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I'm glad I'm not the only one that feel strongly anti-screen in the car. I feel so strongly about it that I drive an old car. I want an electric car eventually,

I'm glad I'm not the only one that feel strongly anti-screen in the car. I feel so strongly about it that I drive an old car. I want an electric car eventually, and I hope that the automakers start building all cars, including electrics, with fully tactile control surfaces (didn't Honda say they'd eliminate screens in their cars? What happened with that?). It looks less Star-Trek sexy, but it also works 50x better. You know who gets this? Airplane pilots. They use screens but with a great deal of care.

chrisseaton 5y ago
They aren’t removing the screens - they’re removing the touch functionality of the screen. Screens are vital for safety - how do you back-up safely without a screen to show you what’s behind you? Aeroplane pilots use an absolute ton of screens, front and centre.
- prepend 5y ago
  > how do you back-up safely without a screen to show you what’s behind you? Turn your head and look behind you.
  - chrisseaton 5y ago
    You have blind spots doing that - that’s how children get run over and why it’s illegal to sell a new car without a screen these days.
    - prepend 5y ago
      Not if you move properly. The idea is to know where a car’s blind spots are and to move your head to look around. It’s tragic how kids get run over, but it’s a tiny amount out of a country of 300 million. When I had toddlers, I would make sure I could see them in front of the car before I would back out. If I didn’t know where they were, I didn’t back up. Not a perfect system, of course. But the idea that rear cameras are a necessity is silly.
    - snypher 5y ago
      I often mow my yard nowhere near a child however my mower is unable to mow in reverse due to some regulations. I'm dissatisfied I'm held to a safety standard which does not apply to my use. Should I be wearing a seatbelt too, because some people fall off? Some burden should fall on parental supervision, rather than x million reverse cameras etc that people don't require.
- binarymax 5y ago
  Wow. I guess I’m really old and remember the days of using the rear view and side mirrors to back up.
  - chrisseaton 5y ago
    No mirror lets you see right behind the back bumper. It’s dangerous.
    - dreamcompiler 5y ago
      And yet drivers managed to (mostly) not back into kids for over 100 years, without rear cameras. You walk around the car before you throw it into reverse. The screens fix the "mostly" problem, but they're not a substitute for driving skill.
      - nzmsv 5y ago
        Kids also used to stand in the back while being driven around. I certainly did. Not only were there no car seats, there weren't even seatbelts in the back. Putting kids and their toys in the back of a station wagon for a road trip used to be a thing. Everyone mostly made it out alive, and yet we still have laws against all of the above now, everywhere in the world.
      - chrisseaton 5y ago
        > managed to (mostly) not back into kids for over 100 years, without rear cameras They reckon the mandatory backup camera law saves 95 lives a year.
        dafoex 5y ago
        Getting out of the car would save 95 lives, too
        chrisseaton 5y ago
        > Getting out of the car Some cars do have remote-control drive features these days, so you can reverse it from outside the car, but that's a super high-end feature (designed for getting in to and out of extremely tight city parking spaces) and relies on the chips that are in shortage, so that's not a solution.
- dreamcompiler 5y ago
  It's now mandated by law that new cars have back-up screens. That's a helpful safety feature, but I fear it's also teaching new drivers that one cannot back up a vehicle without a screen. If such drivers find themselves pulling a trailer, driving a rental truck that has no screen, or driving an ordinary car with a bike rack on the back that obscures the camera's view, they'll suddenly find themselves unable to reverse the vehicle. Don't get dependent on the screens; learn to use the mirrors and swivel your head.
  - chrisseaton 5y ago
    No amount of swivelling your head allows you to see the blind spot right behind you - not using a screen is really dangerous which is why they made them mandatory.
    - dreamcompiler 5y ago
      And yet making them mandatory does not mean they will suddenly appear everywhere, so it's still a good idea to have a backup plan (npi). It sounds to me like you think I'm against backup cameras, but I like them. My concern is that they are not always going to be present and working, so it's still a good idea to learn to safely reverse a vehicle without a camera. Speaking as someone who frequently drives fire trucks, ambulances, and large RVs, it's simply incorrect that it's somehow impossible to safely reverse a vehicle without a camera. Cameras are helpful tools but training and care should still be a driver's #1 safety priority.
    - Melting_Harps 5y ago
