5 ms·

When you call it "full" and "self driving", I don't know how many qualifiers you can attach to it. I know it's not anywhere close to driving by itself, but betw

by ra7 6y ago

When you call it "full" and "self driving", I don't know how many qualifiers you can attach to it. I know it's not anywhere close to driving by itself, but between the naming and Elon Musk constantly talking about how level 5 (I mean, level 5 is the ultimate form of autonomous driving) is just around the corner, it's pretty easy to see that as misleading customers. All while they don't even bother to get a driverless testing permit from CA DMV.

dheera 6y ago
Yeah, of course. But it was always clear to me. The problem is (a) the stock market is full of idiots that won't listen to real engineers like us, and listen to some bullshitty CEOs and analysts instead (b) the SEC and stock market is perfectly optimized and incentivized to maximize the amount of marketing bullshit coming out of company PR. If people wanted more honestly worded things out of companies, we need to stop nailing companies every time they don't "beat" earnings estimates every quarter, and begin to understand how real science and real technological advancement happens. The way NASA is funded, for example, is the exact opposite, and minimizes bullshit, but NASA and Tesla share a lot in common in terms of what they're trying to accomplish for humanity. EDIT: Okay maybe NASA wasn't a good example. But in any case, the current structure of public companies and letting a bunch of gullible <strike>sheep</strike> average citizens collectively determine the value of a company based on what a bunch of <strike>clowns</strike> non-engineers in suits at Wall Street try to make of a highly technical venture isn't a system optimized for minimizing bullshit, it's quite the opposite.
- rodgerd 6y ago
  > But it was always clear to me. So when the CEO went on stage and said cars would be self-delivering via fully autonomous driving it was obvious to you that his statement was a lie?
  - dheera 6y ago
    Yes. I know not to listen to CEOs when they say things like that. They're effectively puppets. I've also probably coded way more lines of autonomous driving code than Elon Musk himself. That isn't to say I don't respect him and his vision, but I'm pretty certain I have a better idea of timelines than the BS he's forced to say to the public.
    - Isinlor 6y ago
      In my opinion Musk actually believes in his timelines. He does exactly the same mistakes without financial incentives e.g. Falcon Heavy. His "COVID panic is dumb" and "it's gone by April" are memes by now. Then he will also openly say that he believes shares are too high, so of course shares dropped. Not to mention that SEC is going after him and Tesla for his stupid tweets. Either he is an alien playing 5 dimensional chess with time-travel, or he is pathologically overoptimistic. He is especially overoptimistic about AI, so it leads him to make stupid predictions about when we will have cars without steering wheels.
- nickik 6y ago
  > The problem is (a) the stock market is full of idiots that won't listen to real engineers like us So you are a real engineer and Musk is not? > begin to understand how real science and real technological advancement happens By pushing for it hard, investing your credibility and a lot of man power and resources into it? Like literally what Elon Musk does with all his projects. > The way NASA is funded, for example, is the exact opposite, and minimizes bullshit NASA claims nonsense literally all the time. The #JournyToMars under Obama for example.
  - dheera 6y ago
    > So you are a real engineer and Musk is not? Real engineers don't bullshit. Real engineers understand that there is a certain responsibility that comes with people trusting their lives to their engineering skills. Real engineers can give you confidences on everything in hard numbers with data. Real engineers can provide realistic estimates of timelines. Real engineers make mistakes sometimes, admit them candidly, and know perfectly well how to adjust those timelines based on past estimate errors and extrapolate adjusted project timeline estimates with basic math. Real engineers know the limits of systems and how to write spec sheets that describe them accurately. Real engineers don't always know the answer to every question, and know when to say "I don't know". It's managers, investors, analysts, and sometimes customers who don't want to listen to those extrapolations and estimates and uncertainty. And so many real engineers gradually become increasingly fake, because the other (corrupt) parts of the system spread their toxic thinking into the engineering. I have a lot of respect for Musk, who was a real engineer, probably REALLY wants to stay a real engineer, and is still mostly an engineer. But he is indeed forced to be a part-time <strike>bullshitter</strike> non-engineer by the system, which demands bullshit by its very incentive structure.
    - xiphias2 6y ago
      For Musk his bullshitting is still nowhere close to the competitors, who said for a long time that they can manufacture millions of electric cars if they really want to. When I told my friend about self driving Tesla who's a BMW fan, he said that BMW will just sell self driving cars when it's ready. Really? Without gathering any data? I'd say BMW is the bigger bullshitter. Elon needs to update the computers maybe, but everything else in the cars is ready for self driving im the near future.

