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I don’t think the NTSB is properly weighing the safety benefits of these systems. They seem to be myopically focused on a few crashes/incidents. Cars are not pl

by mcot2 6y ago

I don’t think the NTSB is properly weighing the safety benefits of these systems. They seem to be myopically focused on a few crashes/incidents. Cars are not planes. For better or worse we as the public have a lot more tolerance for car crashes than plane crashes. I don’t think there is enough evidence that the current ADAS systems are better or worse than human drivers at this point. I’d say the best way to improve the situation is not to have heavy handed regulation at this stage and let the technology play out.

hahahahe 6y ago
That’s an interesting take. So you think we shouldn’t have regulations on this new unproven technology where the government poured billions upon billions to help develop. And that’s fine. Just don’t take gov’t money then.
- prophesi 6y ago
  Not that there shouldn't be any regulations, but that the direction regulations are going in are pretty heavy-handed when you consider how accepting as a society we are to have thousands of car accidents every single day, and thousands of car-related deaths every year (in the USA at least). Self-driving cars are already much safer than human-driven cars.
  - hahahahe 6y ago
    No they’re not safer than human-driven cars. Not enough data to claim that. And how can you even collect that data when we don’t even have fully automated cars in the wild?
    - prophesi 6y ago
      There's plenty of data on it. Safety is _the_ number one thing people are paying attention to in self-driving cars.
      - kergonath 6y ago
        It certainly is the number one fantasy some people have about autonomous cars. As the parent said, there is just no data to support either position.
        yazaddaruvala 6y ago
        You might not like the data, but it exists. Tesla cars are 2x more likely to get into an accident when not in Autopilot mode. Tesla cars in Autopilot mode are roughly 8x less likely to get into an accident compared with the average number of reported accidents in the US. Note: There is a bias about when Autopilot is enabled (i.e. on highways). There is a bias in the type of person that can buy a Tesla car. That said: Tesla is legally obligated to report all Autopilot accidents. Most accidents are not reported, only the major accidents are reported. So it’s likely that Tesla car’s accident rate are even better than the data suggests. https://www.tesla.com/VehicleSafetyReport https://www.tesla.com/VehicleSafetyReport
        6gvONxR4sf7o 6y ago
        > Note: There is a bias about when Autopilot is enabled (i.e. on highways). There is a bias in the type of person that can buy a Tesla car. This is such an enormous bias, it invalidates the rest of the comment.
        kergonath 6y ago
        > There is a bias about when Autopilot is enabled (i.e. on highways). There is a bias in the type of person that can buy a Tesla car. Yes. This makes any extrapolation to the population as a whole impossible without a lot of assumptions. In particular, things like this are meaningless because of sampling bias: > Tesla cars in Autopilot mode are roughly 8x less likely to get into an accident compared with the average number of reported accidents in the US.
        prophesi 6y ago
        It's almost as if we need a society that doesn't revolve around owning high speed vehicles. But we've missed that boat, so automation is our next goal to drastically reduce the thousands of yearly deaths. I don't understand how this is a controversial opinion. The moment self-driving cars is mentioned, safety is the first thing that comes to mind. As a parent comment stated, Tesla is legally obligated to report every accident. And if a huge accident occurs, it will be in the news. Meanwhile it takes a 100 car pileup for any other vehicular accident to make it into a tiny sliver of the news cycle. I don't own a Tesla or any of their stock, but the crux of the argument is that companies developing driving automation are already heavily regulated and will be put to the fire if mishaps do occur. We desperately need this automation if we do claim to not accept thousands of vehicle-related fatalities per year in our society, since better machine vision is always possible while better human judgement and reaction times are not.
    - 6gvONxR4sf7o 6y ago
      There is a massive stats issue in this. It’s not that there isn’t enough data. Is that there isn’t the right kind of data. Properly controlled apples to apples data is what we need, not just a gazillion miles.
  - snowwrestler 6y ago
    Society does not accept any level of car accidents. That’s why there are safety regulations, that’s why there are safety investigators, that’s why there is a ton of safety-related R&D and testing, heck that’s why there are stoplights and traffic laws and rules about using your mobile phone. Individually, no one ever wants to get into a car accident. Collectively, the desired number of accidents each year is zero. We’re not there yet because it’s hard to do, not because of acceptance. So any new mechanism for accidents is going to come in for very heavy scrutiny. And by mechanism I don’t mean solely technology, but also human factors, which are huge issues when it comes to the current state of “self driving” cars.