      > No amount of swivelling your head allows you to see the blind spot right behind you - not using a screen is really dangerous which is why they made them mandatory. I've worked in the auto Industry for a large part of my life in some form, and even when cameras are installed their are a lot of owners (mainly older) who don't use them. I can use them or not since I've spent enough time staging cars, so while it's a useful tool to have them it's specious reasoning to think they are an absolute answer to all accidents that happen when you back up. It's just as odd as thinking as somehow cars with auto-dimming headlamps when the turn signals are on are what was necessary for others to see you want to turn--I have no problem seeing this even on motorcycles as I ride and tend to be rather vigilant to these lights just to not get hit. It's akin to thinking that all cars must have a self-parking feature. Honestly, I place more blame on mobile phones for needless accidents than anything else on the road these days, second only to tired or careless drivers. Both of which I have been guilty of at some point, too.
- dghughes 5y ago
  > how do you back-up safely without a screen to show you what’s behind you? Always-on silicon dioxide transparent amorphous solid with a sublayer of vacuumed deposited silver: a mirror.
  - chrisseaton 5y ago
    You have deadly blind-spots when you rely on mirrors.
    - dafoex 5y ago
      Then use your eyes and neck joint to check your blind spots? You'd fail a UK driving test if you relied entirely on your mirror (or camera, for that matter) when reversing.
      - ryanlol 5y ago
        How do you do that in a perfectly legal street car like a lamborghini aventador?
      - chrisseaton 5y ago
        Unless you have a three-metre articulated neck you are not going to be able to get your head out the car and round the back to see right behind your own car while driving it - I can't believe people aren't aware they have blind spots there? That's how small children get run over. Why do you think they made backup cameras mandatory? Why do you think they believe they save lives?
        dafoex 5y ago
        Who made them mandatory? When and where? You have other blind spots, too, and manufacturers know that relying on a camera makes drivers neglect their other blind spots - Skoda cars even pop up a toast notification saying "Look around, is it safe to move?" to try and discourage lazy drivers thinking the computer is a replacement for a brain. But all this feels like a moot point, anyway. I understood the main argument to be advocating the use of physical controls, not the removal of safety sensors and cameras.
- javajosh 5y ago
  Chris, you've made many, many comments in this subthread, all basically saying the same thing. Yet I've never heard anyone express concern about auto safety and backing up. Not once. It concerns me that you may have an agenda, so I have flagged your messages.
- Koshkin 5y ago
  > how do you back-up safely without a screen The way they’ve been doing it for the past 100 years?
- p49k 5y ago
  > how do you back-up safely without a screen to show you what’s behind you? The older style of parking sensors based on ultrasonic sensors which use beeps and a diagram of the car to indicate what’s behind you and how far away is superior to a camera and doesn’t require a screen (could be done with a few LEDs if necessary) If you have to look at a camera in front of you to back up, you can’t see everything else in the field of vision behind you that’s not covered by the camera. Furthermore screens have much worse resolution and dynamic range than your eyes.
dreamcompiler 5y ago
The difference is that cars are mass-produced while airplanes are effectively bespoke.* And everything-on-the-touchscreen is cheaper to manufacture than physical knobs, so saving 25 cents per car matters. Airplanes are much more expensive than cars because they're all basically made by hand, so they can afford to spend more money on a better human interface. I'm not suggesting touchscreens in cars are "a good thing", but I get the economics. *Boeing makes around 700 aircraft per year. GM makes that many cars every hour.
- javajosh 5y ago
  Oh I am aware that screens are generally a lot cheaper. Plus you can update them over the air! (OTA updates being another anti-feature I do not want on any vehicle that I own or operate).
- madengr 5y ago
  Avionics are going touch too: https://www.garmin.com/en-US/p/166058 https://www.garmin.com/en-US/p/166058
  - FDSGSG 5y ago
    Not to mention the fact that literally every pilot has an iPad mounted in the cockpit for foreflight. Pilots fucking love touchscreens, avionics just change very slowly.
madengr 5y ago
If only this cost less: https://bollingermotors.com/bollinger-b2/ https://bollingermotors.com/bollinger-b2/

chrisseaton 5y ago

They aren’t removing the screens - they’re removing the touch functionality of the screen. Screens are vital for safety - how do you back-up safely without a screen to show you what’s behind you? Aeroplane pilots use an absolute ton of screens, front and centre.

