5 ms·

So sounds like we'll get level 4 autonomy in 2020. Once that happens the discussion around the nature of the approach to level 5 (which is probably asymptotic)

by gfodor 7y ago

So sounds like we'll get level 4 autonomy in 2020. Once that happens the discussion around the nature of the approach to level 5 (which is probably asymptotic) will be a welcome change vs today where people are questioning if we'll ever have a consumer successfully use an autonomous vehicle.

semiotagonal 7y ago
Even if the algorithms more-or-less know how to drive, the best algorithms will eventually be chosen by natural selection. I wouldn't want to be along for the ride during this process.
- dev_dull 7y ago
  Same with best uber drivers.
  - semiotagonal 7y ago
    Any human is the product of eons of natural selection honing our perception and reflexes. The process was unpleasant.
    - deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
    - braythwayt 7y ago
      I think if you look at evolution more closely you'll see that it is messy and is constantly creating dead-ends. Mammals were insignificant until an extinction event occurred. It's not like we were superior and displaced the dinosaurs. We have lots of errors and junk DNA. We make all kinds of mistakes. Perhaps not fatal ones yet, we'll see how climate change plays out. As for our perception and reflexes... I wouldn't brag that they're that good just because they haven't been bad enough to cause our extinction.
      - semiotagonal 7y ago
        > I think if you look at evolution more closely you'll see that it is messy and is constantly creating dead-ends. That's my point. The natural selection process for self-driving automobiles is just beginning, as they meet the challenge of the real world. I'm concerned that it is going to mirror the messiness that biological evolution involves.
    - bduerst 7y ago
      But only two or three generations with automobiles
    - Gustomaximus 7y ago
      Sure there is ~200,000 years of natural selection. That probably 10,000 generations of learning assuming 20 years. But computers can run 10,000 simulations to learn in minutes. And obviously we are not going to create a autonomous driving ability in minutes but we can speed up the learning evolution significantly in machine world vs humans that have 10-50 years per evolutionary learning event. My view is the hard thing about autonomous driving will be the change in style of accidents. Even if autonomous driving has half of human accidents we will probably see things that to the human eye seem really obvious so people will be 'if it can't predict that why should I trust it' type thing. But we won't see the many accidents a computer avoids that a human would make or finds obvious. I'm positive about it but suspect we will see the roll out take many decades as it starts in cities with the right conditions, moves to trucking routes but will probably take some time for national metro coverage.
      - Teever 7y ago
        I think that you overlook the fact that a tremendous amount of evolution went on before humans came onto the scene ~200k years ago.
        Gustomaximus 7y ago
        I was waiting for that :). Let's put it out at billions of generations for pre-human evolution. Point stands. I computer will do millions of simulations in a day. And be done across a population far greater than historic evolution. Doesn't take long to get billions of learning events. On top of which evolution pre-intelligence (as a very loose term) was somewhat random, where our systems are starting from a much more evolved position that does take advantage of existing evolution as much as humans do.
        beerandt 7y ago
        Not really- a single base-pair can change the entire tertiary structure of a protein. Which is something computers are not great at predicting. Depending on how you calculate it, 1 "cycle" of life can be worth trillions^2 or more cpu cycles. It's a meaningless comparison, as presented.
    - Franciscouzo 7y ago
      Is unpleasant, natural selection hasn't magically stopped.
    - richk449 7y ago
      Was?
- asah 7y ago
  nor a pedestrian...
dev_dull 7y ago
the 80/20 principle says it's going to be a long, long time before level 5 autonomy is reached. That's 100% in all conditions. In fact, I would say it's more theory than attainable. There's a reason they're testing in Phoenix. It has almost no Inclement weather. Throw a little snow, mud, or sleet in there and it gets hairy fast. Level 2 is basically the 20% of effort in 80/20. It's exponential effort from then on out.
- panarky 7y ago
  We shouldn't set a dramatically higher safety standard for autonomous drivers than human drivers. When autonomous drivers have the same or fewer injuries per billion miles driven as human drivers, then for all practical purposes it doesn't matter if it's level 4 or level 5.
  - ipython 7y ago
    So it’s ok to have 1+ million dead per year? [0] If so why go through all this trouble to creat autonomous vehicles? I, for one, am glad this was not the prevailing attitude when commercial airliner regulatory bodies were set up. [0] https://www.asirt.org/safe-travel/road-safety-facts/ https://www.asirt.org/safe-travel/road-safety-facts/
    - triceratops 7y ago
      Yes, even if autonomous vehicles are on average exactly as safe as human drivers, they're still worth the effort. Here are some reasons: 1. They're cheaper. This sounds crude, until you realize that this makes things like buses and shared rides far more viable. Meaning millions of people have a better commute and collectively save many lifetimes worth of time. It can also mean less air pollution, due to less traffic congestion (this only applies if congestion pricing is done), which will also save lives. 2. They can always get better over time. Humans can't. 3. Fewer parking lots are needed, which makes cities far more pleasant to live in. 4. Disabled, elderly people and children have better mobility, and aren't dependent on others to drive them everywhere.
mdorazio 7y ago
Operating domain is the key concept with Level 4 and Level 5. Level 4 any time anywhere is not a 2020 goal, but Level 4 in specific locations and conditions is on the way. Same with Level 5. I wouldn’t be surprised to see a Waymo car without a steering wheel driving people around Phoenix in 2025, but a Chicago winter is a different story.

