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This topic aside, I guess I just feel like if the Hacker community is saying “don’t build things! It’s dangerous! What if someone gets hurt! Go DMV! Put a stop

This topic aside, I guess I just feel like if the Hacker community is saying “don’t build things! It’s dangerous! What if someone gets hurt! Go DMV! Put a stop to that!”, then maybe I don’t want to be a Hacker anymore.

arcticbull 5y ago
There's good and bad ways to develop new technologies. It is our responsibility to champion the good and call out the bad. If not us, the people who actually understand and build the technology - then who? [edit] I'm pro EPA too btw, its nice that rivers don't catch fire.
- martindbp 5y ago
  If EPA regulations stood in the way of saving a million lives a year, yeah it would be a bad way to develop new technologies. We know humans are terrible drivers leading to countless tragedies. Tesla FSD is far from working at the moment, nobody is claiming otherwise. But it requires a human supervisor, and this is enforced by a driver facing camera. That combination likely makes it safer than the average driver already today. What I'm seeing is that Tesla's appraoch, fleet learning, is likely to accelerate the advent of L4. If Tesla can solve this using the existing cheap camera sensors, they can scale this out incredibly fast. This year they are likely to produce upwards of 2 million vehicles, and by 2025 it's likely close to 6-7 million. Even if other self-driving solutions get there first, they have no way of reaching Tesla's scale as they need specialized sensors and partnerships with OEMs etc. Consider the possibility that I'm right. By stoking fears and getting FSD banned or delayed, many lives would be lost in the name of safety, when there has been no fatality recorded on FSD.
  - arcticbull 5y ago
    If saving lives were paramount would we not just be advocating for more trains? I think this is simply a cost-saving measure. They have not developed a sufficiently reliable system, they are marketing it as though it is, and putting it on the road. I strongly suspect that they do not in fact require more data to perfect this system - I suspect they need more sensors. If they do need more data, they're free to obtain it otherwise. Autopilot has tried to murder me a few times lol.
  - jjav 5y ago
    > What I'm seeing is that Tesla's appraoch, fleet learning I don't want to see that experimental learning happening on public roads which are shared by people who are not willing participants in the experiment. Every time a Tesla crashes into a barrier killing the driver that is sad, but at least they chose that fate so ok. When Teslas cause damage to other cars or humans who didn't want to be part of the alpha program, that's criminal.
BoorishBears 5y ago
Can you point me to a time where $BIGCORP leveraging mass public testing of 5,000 lb heavy machinery to get around actually having to pay for testers was considered part of the hacker ethos?
- Rygian 5y ago
  What percentage of cars is enough for you to say "mass public testing"?
  - BoorishBears 5y ago
    Why on earth is it supposed to be a percentage of all cars on the road? If I say I just ate a lot of rice, do I define how much rice I ate by the percentage of global rice consumption I accounted for? - Please, 2,000 cars is mass testing.
Thorentis 5y ago
I didn't realise part of being a hacker was being okay with endangering lives.
- anonporridge 5y ago
  We all endanger lives every time we get behind the wheel of a manually driven car.
  - BoorishBears 5y ago
    We individually endanger lives, presumably the people who made your car have not added it to an army of self-endangering cars. It's not like there's nothing between 0 safety features and FSD. We could just have passive safety features like AEB and LKA and get a ton of benefit over nothing...
  - gamblor956 5y ago
    If you endanger lives every time you get behind the wheel of a car, you shouldn't be driving. Millions of people are able to drive safely, and do, every minute of every day.
    - inglor_cz 5y ago
      Millions of people think they are able to drive safely. But 9 of 10 crashes are still caused by human error. 73 per cent of American drivers consider themselves above average [0]. [0] https://www.insurancejournal.com/magazines/mag-editorsnote/2018/02/05/478963.htm https://www.insurancejournal.com/magazines/mag-editorsnote/2... I don't doubt that there are many safe drivers out there, but probably fewer than we think. With modern cars, you can risk a lot before having an accident.
      - mellavora 5y ago
        There was some interesting comment a few months ago about the "human error" aspect of crashes. Basically saying that the quoted statistic (90% or whatever) is a way to NOT look at how road design contributes to the error. Earlier on this threat, someone commented that a road marked as 50 mph often has cars driving 150 mph on it, because it is a shortcut which is build like a racetrack. Obviously 150mph in a 50mph zone is human error, but a few simple changes to road design could take away the 150mph attractiveness of this road. Or see some of the articles on stroads, or badly placed left turns, etc. FSD might be a step to better road safety, but a focus on designing roads for safety might also be a good step.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
hdhxjsksi 5y ago
How does revisiting approach to regulate public self-driving test translate to dont build things in your opinion? To me if looks like no one has issues with building or testing, its just the public testing that there are concerns about.
yumraj 5y ago
Sure, why do we even need DMV and driver's license. Anyone and of any age should be allowed to drive, since who cares it's dangerous since hackers want it that way. Who is DMV to tell someone whether they can or cannot drive. While we're at it, let's argue that FDA shouldn't worry about drug/vaccine trials? Perhaps as soon as a company makes something, it should be given to the people, since hackers. I'm sure pharma companies will love that, human lives be damned.
- XenophileJKO 5y ago
  It would actually be nice if the FDA just published an opinion and let me make the choice whether I wanted to use the drug or not.
martindbp 5y ago
Wholeheartedly agree. I don't give much weight to the negativity on HN anymore. VR bad, crypto bad, Tesla bad, autonomous vehicles bad, billionaires in space bad. To me it's pretty clear that Tesla's audatiousness in pushing FSD could move up the advent of L4 by years, possibly saving hundreds of thousands of lives, for very little downside. In fact, I believe human+FSD is already safer on average, just due to the fact that FSD requires the driver to watch the road.
- Pyramus 5y ago
  > In fact, I believe human+FSD is already safer on average, just due to the fact that FSD requires the driver to watch the road. Are you saying that 'Full Self Driving' is safer because it is not full self driving?
  - martindbp 5y ago
    Yes, the combination of FSD and human may be safer. Deploying it at scale allows Tesla to accelerate the progress towards true FSD, at which point humans would not have to pay attention.
- sidibe 5y ago
  > To me it's pretty clear that Tesla's audatiousness in pushing FSD could move up the advent of L4 by years, possibly saving hundreds of thousands of lives, for very little downside. In fact, I believe human+FSD is already safer on average, just due to the fact that FSD requires the driver to watch the road. I have no idea why that's clear to you. Seems to me from the FSD Beta videos that not only Tesla isn't in the same ballpark yet as the companies that are going for offering geofenced L4, but it doesn't seem to be improving much. Then there's the fact they've handcuffed themselves by widely promising/releasing the product with the hardware customers already have.
- erulabs 5y ago
  It’s genuinely some new form of conservatism. Imagine if the phone phreakers had stopped and given up “because someone might get hurt”. Imagine a hacker forum in the 80s cheering on the FCC. To be clear I don’t care about Tesla here - just the attitude of my peers. I want my culture back.
mellavora 5y ago
Yes, if. If that is what the community is saying. May I suggest an alternate "if", based not just on your statement, but on the general tone of this whole article? I just feel like if the Hacker community is saying "react emotionally based on if we like Tesla or not and just yell at each other without trying to communicate", then maybe I don't want to be a Hacker anymore.
omegalulw 5y ago
This is such a sad take - "move fast and break things" becomes a bad approach when you are breaking bones. It's always a risk reward tradeoff and in this case it's up to Tesla to demonstrate that the risk is manageable.
- willcipriano 5y ago
  Move fast and break your own things, not my things. I don't have equity.