    - matz1 6y ago
      Society does accept some level of car accident otherwise there would be no car on the road at all. Safety regulations is good but too much safety regulation is bad. As individual I accept some level risk, I accept that there is some level of risk that I will be in accident, the trade off of 0 risk are too much.
  - camjohnson26 6y ago
    “Self-driving cars are already much safer than human-driven cars.” Citation sorely needed. The few self driving cars currently on the road either require active human supervision or only operate in the absolute best circumstances so can’t be compared to human drivers who operate in all conditions and all types of vehicles.
- Isinlor 6y ago
  Companies should be required to monitor distances driven and report crashes when L2+ systems are active. If it's proven that a system performs significantly worse than a human then regulate it further.
- Hypocritelefty 6y ago
  No point debating anything here as this place is full of Tesla shills
Robotbeat 6y ago
Yeah, the problem is the "high profile crashes" aspect. It's not that crashes with only humans behind the wheel are uncommon. They're common as dirt! But they're not "high profile." So arguably NTSB's perspective (since they only do "high profile" crashes) is heavily skewed toward dramatic anecdotes compared to NHTSA who have to take into account all the crashes, high profile or not. Data vs anecdote.
- omgwtfbyobbq 6y ago
  I think NTSB is using data in the aggregate. What they seem to be focusing on is manufacturers, specifically Tesla, broadly allowing use of these systems in circumstances where it's possibly dangerous and also allowing advanced features, which can be more dangerous, for smaller groups. Their POV is that if manufacturers were more restrictive about where the comfort features could be used, there would be fewer deaths. I've never read about them criticizing the active safety components to these systems.
- snowwrestler 6y ago
  The staff of the NTSB is well aware of the broader context of automotive safety.
  - FireBeyond 6y ago
    I love some of this. "Elon says that the way NTSB tests is biased against Tesla. They must be a failed institution/in the pockets of big oil!" Critical thinking far too often goes out the window.
RcouF1uZ4gsC 6y ago
But here is the thing. If you compare Tesla’s with some of the other higher end cars, they have a higher mortality. https://medium.com/@MidwesternHedgi/teslas-driver-fatality-rate-is-more-than-triple-that-of-luxury-cars-and-likely-even-higher-433670ddde17 https://medium.com/@MidwesternHedgi/teslas-driver-fatality-r...
- Robotbeat 6y ago
  Tesla isn't selling exclusively in the luxury market. If you want a high performance or road-trip capable electric car, you basically have just one option. So you should compare against overall cars, not just "high end" luxury cars. Being electric has made them more expensive, but they're not really true luxury cars for the most part and are not driven by the same people or under the same conditions or under the same driving style as luxury cars.
  - worik 6y ago
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_electric_cars_currently_available https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_electric_cars_currentl... Tesla is right up there but there are many snapping at its heels, especially from China. I am hoping my next car will be a Chinese electric sports car. But, unlike a Tesla, one I own.
  - Hypocritelefty 6y ago
    10k for a fraud is not high end? Where does fraud Karen finds shills like you?
  - clouddrover 6y ago
    > If you want a high performance or road-trip capable electric car, you basically have just one option. Is it the Porsche Taycan? Or the Porsche Taycan Cross Turismo? Or do you mean the Audi e-tron GT? Or perhaps the Lucid Air? Or maybe the Mercedes EQS?
    - leetcrew 6y ago
      I would certainly take a taycan over any tesla, but to be fair, the taycan has a significantly worse range. I might be wrong now, but tesla was the leader in that category last I checked.
maxerickson 6y ago
If the system requires driver attention for the best safety outcomes, it seems a bit over the top to describe regulation requiring functional driver attention monitoring 'heavy handed'. Putting it another way, is there evidence that some ADAS are better than others? Because that's another way to choose regulations.
- ehvatum 6y ago
  Driving with autopilot off certainly requires driver attention.
nojito 6y ago
There isn't even evidence that backup cameras reduce accidents.
hellbannedguy 6y ago
A self entitled rich man can afford to take chances. The guy he plows into can’t. Tesla’s driving technology seems good enough, so I can picture guys whom are tired, or have been drinking, thinking I’ll take a calculated risk tonight. Once a week I think about that tech guy whom plowed into a bollard on 101, or the guy sleeping coming home from Vegas. I’m glad the NTSB is being very prudent. This is coming from a guy whom hates most laws, and believe society would be better off without so many regulations.

