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Not even geohot is asserting that "SAE Level 2 is the most practical self-driving we are ever going to get", his assertion is that he thinks nobody is going to
by Eridrus 4y ago
Not even geohot is asserting that "SAE Level 2 is the most practical self-driving we are ever going to get", his assertion is that he thinks nobody is going to get there in the next 10 years.
He may be right that we won't get there broadly for 10 years, but I think that's a rationalization of how things have gone for him, and the fact that the methods he has worked on don't have a chance of getting there, rather than the thesis he had when he started comma. Because if this was your thesis, there was really no reason to get into the space when he did.
In particular, Waymo One is already an L4 driver. It operates completely autonomously and passengers do not have the option of taking over. I don't know how often they get stuck and have to call someone to do roadside service, etc, but clearly in some areas it is already feasible. So the question is whether this is possible in dense urban areas or not.
And if you're just looking at SAE 2, the main competitors in this space, Mobileye and Tesla are doing way better than comma.
I definitely thought progress would be faster here, but I don't think we're anywhere near as far away from useful systems as geohot argues.
- andrewmcwatters 4y agoYou don't have to tell me about Waymo. I live where they operate. I'm one of the few people in the United States who can actually use their service. They limit where you can go by an approximate 4x9 city block area, and actually less than that, I'm being generous. You have no idea exactly how limited the service is. Effectively, you can't go ANYWHERE in the Phoenix metro area unless your A-to-B destination is squarely in that region. That's not Level 4. Whatever pretend system they've got going on, I'm sure works perfectly on those particular pristine roads, but no one is using Waymo. There are no real, coast-to-coast Level 4 systems.
- Dylan16807 4y agoFor a grading analogy, an area like that is level 4 minus, but "coast-to-coast" is level 4 plus. You don't need coast to coast to be "real". If they manage to cover 90% of a metro area, I'd be happy to call it a "real" level 4 service. Right now I'd want an explanation for why they're not adding blocks all the time.
- Eridrus 4y agoI am aware of the limitations, but covering some predefined area with no human intervention is the definition of L4. Clearly there is non-zero development risk here, but I don't think it's going so badly that it's definitely going to take 10+ years to launch in a metro area with millions of people. It may take a decade to get to a coast-to-coast system, but there's not a whole lot of incentive to build that vs serving a few large metros in the near future.