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Disagree. Autopilots for aircraft have been proven technology for 100 years. It's a dramatically easier problem because there are many fewer edge cases, more de

Disagree. Autopilots for aircraft have been proven technology for 100 years. It's a dramatically easier problem because there are many fewer edge cases, more degrees of freedom for the control system to exploit, no fixed roads to follow, and less traffic. And with widespread use of transponders, aircraft talking to each other is already common. It's still considered future technology for cars.

benj111 7y ago
A plane autopilot isnt really the same as full self driving though. You might be right but in the flying car future we'll have millions of flying cars doing the daily commute, all trying to land in the middle of a city. So I guess flying cars will be like normal cars, the easy bit is the middle bit, either flying in well defined lanes, or driving on the motorway. The hard bit is at either end.
- y4mi 7y ago
  > So I guess flying cars will be like normal cars, the easy bit is the middle bit, either flying in well defined lanes, or driving on the motorway. Not that easy considering that at least two Tesla's were totaled driving themselves on a motorway... One by straight up running into a splitting lane and another just ignoring a truck and driving into it.
  - benj111 7y ago
    Stopping an aeroplane stalling is supposed to be easy too. I guess easy is relative whether for cars or planes.
reacweb 7y ago
Take off, landing and cruising are easy to automate. IMHO, the single purpose of a pilot is to handle failures. The experience (for example https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_France_Flight_447 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_France_Flight_447) shows that it is difficult to react correctly when inputs are unreliable and that many crash are avoided thanks to smart (and creative) pilots (see Hudson landing).
- blauditore 7y ago
  > Take off, landing and cruising are easy to automate. Agree with take off and cruising, but landing is magnitudes more complex, at least much more difficult for humans. Do you have a source that this is reliably automated? > many crash are avoided thanks to smart (and creative) pilots (see Hudson landing). Actually, the emergency plan in case of engine failure after take off always gets discussed on ground before each start, along with defining an emergency landing area. So I would assume the Hudson river often gets scoped in those preflight discussions, even though such incidents rarely ever happen. Source: I took flight lessons a long time ago.
  - pedrocr 7y ago
    >Agree with take off and cruising, but landing is magnitudes more complex, at least much more difficult for humans. Do you have a source that this is reliably automated? I believe all modern airliners are capable of fully automated landings as long as the airport supports them. To the point where automated systems can land in zero visibility where pilots are incapable of doing a manual landing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instrument_landing_system#ILS_categories https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instrument_landing_system#ILS_... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autoland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autoland These systems are so precise I've read they had to add a random factor to the landing location as the planes were all touching down on the exact same spot and damaging the runway. This has been the case for a long time now. The landings are all still initiated by the pilots but there doesn't seem to be any fundamental technical reason fully automated flights couldn't be done today. But since we still require pilots to handle failures it's best to keep them in the loop instead of dumping a broken state with a huge workload when the automation happens to fail.
  - speakeron 7y ago
    > Agree with take off and cruising, but landing is magnitudes more complex, at least much more difficult for humans. Do you have a source that this is reliably automated? Landing has been automated since the 1960s. The first airplane to do it in service was the De Havilland Trident[1] [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=flVcxfOnWi0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=flVcxfOnWi0

benj111 7y ago

A plane autopilot isnt really the same as full self driving though. You might be right but in the flying car future we'll have millions of flying cars doing the daily commute, all trying to land in the middle of a city. So I guess flying cars will be like normal cars, the easy bit is the middle bit, either flying in well defined lanes, or driving on the motorway. The hard bit is at either end.

y4mi 7y ago
> So I guess flying cars will be like normal cars, the easy bit is the middle bit, either flying in well defined lanes, or driving on the motorway. Not that easy considering that at least two Tesla's were totaled driving themselves on a motorway... One by straight up running into a splitting lane and another just ignoring a truck and driving into it.
- benj111 7y ago
  Stopping an aeroplane stalling is supposed to be easy too. I guess easy is relative whether for cars or planes.

reacweb 7y ago

Take off, landing and cruising are easy to automate. IMHO, the single purpose of a pilot is to handle failures. The experience (for example https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_France_Flight_447 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_France_Flight_447) shows that it is difficult to react correctly when inputs are unreliable and that many crash are avoided thanks to smart (and creative) pilots (see Hudson landing).

blauditore 7y ago
> Take off, landing and cruising are easy to automate. Agree with take off and cruising, but landing is magnitudes more complex, at least much more difficult for humans. Do you have a source that this is reliably automated? > many crash are avoided thanks to smart (and creative) pilots (see Hudson landing). Actually, the emergency plan in case of engine failure after take off always gets discussed on ground before each start, along with defining an emergency landing area. So I would assume the Hudson river often gets scoped in those preflight discussions, even though such incidents rarely ever happen. Source: I took flight lessons a long time ago.
- pedrocr 7y ago
  >Agree with take off and cruising, but landing is magnitudes more complex, at least much more difficult for humans. Do you have a source that this is reliably automated? I believe all modern airliners are capable of fully automated landings as long as the airport supports them. To the point where automated systems can land in zero visibility where pilots are incapable of doing a manual landing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instrument_landing_system#ILS_categories https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instrument_landing_system#ILS_... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autoland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autoland These systems are so precise I've read they had to add a random factor to the landing location as the planes were all touching down on the exact same spot and damaging the runway. This has been the case for a long time now. The landings are all still initiated by the pilots but there doesn't seem to be any fundamental technical reason fully automated flights couldn't be done today. But since we still require pilots to handle failures it's best to keep them in the loop instead of dumping a broken state with a huge workload when the automation happens to fail.
- speakeron 7y ago
  > Agree with take off and cruising, but landing is magnitudes more complex, at least much more difficult for humans. Do you have a source that this is reliably automated? Landing has been automated since the 1960s. The first airplane to do it in service was the De Havilland Trident[1] [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=flVcxfOnWi0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=flVcxfOnWi0