prepend 5y ago
> how do you back-up safely without a screen to show you what’s behind you? Turn your head and look behind you.
- chrisseaton 5y ago
  You have blind spots doing that - that’s how children get run over and why it’s illegal to sell a new car without a screen these days.
  - prepend 5y ago
    Not if you move properly. The idea is to know where a car’s blind spots are and to move your head to look around. It’s tragic how kids get run over, but it’s a tiny amount out of a country of 300 million. When I had toddlers, I would make sure I could see them in front of the car before I would back out. If I didn’t know where they were, I didn’t back up. Not a perfect system, of course. But the idea that rear cameras are a necessity is silly.
  - snypher 5y ago
    I often mow my yard nowhere near a child however my mower is unable to mow in reverse due to some regulations. I'm dissatisfied I'm held to a safety standard which does not apply to my use. Should I be wearing a seatbelt too, because some people fall off? Some burden should fall on parental supervision, rather than x million reverse cameras etc that people don't require.
binarymax 5y ago
Wow. I guess I’m really old and remember the days of using the rear view and side mirrors to back up.
- chrisseaton 5y ago
  No mirror lets you see right behind the back bumper. It’s dangerous.
  - dreamcompiler 5y ago
    And yet drivers managed to (mostly) not back into kids for over 100 years, without rear cameras. You walk around the car before you throw it into reverse. The screens fix the "mostly" problem, but they're not a substitute for driving skill.
    - nzmsv 5y ago
      Kids also used to stand in the back while being driven around. I certainly did. Not only were there no car seats, there weren't even seatbelts in the back. Putting kids and their toys in the back of a station wagon for a road trip used to be a thing. Everyone mostly made it out alive, and yet we still have laws against all of the above now, everywhere in the world.
    - chrisseaton 5y ago
      > managed to (mostly) not back into kids for over 100 years, without rear cameras They reckon the mandatory backup camera law saves 95 lives a year.
      - dafoex 5y ago
        Getting out of the car would save 95 lives, too
        chrisseaton 5y ago
        > Getting out of the car Some cars do have remote-control drive features these days, so you can reverse it from outside the car, but that's a super high-end feature (designed for getting in to and out of extremely tight city parking spaces) and relies on the chips that are in shortage, so that's not a solution.
dreamcompiler 5y ago
It's now mandated by law that new cars have back-up screens. That's a helpful safety feature, but I fear it's also teaching new drivers that one cannot back up a vehicle without a screen. If such drivers find themselves pulling a trailer, driving a rental truck that has no screen, or driving an ordinary car with a bike rack on the back that obscures the camera's view, they'll suddenly find themselves unable to reverse the vehicle. Don't get dependent on the screens; learn to use the mirrors and swivel your head.
- chrisseaton 5y ago
  No amount of swivelling your head allows you to see the blind spot right behind you - not using a screen is really dangerous which is why they made them mandatory.
  - dreamcompiler 5y ago
    And yet making them mandatory does not mean they will suddenly appear everywhere, so it's still a good idea to have a backup plan (npi). It sounds to me like you think I'm against backup cameras, but I like them. My concern is that they are not always going to be present and working, so it's still a good idea to learn to safely reverse a vehicle without a camera. Speaking as someone who frequently drives fire trucks, ambulances, and large RVs, it's simply incorrect that it's somehow impossible to safely reverse a vehicle without a camera. Cameras are helpful tools but training and care should still be a driver's #1 safety priority.
  - Melting_Harps 5y ago