by gfodor 7y ago

semiotagonal 7y ago

Even if the algorithms more-or-less know how to drive, the best algorithms will eventually be chosen by natural selection. I wouldn't want to be along for the ride during this process.

dev_dull 7y ago
Same with best uber drivers.
- semiotagonal 7y ago
  Any human is the product of eons of natural selection honing our perception and reflexes. The process was unpleasant.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
  - braythwayt 7y ago
    I think if you look at evolution more closely you'll see that it is messy and is constantly creating dead-ends. Mammals were insignificant until an extinction event occurred. It's not like we were superior and displaced the dinosaurs. We have lots of errors and junk DNA. We make all kinds of mistakes. Perhaps not fatal ones yet, we'll see how climate change plays out. As for our perception and reflexes... I wouldn't brag that they're that good just because they haven't been bad enough to cause our extinction.
    - semiotagonal 7y ago
      > I think if you look at evolution more closely you'll see that it is messy and is constantly creating dead-ends. That's my point. The natural selection process for self-driving automobiles is just beginning, as they meet the challenge of the real world. I'm concerned that it is going to mirror the messiness that biological evolution involves.
  - bduerst 7y ago
    But only two or three generations with automobiles
  - Gustomaximus 7y ago
    Sure there is ~200,000 years of natural selection. That probably 10,000 generations of learning assuming 20 years. But computers can run 10,000 simulations to learn in minutes. And obviously we are not going to create a autonomous driving ability in minutes but we can speed up the learning evolution significantly in machine world vs humans that have 10-50 years per evolutionary learning event. My view is the hard thing about autonomous driving will be the change in style of accidents. Even if autonomous driving has half of human accidents we will probably see things that to the human eye seem really obvious so people will be 'if it can't predict that why should I trust it' type thing. But we won't see the many accidents a computer avoids that a human would make or finds obvious. I'm positive about it but suspect we will see the roll out take many decades as it starts in cities with the right conditions, moves to trucking routes but will probably take some time for national metro coverage.
    - Teever 7y ago
      I think that you overlook the fact that a tremendous amount of evolution went on before humans came onto the scene ~200k years ago.
      - Gustomaximus 7y ago
        I was waiting for that :). Let's put it out at billions of generations for pre-human evolution. Point stands. I computer will do millions of simulations in a day. And be done across a population far greater than historic evolution. Doesn't take long to get billions of learning events. On top of which evolution pre-intelligence (as a very loose term) was somewhat random, where our systems are starting from a much more evolved position that does take advantage of existing evolution as much as humans do.
        beerandt 7y ago
        Not really- a single base-pair can change the entire tertiary structure of a protein. Which is something computers are not great at predicting. Depending on how you calculate it, 1 "cycle" of life can be worth trillions^2 or more cpu cycles. It's a meaningless comparison, as presented.
  - Franciscouzo 7y ago
    Is unpleasant, natural selection hasn't magically stopped.
  - richk449 7y ago
    Was?
asah 7y ago
nor a pedestrian...

dev_dull 7y ago

the 80/20 principle says it's going to be a long, long time before level 5 autonomy is reached. That's 100% in all conditions. In fact, I would say it's more theory than attainable. There's a reason they're testing in Phoenix. It has almost no Inclement weather. Throw a little snow, mud, or sleet in there and it gets hairy fast. Level 2 is basically the 20% of effort in 80/20. It's exponential effort from then on out.

panarky 7y ago
We shouldn't set a dramatically higher safety standard for autonomous drivers than human drivers. When autonomous drivers have the same or fewer injuries per billion miles driven as human drivers, then for all practical purposes it doesn't matter if it's level 4 or level 5.
- ipython 7y ago
  So it’s ok to have 1+ million dead per year? [0] If so why go through all this trouble to creat autonomous vehicles? I, for one, am glad this was not the prevailing attitude when commercial airliner regulatory bodies were set up. [0] https://www.asirt.org/safe-travel/road-safety-facts/ https://www.asirt.org/safe-travel/road-safety-facts/
  - triceratops 7y ago
    Yes, even if autonomous vehicles are on average exactly as safe as human drivers, they're still worth the effort. Here are some reasons: 1. They're cheaper. This sounds crude, until you realize that this makes things like buses and shared rides far more viable. Meaning millions of people have a better commute and collectively save many lifetimes worth of time. It can also mean less air pollution, due to less traffic congestion (this only applies if congestion pricing is done), which will also save lives. 2. They can always get better over time. Humans can't. 3. Fewer parking lots are needed, which makes cities far more pleasant to live in. 4. Disabled, elderly people and children have better mobility, and aren't dependent on others to drive them everywhere.

mdorazio 7y ago

Operating domain is the key concept with Level 4 and Level 5. Level 4 any time anywhere is not a 2020 goal, but Level 4 in specific locations and conditions is on the way. Same with Level 5. I wouldn’t be surprised to see a Waymo car without a steering wheel driving people around Phoenix in 2025, but a Chicago winter is a different story.