading up to the crash, but their communication is reflective of a desire to preserve life. So I wouldn't call it evil, let alone call it blatantly evil. Stepping back further, away from this accident, Tesla is also a leading player in moving away from destroying our planet. By that I mean they are pushing renewable energy. Again, not something I would call evil, let alone blatantly evil.
    - blub 8y ago
      "Tesla's safety record" is misleading: * every update to the software makes the record irrelevant, because one is no longer driving the same car which set the previous record. Lane centering for instance was introduced in an OTA update and it likely contributed to this accident. * most of the safe miles driven by Teslas are not with autopilot on. The NTSB explicitly said they did not test autopilot. * finally, some HN users did the math and it turns out that humans have overall a better safety record than autopilot Teslas. To me it looks like Tesla's communication is only reflective of covering their asses. From blaming that journalist to the latest accident. Note: I work for a Tesla competitor.
      - tigershark 8y ago
        Your first point is absolutely misleading. You can apply the same logic to the other cars saying that they are all different because of the different tyres, the different conditions of the tyres, of the brakes, the different degree of care and so on. You can’t just say that they are not the same cars because of the different variables.
        etaioinshrdlu 8y ago
        I think OTA driving software updates are a bigger variable than tires. I think you would too if you think about it more.
      - JoshCole 8y ago
        I agree that there are aspects of the Tesla safety record which have caveats, but even when I take those caveats into account, I still come out thinking of the Tesla as being relatively safe. The same feature which adds danger at every update is one that also has the potential to add safety at every update. Eventually for example, that same update feature is expected to bring the car to the point of being superhuman in its ability to drive safely. The inability to rely on the autopilot means that I'm still responsible for my own safety, so the autopilot safety isn't as important as the car's safety in general. I disagree that their communication is only reflective of them covering their ass. I feel their is the expectation that self-driving is going to prevent more deaths than it causes. Especially as the technology improves, but even to an extent now if only through the virtue of it not being a system people should be using without being ready to intervene. Don't get me wrong here, you raise good points. I just don't think it's a case of blatant evil. Also, if you have the link to the math, I'd love to read it.
- CamelCaseName 8y ago
  Yes, cars kill, injure, and create disease, but they also connect people across the world, to relatives, to work, to buy and deliver goods and services. Without cars, our level of productivity would be a fraction of what it is today as employment is confined to a tiny geography. Many more people would die from fires, disease, and crime as emergency services arrive on horse drawn carriage. Most people would never venture out of their hometowns. Car companies, for all their faults, for all their fraud and corruption, create products that immeasurably benefit us every day. Before we call them evil, we must look at the impact they have on each of us. That impact is decidedly positive, as evidenced by the widespread ownership of cars.
- MPSimmons 8y ago
  Tesla kills a million people a year?

megablast 8y ago

It is a car company. Their products directly kill over a million people every year. The injure 10x as many. Their pollution causes a similar number of deaths. They are responsible for so many horrible side effects, including dangerous city and suburbs to people taking up more and more space. You think this one crash makes them evil?

buvanshak 8y ago
No, it is not the crash that makes the evil. It is how they handle it. And how they put blatantly misleading marketing out there, along with poorly researched features that may or may not have lead to overconfidence from the drivers along with half baked tech, that resulted in crashes such as these.
- megablast 8y ago
  You just ignored every one of my points.
- JoshCole 8y ago
  There haven't even been five deaths yet in the entire history of Tesla autopilot car accidents, but there are more than three thousand deaths a day due to car accidents. Tesla's safety record actually is such that if scaled up, their would be a massive drop in the number of deaths per day. Their marketing reflects this. So does their communication on the topic. I know it can sound offensive when they say that a driver died without his hands on the wheel in the six seconds leading up to the crash, but their communication is reflective of a desire to preserve life. So I wouldn't call it evil, let alone call it blatantly evil. Stepping back further, away from this accident, Tesla is also a leading player in moving away from destroying our planet. By that I mean they are pushing renewable energy. Again, not something I would call evil, let alone blatantly evil.
  - blub 8y ago
    "Tesla's safety record" is misleading: * every update to the software makes the record irrelevant, because one is no longer driving the same car which set the previous record. Lane centering for instance was introduced in an OTA update and it likely contributed to this accident. * most of the safe miles driven by Teslas are not with autopilot on. The NTSB explicitly said they did not test autopilot. * finally, some HN users did the math and it turns out that humans have overall a better safety record than autopilot Teslas. To me it looks like Tesla's communication is only reflective of covering their asses. From blaming that journalist to the latest accident. Note: I work for a Tesla competitor.
    - tigershark 8y ago
      Your first point is absolutely misleading. You can apply the same logic to the other cars saying that they are all different because of the different tyres, the different conditions of the tyres, of the brakes, the different degree of care and so on. You can’t just say that they are not the same cars because of the different variables.
      - etaioinshrdlu 8y ago
        I think OTA driving software updates are a bigger variable than tires. I think you would too if you think about it more.
    - JoshCole 8y ago
      I agree that there are aspects of the Tesla safety record which have caveats, but even when I take those caveats into account, I still come out thinking of the Tesla as being relatively safe. The same feature which adds danger at every update is one that also has the potential to add safety at every update. Eventually for example, that same update feature is expected to bring the car to the point of being superhuman in its ability to drive safely. The inability to rely on the autopilot means that I'm still responsible for my own safety, so the autopilot safety isn't as important as the car's safety in general. I disagree that their communication is only reflective of them covering their ass. I feel their is the expectation that self-driving is going to prevent more deaths than it causes. Especially as the technology improves, but even to an extent now if only through the virtue of it not being a system people should be using without being ready to intervene. Don't get me wrong here, you raise good points. I just don't think it's a case of blatant evil. Also, if you have the link to the math, I'd love to read it.
CamelCaseName 8y ago
Yes, cars kill, injure, and create disease, but they also connect people across the world, to relatives, to work, to buy and deliver goods and services. Without cars, our level of productivity would be a fraction of what it is today as employment is confined to a tiny geography. Many more people would die from fires, disease, and crime as emergency services arrive on horse drawn carriage. Most people would never venture out of their hometowns. Car companies, for all their faults, for all their fraud and corruption, create products that immeasurably benefit us every day. Before we call them evil, we must look at the impact they have on each of us. That impact is decidedly positive, as evidenced by the widespread ownership of cars.
MPSimmons 8y ago
Tesla kills a million people a year?