3 ms·

Not having RADAR + LIDAR here is the problem IMHO. You need multi-sensors, relying on purely visual is an issue, and when humans run into visual ambiguity (ther

Not having RADAR + LIDAR here is the problem IMHO. You need multi-sensors, relying on purely visual is an issue, and when humans run into visual ambiguity (there was a ton of tree shadow on the ground), we instinctively slow down or stop. Mission #0 for self driving is to never collide head on with something. Radar car systems that automatically apply braking from 20 years ago could achieve this. IMHO, forward facing radar running without AI and straight up deterministic algorithms should be able to take control away from the ML systems when a collision in imminent.

ajross 5y ago
No radar collision avoidance system in production would have seen that pole. They're tuned very strongly to avoid seeing stationary objects (to avoid signaling for candy wrappers and manhole covers). Lidar might have, but it's much thinner than you think and lidar has much (like an order of magnitude) poorer horizontal resolution than cameras. Really, this is fixable. The car can see streetlights. I mean, duh. This wasn't an out-of-regime situation. There's a bug, mostly likely in the contrast control layer (the lamp was in a shadow). Bugs can be fixed, that's what beta is for. This is going to be a popular genre ("Did you see what that Tesla did?") for a while as the new capabilities appear in public. And then they'll be fixed, and we'll go back to arguing about other stuff.
- Ancapistani 5y ago
  The obstacle avoidance sensors on my quadcopter wouldn’t have let me hit that pole. They are just optical cameras, and work at speeds of ~22mph and below. It seems nuts to me that Tesla can’t do better than a ~$1,500 quadcopter.
  - ajross 5y ago
    > It seems nuts to me that Tesla can’t do better than a ~$1,500 quadcopter. That's probably because you've mischaracterized the issue. It's a streetlight. Obviously Teslas see streetlights. Go for a ride in a friends car (not even one with FSD Beta) and look at the screen. You'll see streetlights rendered by the hundreds. It's basically perfect. It failed here, not because it couldn't see "a pole" but because of a much more specific bug. Specific bugs can, almost always, be fixed.
    - cromwellian 5y ago
      There's a YouTube channel I've been watching for longest time that tests the ability of FSD to navigate a monorail suspended by these columns in the middle of the street. It has been failing for years, and he reports the bug every time, and it never gets fixed. Here's the latest, even when it finally succeeds, it is not very convincing or consistent. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWc-r0InwVk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWc-r0InwVk
      - ajross 5y ago
        So... if the bug existed before, and appears to be fixed now (but with other issues remaining), isn't that consistent with the theory that this is simply software like any other and that bugs can be fixed? Or do you think that the progress we're seeing currently will just stop? You think that video is as well as the car will ever handle that particular situation to your satisfaction and no further progress is possible?
        cromwellian 5y ago
        How about that these kinds of bugs are not in a class that can all be solved by a few bug fixes, but represent a very long tail of bugs that need one-off fixes. Most software has to deal with a limited input domain, and when mistakes are made, they are tolerable. And even in the case of software in limited domains, critical bugs remain in commercial software that have been around for decades, with new bugs cropping up as the software is maintained. Now look at FSD: What is the input domain? The entire real world and the incredible diversity of variety of it. And what is the repercussions of a bug? Death or injury. So like I said, these FSD systems should be designed with a kind of "kernel" vs "user" space paradigm. The "kernel" has a mission to absolutely prevent "user" space from crashing the system. In my view, that would mean a backup sensor suite and software design whose highest priority is to avoid collision, rather than driving or navigating. All of Tesla's ML systems should be in the "user" space. They view the world, make predictions to navigate, but any control inputs they yield should always be overridden by the "kernel" if a collision is pending.

ajross 5y ago

No radar collision avoidance system in production would have seen that pole. They're tuned very strongly to avoid seeing stationary objects (to avoid signaling for candy wrappers and manhole covers). Lidar might have, but it's much thinner than you think and lidar has much (like an order of magnitude) poorer horizontal resolution than cameras. Really, this is fixable. The car can see streetlights. I mean, duh. This wasn't an out-of-regime situation. There's a bug, mostly likely in the contrast control layer (the lamp was in a shadow). Bugs can be fixed, that's what beta is for. This is going to be a popular genre ("Did you see what that Tesla did?") for a while as the new capabilities appear in public. And then they'll be fixed, and we'll go back to arguing about other stuff.

Ancapistani 5y ago
The obstacle avoidance sensors on my quadcopter wouldn’t have let me hit that pole. They are just optical cameras, and work at speeds of ~22mph and below. It seems nuts to me that Tesla can’t do better than a ~$1,500 quadcopter.
- ajross 5y ago
  > It seems nuts to me that Tesla can’t do better than a ~$1,500 quadcopter. That's probably because you've mischaracterized the issue. It's a streetlight. Obviously Teslas see streetlights. Go for a ride in a friends car (not even one with FSD Beta) and look at the screen. You'll see streetlights rendered by the hundreds. It's basically perfect. It failed here, not because it couldn't see "a pole" but because of a much more specific bug. Specific bugs can, almost always, be fixed.
  - cromwellian 5y ago
    There's a YouTube channel I've been watching for longest time that tests the ability of FSD to navigate a monorail suspended by these columns in the middle of the street. It has been failing for years, and he reports the bug every time, and it never gets fixed. Here's the latest, even when it finally succeeds, it is not very convincing or consistent. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWc-r0InwVk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWc-r0InwVk
    - ajross 5y ago
      So... if the bug existed before, and appears to be fixed now (but with other issues remaining), isn't that consistent with the theory that this is simply software like any other and that bugs can be fixed? Or do you think that the progress we're seeing currently will just stop? You think that video is as well as the car will ever handle that particular situation to your satisfaction and no further progress is possible?
      - cromwellian 5y ago
        How about that these kinds of bugs are not in a class that can all be solved by a few bug fixes, but represent a very long tail of bugs that need one-off fixes. Most software has to deal with a limited input domain, and when mistakes are made, they are tolerable. And even in the case of software in limited domains, critical bugs remain in commercial software that have been around for decades, with new bugs cropping up as the software is maintained. Now look at FSD: What is the input domain? The entire real world and the incredible diversity of variety of it. And what is the repercussions of a bug? Death or injury. So like I said, these FSD systems should be designed with a kind of "kernel" vs "user" space paradigm. The "kernel" has a mission to absolutely prevent "user" space from crashing the system. In my view, that would mean a backup sensor suite and software design whose highest priority is to avoid collision, rather than driving or navigating. All of Tesla's ML systems should be in the "user" space. They view the world, make predictions to navigate, but any control inputs they yield should always be overridden by the "kernel" if a collision is pending.