by mcot2 6y ago

hahahahe 6y ago

That’s an interesting take. So you think we shouldn’t have regulations on this new unproven technology where the government poured billions upon billions to help develop. And that’s fine. Just don’t take gov’t money then.

prophesi 6y ago
Not that there shouldn't be any regulations, but that the direction regulations are going in are pretty heavy-handed when you consider how accepting as a society we are to have thousands of car accidents every single day, and thousands of car-related deaths every year (in the USA at least). Self-driving cars are already much safer than human-driven cars.
- hahahahe 6y ago
  No they’re not safer than human-driven cars. Not enough data to claim that. And how can you even collect that data when we don’t even have fully automated cars in the wild?
  - prophesi 6y ago
    There's plenty of data on it. Safety is _the_ number one thing people are paying attention to in self-driving cars.
    - kergonath 6y ago
      It certainly is the number one fantasy some people have about autonomous cars. As the parent said, there is just no data to support either position.
      - yazaddaruvala 6y ago
        You might not like the data, but it exists. Tesla cars are 2x more likely to get into an accident when not in Autopilot mode. Tesla cars in Autopilot mode are roughly 8x less likely to get into an accident compared with the average number of reported accidents in the US. Note: There is a bias about when Autopilot is enabled (i.e. on highways). There is a bias in the type of person that can buy a Tesla car. That said: Tesla is legally obligated to report all Autopilot accidents. Most accidents are not reported, only the major accidents are reported. So it’s likely that Tesla car’s accident rate are even better than the data suggests. https://www.tesla.com/VehicleSafetyReport https://www.tesla.com/VehicleSafetyReport
        6gvONxR4sf7o 6y ago
        > Note: There is a bias about when Autopilot is enabled (i.e. on highways). There is a bias in the type of person that can buy a Tesla car. This is such an enormous bias, it invalidates the rest of the comment.
        kergonath 6y ago
        > There is a bias about when Autopilot is enabled (i.e. on highways). There is a bias in the type of person that can buy a Tesla car. Yes. This makes any extrapolation to the population as a whole impossible without a lot of assumptions. In particular, things like this are meaningless because of sampling bias: > Tesla cars in Autopilot mode are roughly 8x less likely to get into an accident compared with the average number of reported accidents in the US.
        prophesi 6y ago
        It's almost as if we need a society that doesn't revolve around owning high speed vehicles. But we've missed that boat, so automation is our next goal to drastically reduce the thousands of yearly deaths. I don't understand how this is a controversial opinion. The moment self-driving cars is mentioned, safety is the first thing that comes to mind. As a parent comment stated, Tesla is legally obligated to report every accident. And if a huge accident occurs, it will be in the news. Meanwhile it takes a 100 car pileup for any other vehicular accident to make it into a tiny sliver of the news cycle. I don't own a Tesla or any of their stock, but the crux of the argument is that companies developing driving automation are already heavily regulated and will be put to the fire if mishaps do occur. We desperately need this automation if we do claim to not accept thousands of vehicle-related fatalities per year in our society, since better machine vision is always possible while better human judgement and reaction times are not.
  - 6gvONxR4sf7o 6y ago
    There is a massive stats issue in this. It’s not that there isn’t enough data. Is that there isn’t the right kind of data. Properly controlled apples to apples data is what we need, not just a gazillion miles.
- snowwrestler 6y ago
  Society does not accept any level of car accidents. That’s why there are safety regulations, that’s why there are safety investigators, that’s why there is a ton of safety-related R&D and testing, heck that’s why there are stoplights and traffic laws and rules about using your mobile phone. Individually, no one ever wants to get into a car accident. Collectively, the desired number of accidents each year is zero. We’re not there yet because it’s hard to do, not because of acceptance. So any new mechanism for accidents is going to come in for very heavy scrutiny. And by mechanism I don’t mean solely technology, but also human factors, which are huge issues when it comes to the current state of “self driving” cars.
  - matz1 6y ago
    Society does accept some level of car accident otherwise there would be no car on the road at all. Safety regulations is good but too much safety regulation is bad. As individual I accept some level risk, I accept that there is some level of risk that I will be in accident, the trade off of 0 risk are too much.
- camjohnson26 6y ago
  “Self-driving cars are already much safer than human-driven cars.” Citation sorely needed. The few self driving cars currently on the road either require active human supervision or only operate in the absolute best circumstances so can’t be compared to human drivers who operate in all conditions and all types of vehicles.
Isinlor 6y ago
Companies should be required to monitor distances driven and report crashes when L2+ systems are active. If it's proven that a system performs significantly worse than a human then regulate it further.
Hypocritelefty 6y ago
No point debating anything here as this place is full of Tesla shills

