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Words, in general, mean things. "Autopilot" is a word that means things. It does not, most notably mean "at its most generously-described best, full and complet
by eropple 7y ago
Words, in general, mean things. "Autopilot" is a word that means things. It does not, most notably mean "at its most generously-described best, full and complete attention the entire time lest it send you into the side of a semi at highway speeds or direct you into a concrete barrier".
Tesla does not need any heroes with capes attempting to minimize their literally-not-figuratively-dangerous marketing. They'll do fine without it. I promise.
- perl4ever 7y ago"It does not mean "full and complete attention the entire time lest it send you into the side of a semi at highway speeds" or "direct you into a concrete barrier"." Presumably "Autopilot" is a reference to aircraft, and they do not fly milliseconds away from concrete. (at least not the vast majority of the time) So if you want to be literal, then the word autopilot shouldn't give you confidence you aren't going to hit things and is not false advertising. The issue is the implicit claim that you can let an autopilot drive your car safely. But it's a fine autopilot!
- comex 7y agoThat is extremely overliteral.
- perl4ever 7y agoYeah, so how do you decide where it crosses the line? You can interpret it as a metaphor, or very literally. It seems unreasonable to me to interpret it exactly as literally as necessary to make your argument against Tesla the strongest.
- spookthesunset 7y agoGive me a break dude. Tesla’s marketing department knew exactly what they were doing when they called it “auto pilot”. And it wasn’t because somebody there looked up the “literal meaning” of “auto pilot” and rolled with that (though it certainly provides an easy out for their more... dedicated... fans to help defend the company)
- perl4ever 7y agoI'm not a fan, owner, or shareholder of Tesla. I've repeatedly stated on HN that I think PHEVs are the future and not full electric cars. What you think of Tesla has nothing to do with whether 2+2=4. If you don't want to discuss the same thing as another person, then go do something else.
- eropple 7y agoFrankly, this is disingenuity to the point of mendaciousness. Tesla knew what they were doing. Well-actuallying does not and will not change that.
- perl4ever 7y agoI'm not endorsing Tesla or their tech, and I stand behind what I wrote as demonstrating the alternative to taking "Autopilot" as a metaphor - taking it literally. If you don't like either one, what's your justification for interpreting Autopilot in a particular way?
- retsibsi 7y agoI think the important questions are how people actually interpret it, and (if we want to judge Tesla) how they could reasonably have expected people to interpret it. I don't know exactly how they presented it to the public, but it definitely doesn't seem like a name you'd choose if you were keen to avoid having people overestimate its capabilities.
- perl4ever 7y agoI think it's insane to identify the problem as being the name, rather than that using the technology inherently leads to a dangerous sense of confidence (assuming it doesn't in fact scare you out of continuing). As many people have said, the fundamental issue is the tiny amount of time between appropriate operation and disaster, and the better it works at first, the less prepared a person is when it goes haywire. This is the same no matter what you call it.
- retsibsi 7y agoYeah I agree that that is a bigger problem. (And not just confidence, but concentration -- even if you know you can't trust the car, it must be a lot harder to stay properly alert when you have nothing to do 99% of the time.) I didn't mean to agree with anyone who thinks that the name is the problem, but I think it could plausibly make things worse by contributing to unrealistic expectations and gung-ho attitudes. It could also give us a clue about Tesla's attitude, and how they are balancing hyping the feature vs. trying to prevent driver complacency.
- spookthesunset 7y agoIt is completely dishonest to suggest they called it auto pilot for any reason other than to invoke the image of the car doing every thing for you. It’s funny how people love to slam other companies marketing as being dishonest “brainwashing” but give Tesla a free pass.
- natch 7y agoInstead of trying to tear Tesla down for something you are doing yourself, why not look for the positive aspects of what is happening? The technology is getting hugely better over time, so whatever you have been reading about it is probably outdated.