    > No amount of swivelling your head allows you to see the blind spot right behind you - not using a screen is really dangerous which is why they made them mandatory. I've worked in the auto Industry for a large part of my life in some form, and even when cameras are installed their are a lot of owners (mainly older) who don't use them. I can use them or not since I've spent enough time staging cars, so while it's a useful tool to have them it's specious reasoning to think they are an absolute answer to all accidents that happen when you back up. It's just as odd as thinking as somehow cars with auto-dimming headlamps when the turn signals are on are what was necessary for others to see you want to turn--I have no problem seeing this even on motorcycles as I ride and tend to be rather vigilant to these lights just to not get hit. It's akin to thinking that all cars must have a self-parking feature. Honestly, I place more blame on mobile phones for needless accidents than anything else on the road these days, second only to tired or careless drivers. Both of which I have been guilty of at some point, too.
dghughes 5y ago
> how do you back-up safely without a screen to show you what’s behind you? Always-on silicon dioxide transparent amorphous solid with a sublayer of vacuumed deposited silver: a mirror.
- chrisseaton 5y ago
  You have deadly blind-spots when you rely on mirrors.
  - dafoex 5y ago
    Then use your eyes and neck joint to check your blind spots? You'd fail a UK driving test if you relied entirely on your mirror (or camera, for that matter) when reversing.
    - ryanlol 5y ago
      How do you do that in a perfectly legal street car like a lamborghini aventador?
    - chrisseaton 5y ago
      Unless you have a three-metre articulated neck you are not going to be able to get your head out the car and round the back to see right behind your own car while driving it - I can't believe people aren't aware they have blind spots there? That's how small children get run over. Why do you think they made backup cameras mandatory? Why do you think they believe they save lives?
      - dafoex 5y ago
        Who made them mandatory? When and where? You have other blind spots, too, and manufacturers know that relying on a camera makes drivers neglect their other blind spots - Skoda cars even pop up a toast notification saying "Look around, is it safe to move?" to try and discourage lazy drivers thinking the computer is a replacement for a brain. But all this feels like a moot point, anyway. I understood the main argument to be advocating the use of physical controls, not the removal of safety sensors and cameras.
javajosh 5y ago
Chris, you've made many, many comments in this subthread, all basically saying the same thing. Yet I've never heard anyone express concern about auto safety and backing up. Not once. It concerns me that you may have an agenda, so I have flagged your messages.
Koshkin 5y ago
> how do you back-up safely without a screen The way they’ve been doing it for the past 100 years?
p49k 5y ago
> how do you back-up safely without a screen to show you what’s behind you? The older style of parking sensors based on ultrasonic sensors which use beeps and a diagram of the car to indicate what’s behind you and how far away is superior to a camera and doesn’t require a screen (could be done with a few LEDs if necessary) If you have to look at a camera in front of you to back up, you can’t see everything else in the field of vision behind you that’s not covered by the camera. Furthermore screens have much worse resolution and dynamic range than your eyes.

dreamcompiler 5y ago

The difference is that cars are mass-produced while airplanes are effectively bespoke.* And everything-on-the-touchscreen is cheaper to manufacture than physical knobs, so saving 25 cents per car matters. Airplanes are much more expensive than cars because they're all basically made by hand, so they can afford to spend more money on a better human interface. I'm not suggesting touchscreens in cars are "a good thing", but I get the economics. *Boeing makes around 700 aircraft per year. GM makes that many cars every hour.

javajosh 5y ago
Oh I am aware that screens are generally a lot cheaper. Plus you can update them over the air! (OTA updates being another anti-feature I do not want on any vehicle that I own or operate).
madengr 5y ago
Avionics are going touch too: https://www.garmin.com/en-US/p/166058 https://www.garmin.com/en-US/p/166058
- FDSGSG 5y ago
  Not to mention the fact that literally every pilot has an iPad mounted in the cockpit for foreflight. Pilots fucking love touchscreens, avionics just change very slowly.

madengr 5y ago

If only this cost less: https://bollingermotors.com/bollinger-b2/ https://bollingermotors.com/bollinger-b2/