Robotbeat 6y ago

Yeah, the problem is the "high profile crashes" aspect. It's not that crashes with only humans behind the wheel are uncommon. They're common as dirt! But they're not "high profile." So arguably NTSB's perspective (since they only do "high profile" crashes) is heavily skewed toward dramatic anecdotes compared to NHTSA who have to take into account all the crashes, high profile or not. Data vs anecdote.

omgwtfbyobbq 6y ago
I think NTSB is using data in the aggregate. What they seem to be focusing on is manufacturers, specifically Tesla, broadly allowing use of these systems in circumstances where it's possibly dangerous and also allowing advanced features, which can be more dangerous, for smaller groups. Their POV is that if manufacturers were more restrictive about where the comfort features could be used, there would be fewer deaths. I've never read about them criticizing the active safety components to these systems.
snowwrestler 6y ago
The staff of the NTSB is well aware of the broader context of automotive safety.
- FireBeyond 6y ago
  I love some of this. "Elon says that the way NTSB tests is biased against Tesla. They must be a failed institution/in the pockets of big oil!" Critical thinking far too often goes out the window.

RcouF1uZ4gsC 6y ago

But here is the thing. If you compare Tesla’s with some of the other higher end cars, they have a higher mortality. https://medium.com/@MidwesternHedgi/teslas-driver-fatality-rate-is-more-than-triple-that-of-luxury-cars-and-likely-even-higher-433670ddde17 https://medium.com/@MidwesternHedgi/teslas-driver-fatality-r...

Robotbeat 6y ago
Tesla isn't selling exclusively in the luxury market. If you want a high performance or road-trip capable electric car, you basically have just one option. So you should compare against overall cars, not just "high end" luxury cars. Being electric has made them more expensive, but they're not really true luxury cars for the most part and are not driven by the same people or under the same conditions or under the same driving style as luxury cars.
- worik 6y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_electric_cars_currently_available https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_electric_cars_currentl... Tesla is right up there but there are many snapping at its heels, especially from China. I am hoping my next car will be a Chinese electric sports car. But, unlike a Tesla, one I own.
- Hypocritelefty 6y ago
  10k for a fraud is not high end? Where does fraud Karen finds shills like you?
- clouddrover 6y ago
  > If you want a high performance or road-trip capable electric car, you basically have just one option. Is it the Porsche Taycan? Or the Porsche Taycan Cross Turismo? Or do you mean the Audi e-tron GT? Or perhaps the Lucid Air? Or maybe the Mercedes EQS?
  - leetcrew 6y ago
    I would certainly take a taycan over any tesla, but to be fair, the taycan has a significantly worse range. I might be wrong now, but tesla was the leader in that category last I checked.

maxerickson 6y ago

If the system requires driver attention for the best safety outcomes, it seems a bit over the top to describe regulation requiring functional driver attention monitoring 'heavy handed'. Putting it another way, is there evidence that some ADAS are better than others? Because that's another way to choose regulations.

ehvatum 6y ago
Driving with autopilot off certainly requires driver attention.

nojito 6y ago

There isn't even evidence that backup cameras reduce accidents.

hellbannedguy 6y ago

A self entitled rich man can afford to take chances. The guy he plows into can’t. Tesla’s driving technology seems good enough, so I can picture guys whom are tired, or have been drinking, thinking I’ll take a calculated risk tonight. Once a week I think about that tech guy whom plowed into a bollard on 101, or the guy sleeping coming home from Vegas. I’m glad the NTSB is being very prudent. This is coming from a guy whom hates most laws, and believe society would be better off without so many regulations.