4 ms·

Yet electronic stability control[1] works far better than human control on snow, wet roads, or ice. If you don't believe it, try an obstacle course on an ice t

Yet electronic stability control[1] works far better than human control on snow, wet roads, or ice. If you don't believe it, try an obstacle course on an ice track with and without it sometime (a required part of driver's ed in Norway). Example: https://youtu.be/hd5JMQr4qe0?t=56s https://youtu.be/hd5JMQr4qe0?t=56s https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_stability_control https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_stability_control

manfredo 8y ago
Stability and traction control is not the same as a self driving car. Keeping wheels from locking, and keeping cars from sliding is largely a solved problem. I think the previous poster was more about referencing recognition of patches of ice ahead and slowing down preemptively. This is a big issue in places with bridges, since ice can form on bridges but not the rest of the roads (since bridges aren't kept warm by the earth, the dirt under most roads acts like a heat battery). Also expecting when other drivers will slide. I've actually witnessed people getting, how would you put this, reverse-rear-ended by drivers trying to go up a hill and then sliding back down.
- mikejb 8y ago
  I'd argue that Self-driving cars are better capable of recognizing ice patches. They don't just rely on visible light to see the ice, but have a more diverse sensor array. The challenge there of course is having the car learn to interpret the input of these sensors. But that doesn't seem like a unpassable hurdle. On the contrary, it would be pretty high on the list of things to tackle when aiming for driving in snowy weather.
  - jakeogh 8y ago
    Ignoring the real problem you mentioned, camera dynamic range (for example) is pathetic compared to the human eye.
    - mikejb 8y ago
      Depends on the camera, but mostly yes. OTOH, it's (relative) trivial to improve that for cars; it's way harder to improve it for humans. (Also, as a data point, I think there was a guy who drove his Tesla with lights off, and it was able to stay within the lines)
semi-extrinsic 8y ago
ESP works magic because it can do things that a human physically isn't allowed to do, namely "stop this one wheel from spinning faster than the others". Incidentally, if you've ever tried driving on snow/ice/mud in a 4x4 car with fully locking differentials, you have a completely mechanical solution that beats ESP. And FWIW, Swedish insurance agency research pointed out last year that cars with permanent 4x4 and ESP were up to 40% more likely to get into severe accidents in bad conditions, because the driver does not get the "hey, this road is slippery, better slow down" experience, so they go too fast for the prevailing conditions. http://feed.ne.cision.com/wpyfs/00/00/00/00/00/3E/5A/A2/wkr0011.pdf http://feed.ne.cision.com/wpyfs/00/00/00/00/00/3E/5A/A2/wkr0...
- kwhitefoot 8y ago
  That made interesting reading. It would have been even more interesting if they had also divided the population of cars by the drivers sex and age. At least here in Norway it is very much the case that accidents are more frequent and more severe when a young man is driving. Also I suspect that women on average are more likely to drive a two wheel drive car. My point is that we might find that four wheel drive cars driven by women are as safe or safer than two wheel drive cars driven by women and that the worsening of safety for four wheel drive driven by young men is even more dramatic than the study showed.
jakeogh 8y ago
Unscientific test. Give the human individual brake control (I can think of simple analog systems to do it). I learned to drive on ice covered dirt roads, many times I would have liked to have the ability to asymmetrically brake. A simple 2nd order gimble would be awesome. Having a single symmetric pedal dumbs it down way too much to make a pre-programmed car vs human comparison. Same thing goes for torque distribution. It's generated dogma that pre-programmed devices can perform better than biological systems, so I bet my suggestion will be met with incredulity bordering on "y humans cant handle x".
- Tor3 8y ago
  > I would have liked to have the ability to asymmetrically brake Yes, I have been in that situation too. As for brakes.. ABS is very bad at handling hard snow with a drizzle of fresh snow on top. It's nearly impossible to stop. I've had to actually turn off the engine in order to stop the car when driving (slowly) down a hill from a hotel in a certain snowy area, in order not to end up on the main road in front. That was with various rental cars (yes, I go to that place regularly in my job). The first time this happened I thought here was a technical problem with the car. So I asked around. Same experience from others. The cars vary, but they're all much worse than fully manual brakes, in certain conditions. And then there was the time there was a reindeer (yes, a reindeer) running along the road, zig-zagging in front of the car. Snow conditions as described above. ABS refused to brake. Didn't want to switch off the engine (busy steering), so after about fifteen seconds of this I drove the car off the road instead, safely into a lot of snow. And people want computers to drive cars, when computers can't even be used safely for brakes? In any case, I've yet to hear about a self-driving car which can predict that another driver will get into problems in a few seconds unless I slow down or increase the speed, in order to allow a third car to adjust. This is something I see or do nearly daily, on my commute.
- Piskvorrr 8y ago
  A mind-machine interface would be probably appropriate there - I can't imagine a physical interface for this which could be operated by anyone except for an octopus (but I don't see many octopi driving anyway).
- 8y ago