arcticbull 5y ago

There's good and bad ways to develop new technologies. It is our responsibility to champion the good and call out the bad. If not us, the people who actually understand and build the technology - then who? [edit] I'm pro EPA too btw, its nice that rivers don't catch fire.

martindbp 5y ago
If EPA regulations stood in the way of saving a million lives a year, yeah it would be a bad way to develop new technologies. We know humans are terrible drivers leading to countless tragedies. Tesla FSD is far from working at the moment, nobody is claiming otherwise. But it requires a human supervisor, and this is enforced by a driver facing camera. That combination likely makes it safer than the average driver already today. What I'm seeing is that Tesla's appraoch, fleet learning, is likely to accelerate the advent of L4. If Tesla can solve this using the existing cheap camera sensors, they can scale this out incredibly fast. This year they are likely to produce upwards of 2 million vehicles, and by 2025 it's likely close to 6-7 million. Even if other self-driving solutions get there first, they have no way of reaching Tesla's scale as they need specialized sensors and partnerships with OEMs etc. Consider the possibility that I'm right. By stoking fears and getting FSD banned or delayed, many lives would be lost in the name of safety, when there has been no fatality recorded on FSD.
- arcticbull 5y ago
  If saving lives were paramount would we not just be advocating for more trains? I think this is simply a cost-saving measure. They have not developed a sufficiently reliable system, they are marketing it as though it is, and putting it on the road. I strongly suspect that they do not in fact require more data to perfect this system - I suspect they need more sensors. If they do need more data, they're free to obtain it otherwise. Autopilot has tried to murder me a few times lol.
- jjav 5y ago
  > What I'm seeing is that Tesla's appraoch, fleet learning I don't want to see that experimental learning happening on public roads which are shared by people who are not willing participants in the experiment. Every time a Tesla crashes into a barrier killing the driver that is sad, but at least they chose that fate so ok. When Teslas cause damage to other cars or humans who didn't want to be part of the alpha program, that's criminal.

BoorishBears 5y ago

Can you point me to a time where $BIGCORP leveraging mass public testing of 5,000 lb heavy machinery to get around actually having to pay for testers was considered part of the hacker ethos?

