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I think a lot of people thought it would be exactly as hard as it has turned out to be but were dismissed as being luddites or lacking imagination. I think it’

I think a lot of people thought it would be exactly as hard as it has turned out to be but were dismissed as being luddites or lacking imagination. I think it’s always been apparent that self driving is one of those problems where the first 90% is hard but solvable, but where the difficulty just keeps increasing in the last 10%. When I was growing up in the 80s and 90s I was constantly seeing coverage of cars driving themselves around circuits and even handling skids in a skid pan better than any human. I fully expected to never have to drive. Sadly I was very wrong. I’ve never wanted more to be wrong about my cynicism about a technology than with self driving.

ilaksh 4y ago
And yet here there is an article about expanding the service area of a working self driving system and you are still implying that you believe it's impossible.
- ghaff 4y ago
  In a limited area in cities with good weather. It would be foolish to bet that we'll never have fully autonomous driving on most roads in most conditions. It's probably also foolish to bet that kids growing up today can generally get by without ever learning to drive. (Yes, some cities are better than others and some just accept they can't easily go many places or pursue certain activities but that's not the general case.)
KKKKkkkk1 4y ago
I think a lot of people thought it would be exactly as hard as it has turned out to be but were dismissed as being luddites or lacking imagination. There may have been a lot of people like that, but there were very few knowledgeable people who were making such predictions in public. The only one I know of is Rodney Brooks, and even he went public for the first time only in 2017 [0]. [0] https://rodneybrooks.com/edge-cases-for-self-driving-cars/ https://rodneybrooks.com/edge-cases-for-self-driving-cars/
- ghaff 4y ago
  John Leonard of MIT said something similar around the same time. "Taking me from Cambridge to Logan Airport with no driver in any Boston weather or traffic condition — that might not be in my lifetime," Leonard told Bloomberg. (2018) (I think he actually said the "not in my lifetime" thing originally a few years earlier.)

ilaksh 4y ago

And yet here there is an article about expanding the service area of a working self driving system and you are still implying that you believe it's impossible.

ghaff 4y ago
In a limited area in cities with good weather. It would be foolish to bet that we'll never have fully autonomous driving on most roads in most conditions. It's probably also foolish to bet that kids growing up today can generally get by without ever learning to drive. (Yes, some cities are better than others and some just accept they can't easily go many places or pursue certain activities but that's not the general case.)

KKKKkkkk1 4y ago

I think a lot of people thought it would be exactly as hard as it has turned out to be but were dismissed as being luddites or lacking imagination. There may have been a lot of people like that, but there were very few knowledgeable people who were making such predictions in public. The only one I know of is Rodney Brooks, and even he went public for the first time only in 2017 [0]. [0] https://rodneybrooks.com/edge-cases-for-self-driving-cars/ https://rodneybrooks.com/edge-cases-for-self-driving-cars/

ghaff 4y ago
John Leonard of MIT said something similar around the same time. "Taking me from Cambridge to Logan Airport with no driver in any Boston weather or traffic condition — that might not be in my lifetime," Leonard told Bloomberg. (2018) (I think he actually said the "not in my lifetime" thing originally a few years earlier.)