by ra7 6y ago

dheera 6y ago

Yeah, of course. But it was always clear to me. The problem is (a) the stock market is full of idiots that won't listen to real engineers like us, and listen to some bullshitty CEOs and analysts instead (b) the SEC and stock market is perfectly optimized and incentivized to maximize the amount of marketing bullshit coming out of company PR. If people wanted more honestly worded things out of companies, we need to stop nailing companies every time they don't "beat" earnings estimates every quarter, and begin to understand how real science and real technological advancement happens. The way NASA is funded, for example, is the exact opposite, and minimizes bullshit, but NASA and Tesla share a lot in common in terms of what they're trying to accomplish for humanity. EDIT: Okay maybe NASA wasn't a good example. But in any case, the current structure of public companies and letting a bunch of gullible <strike>sheep</strike> average citizens collectively determine the value of a company based on what a bunch of <strike>clowns</strike> non-engineers in suits at Wall Street try to make of a highly technical venture isn't a system optimized for minimizing bullshit, it's quite the opposite.

rodgerd 6y ago
> But it was always clear to me. So when the CEO went on stage and said cars would be self-delivering via fully autonomous driving it was obvious to you that his statement was a lie?
- dheera 6y ago
  Yes. I know not to listen to CEOs when they say things like that. They're effectively puppets. I've also probably coded way more lines of autonomous driving code than Elon Musk himself. That isn't to say I don't respect him and his vision, but I'm pretty certain I have a better idea of timelines than the BS he's forced to say to the public.
  - Isinlor 6y ago
    In my opinion Musk actually believes in his timelines. He does exactly the same mistakes without financial incentives e.g. Falcon Heavy. His "COVID panic is dumb" and "it's gone by April" are memes by now. Then he will also openly say that he believes shares are too high, so of course shares dropped. Not to mention that SEC is going after him and Tesla for his stupid tweets. Either he is an alien playing 5 dimensional chess with time-travel, or he is pathologically overoptimistic. He is especially overoptimistic about AI, so it leads him to make stupid predictions about when we will have cars without steering wheels.
nickik 6y ago
> The problem is (a) the stock market is full of idiots that won't listen to real engineers like us So you are a real engineer and Musk is not? > begin to understand how real science and real technological advancement happens By pushing for it hard, investing your credibility and a lot of man power and resources into it? Like literally what Elon Musk does with all his projects. > The way NASA is funded, for example, is the exact opposite, and minimizes bullshit NASA claims nonsense literally all the time. The #JournyToMars under Obama for example.
- dheera 6y ago
  > So you are a real engineer and Musk is not? Real engineers don't bullshit. Real engineers understand that there is a certain responsibility that comes with people trusting their lives to their engineering skills. Real engineers can give you confidences on everything in hard numbers with data. Real engineers can provide realistic estimates of timelines. Real engineers make mistakes sometimes, admit them candidly, and know perfectly well how to adjust those timelines based on past estimate errors and extrapolate adjusted project timeline estimates with basic math. Real engineers know the limits of systems and how to write spec sheets that describe them accurately. Real engineers don't always know the answer to every question, and know when to say "I don't know". It's managers, investors, analysts, and sometimes customers who don't want to listen to those extrapolations and estimates and uncertainty. And so many real engineers gradually become increasingly fake, because the other (corrupt) parts of the system spread their toxic thinking into the engineering. I have a lot of respect for Musk, who was a real engineer, probably REALLY wants to stay a real engineer, and is still mostly an engineer. But he is indeed forced to be a part-time <strike>bullshitter</strike> non-engineer by the system, which demands bullshit by its very incentive structure.
  - xiphias2 6y ago
    For Musk his bullshitting is still nowhere close to the competitors, who said for a long time that they can manufacture millions of electric cars if they really want to. When I told my friend about self driving Tesla who's a BMW fan, he said that BMW will just sell self driving cars when it's ready. Really? Without gathering any data? I'd say BMW is the bigger bullshitter. Elon needs to update the computers maybe, but everything else in the cars is ready for self driving im the near future.