Rygian 5y ago
What percentage of cars is enough for you to say "mass public testing"?
- BoorishBears 5y ago
  Why on earth is it supposed to be a percentage of all cars on the road? If I say I just ate a lot of rice, do I define how much rice I ate by the percentage of global rice consumption I accounted for? - Please, 2,000 cars is mass testing.

Thorentis 5y ago

I didn't realise part of being a hacker was being okay with endangering lives.

anonporridge 5y ago
We all endanger lives every time we get behind the wheel of a manually driven car.
- BoorishBears 5y ago
  We individually endanger lives, presumably the people who made your car have not added it to an army of self-endangering cars. It's not like there's nothing between 0 safety features and FSD. We could just have passive safety features like AEB and LKA and get a ton of benefit over nothing...
- gamblor956 5y ago
  If you endanger lives every time you get behind the wheel of a car, you shouldn't be driving. Millions of people are able to drive safely, and do, every minute of every day.
  - inglor_cz 5y ago
    Millions of people think they are able to drive safely. But 9 of 10 crashes are still caused by human error. 73 per cent of American drivers consider themselves above average [0]. [0] https://www.insurancejournal.com/magazines/mag-editorsnote/2018/02/05/478963.htm https://www.insurancejournal.com/magazines/mag-editorsnote/2... I don't doubt that there are many safe drivers out there, but probably fewer than we think. With modern cars, you can risk a lot before having an accident.
    - mellavora 5y ago
      There was some interesting comment a few months ago about the "human error" aspect of crashes. Basically saying that the quoted statistic (90% or whatever) is a way to NOT look at how road design contributes to the error. Earlier on this threat, someone commented that a road marked as 50 mph often has cars driving 150 mph on it, because it is a shortcut which is build like a racetrack. Obviously 150mph in a 50mph zone is human error, but a few simple changes to road design could take away the 150mph attractiveness of this road. Or see some of the articles on stroads, or badly placed left turns, etc. FSD might be a step to better road safety, but a focus on designing roads for safety might also be a good step.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

hdhxjsksi 5y ago

How does revisiting approach to regulate public self-driving test translate to dont build things in your opinion? To me if looks like no one has issues with building or testing, its just the public testing that there are concerns about.

yumraj 5y ago

Sure, why do we even need DMV and driver's license. Anyone and of any age should be allowed to drive, since who cares it's dangerous since hackers want it that way. Who is DMV to tell someone whether they can or cannot drive. While we're at it, let's argue that FDA shouldn't worry about drug/vaccine trials? Perhaps as soon as a company makes something, it should be given to the people, since hackers. I'm sure pharma companies will love that, human lives be damned.

XenophileJKO 5y ago
It would actually be nice if the FDA just published an opinion and let me make the choice whether I wanted to use the drug or not.

martindbp 5y ago

Wholeheartedly agree. I don't give much weight to the negativity on HN anymore. VR bad, crypto bad, Tesla bad, autonomous vehicles bad, billionaires in space bad. To me it's pretty clear that Tesla's audatiousness in pushing FSD could move up the advent of L4 by years, possibly saving hundreds of thousands of lives, for very little downside. In fact, I believe human+FSD is already safer on average, just due to the fact that FSD requires the driver to watch the road.

Pyramus 5y ago
> In fact, I believe human+FSD is already safer on average, just due to the fact that FSD requires the driver to watch the road. Are you saying that 'Full Self Driving' is safer because it is not full self driving?
- martindbp 5y ago
  Yes, the combination of FSD and human may be safer. Deploying it at scale allows Tesla to accelerate the progress towards true FSD, at which point humans would not have to pay attention.
sidibe 5y ago
> To me it's pretty clear that Tesla's audatiousness in pushing FSD could move up the advent of L4 by years, possibly saving hundreds of thousands of lives, for very little downside. In fact, I believe human+FSD is already safer on average, just due to the fact that FSD requires the driver to watch the road. I have no idea why that's clear to you. Seems to me from the FSD Beta videos that not only Tesla isn't in the same ballpark yet as the companies that are going for offering geofenced L4, but it doesn't seem to be improving much. Then there's the fact they've handcuffed themselves by widely promising/releasing the product with the hardware customers already have.
erulabs 5y ago
It’s genuinely some new form of conservatism. Imagine if the phone phreakers had stopped and given up “because someone might get hurt”. Imagine a hacker forum in the 80s cheering on the FCC. To be clear I don’t care about Tesla here - just the attitude of my peers. I want my culture back.

mellavora 5y ago

Yes, if. If that is what the community is saying. May I suggest an alternate "if", based not just on your statement, but on the general tone of this whole article? I just feel like if the Hacker community is saying "react emotionally based on if we like Tesla or not and just yell at each other without trying to communicate", then maybe I don't want to be a Hacker anymore.

omegalulw 5y ago

This is such a sad take - "move fast and break things" becomes a bad approach when you are breaking bones. It's always a risk reward tradeoff and in this case it's up to Tesla to demonstrate that the risk is manageable.

willcipriano 5y ago
Move fast and break your own things, not my things. I don't have equity.