manfredo 8y ago

Stability and traction control is not the same as a self driving car. Keeping wheels from locking, and keeping cars from sliding is largely a solved problem. I think the previous poster was more about referencing recognition of patches of ice ahead and slowing down preemptively. This is a big issue in places with bridges, since ice can form on bridges but not the rest of the roads (since bridges aren't kept warm by the earth, the dirt under most roads acts like a heat battery). Also expecting when other drivers will slide. I've actually witnessed people getting, how would you put this, reverse-rear-ended by drivers trying to go up a hill and then sliding back down.

mikejb 8y ago
I'd argue that Self-driving cars are better capable of recognizing ice patches. They don't just rely on visible light to see the ice, but have a more diverse sensor array. The challenge there of course is having the car learn to interpret the input of these sensors. But that doesn't seem like a unpassable hurdle. On the contrary, it would be pretty high on the list of things to tackle when aiming for driving in snowy weather.
- jakeogh 8y ago
  Ignoring the real problem you mentioned, camera dynamic range (for example) is pathetic compared to the human eye.
  - mikejb 8y ago
    Depends on the camera, but mostly yes. OTOH, it's (relative) trivial to improve that for cars; it's way harder to improve it for humans. (Also, as a data point, I think there was a guy who drove his Tesla with lights off, and it was able to stay within the lines)

semi-extrinsic 8y ago

ESP works magic because it can do things that a human physically isn't allowed to do, namely "stop this one wheel from spinning faster than the others". Incidentally, if you've ever tried driving on snow/ice/mud in a 4x4 car with fully locking differentials, you have a completely mechanical solution that beats ESP. And FWIW, Swedish insurance agency research pointed out last year that cars with permanent 4x4 and ESP were up to 40% more likely to get into severe accidents in bad conditions, because the driver does not get the "hey, this road is slippery, better slow down" experience, so they go too fast for the prevailing conditions. http://feed.ne.cision.com/wpyfs/00/00/00/00/00/3E/5A/A2/wkr0011.pdf http://feed.ne.cision.com/wpyfs/00/00/00/00/00/3E/5A/A2/wkr0...

kwhitefoot 8y ago
That made interesting reading. It would have been even more interesting if they had also divided the population of cars by the drivers sex and age. At least here in Norway it is very much the case that accidents are more frequent and more severe when a young man is driving. Also I suspect that women on average are more likely to drive a two wheel drive car. My point is that we might find that four wheel drive cars driven by women are as safe or safer than two wheel drive cars driven by women and that the worsening of safety for four wheel drive driven by young men is even more dramatic than the study showed.

jakeogh 8y ago

Unscientific test. Give the human individual brake control (I can think of simple analog systems to do it). I learned to drive on ice covered dirt roads, many times I would have liked to have the ability to asymmetrically brake. A simple 2nd order gimble would be awesome. Having a single symmetric pedal dumbs it down way too much to make a pre-programmed car vs human comparison. Same thing goes for torque distribution. It's generated dogma that pre-programmed devices can perform better than biological systems, so I bet my suggestion will be met with incredulity bordering on "y humans cant handle x".

Tor3 8y ago
> I would have liked to have the ability to asymmetrically brake Yes, I have been in that situation too. As for brakes.. ABS is very bad at handling hard snow with a drizzle of fresh snow on top. It's nearly impossible to stop. I've had to actually turn off the engine in order to stop the car when driving (slowly) down a hill from a hotel in a certain snowy area, in order not to end up on the main road in front. That was with various rental cars (yes, I go to that place regularly in my job). The first time this happened I thought here was a technical problem with the car. So I asked around. Same experience from others. The cars vary, but they're all much worse than fully manual brakes, in certain conditions. And then there was the time there was a reindeer (yes, a reindeer) running along the road, zig-zagging in front of the car. Snow conditions as described above. ABS refused to brake. Didn't want to switch off the engine (busy steering), so after about fifteen seconds of this I drove the car off the road instead, safely into a lot of snow. And people want computers to drive cars, when computers can't even be used safely for brakes? In any case, I've yet to hear about a self-driving car which can predict that another driver will get into problems in a few seconds unless I slow down or increase the speed, in order to allow a third car to adjust. This is something I see or do nearly daily, on my commute.
Piskvorrr 8y ago
A mind-machine interface would be probably appropriate there - I can't imagine a physical interface for this which could be operated by anyone except for an octopus (but I don't see many octopi driving anyway).
8y ago