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You said "it's difficult to craft a compelling case for why safety is actually--versus theoretically--impeded". That apparently means you believe there is a wor

You said "it's difficult to craft a compelling case for why safety is actually--versus theoretically--impeded". That apparently means you believe there is a world where these incidents happening 10 more frequently [1] will not impede safety. I would like to know what that world is. But if you can't make a case for a world where there's zero safety impact, then it seems like it would be pretty easy to make a case for a world where there's some safety impact. Personally, I'd say that a bunch of people whose whole job is public safety saying that public safety is impeded is a decent case that public safety is impeded. But since you apparently believe otherwise, I'm looking for your explanation of how there's zero safety impact. [1] "‘Blanket the city’: CEO says SF can handle 10 times more Cruise driverless vehicles": https://missionlocal.org/2023/08/cruise-origin-waymo-robotaxi-driverless-car-autonomous-vehicle-california-public-utilities-commission/ https://missionlocal.org/2023/08/cruise-origin-waymo-robotax...

SR2Z 3y ago
I'd expect our public safety people to arrive with real numbers about human vs AV obstructions. SF's bias against change is pretty well-understood at this point, and I'm not at all convinced that this is a good reason to block expansion.
- lesuorac 3y ago
  Not that SF has taken this stance, but I think the stance of share your data with us or else we won't approve would be fine by me. > Also upsetting to firefighters was “zero transparency” of data from self-driving car companies. Because Waymo and Cruise do not disclose internal counts of unexpected stops or other incidents that impede first responders, the fire department is forced to depend on information from members of the public, city employees, firefighters or transit operators, which oftentimes resulted in incomplete or duplicate reports. Although later in the article they do provide some numbers. > She said the 55 — and counting — examples that the fire department has cited of driverless cars’ interference with law enforcement or first responder operations “demonstrated that these vehicles themselves are not understanding human traffic control.” > Just one week ago, that number was 50. “We think that the companies are ready to move forward with broad expansion when that number has gone down and does not continue to go up,” said Friedlander.
- wpietri 3y ago
  One, they've got some data. Two, why is it their job to prove the problem rather than the job of the people proposing the change to demonstrate safety? Three, why is it San Francisco's job to be a proving ground for this? I think there's pretty good theoretical reason to think automated cars are, asbsent AGI, fundamentally unable to be good traffic participants: traffic is social. And I'm hardly alone here; robot scientist and iRobot founder Rodney Brooks is very skeptical of the current self-driving efforts. His predictions have turned out to be much more accurate than the boosters. And that's before we even get to the question of other impacts. So I think the burden of proof here should not be on the city. It should be firmly on the people making self-driving cars. Why aren't they arriving with real numbers?
  - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
    I wish the debate took this form. Why should San Francisco be at the bleeding edge and what will these companies give it in return?
    - SR2Z 3y ago
      > Why should San Francisco be at the bleeding edge and what will these companies give it in return? Other than lots of high-paying jobs, tax revenues, and transit options? Other than the pedestrian that dies basically every week to cars, or the severe injury every 14 hours due to cars? San Francisco is owed nothing. It's a city government; it really should not be in the business of twisting companies arms to extract concessions for imagined slights. It can pass fair, objective laws in good faith. It has historically been horrible at doing that.
      - wpietri 3y ago
        San Francisco is a government that represents the people who live there. If the people of San Francisco want no robot cars until they're reasonably safe, that's a call they should get to make. If that means the loss of the things you mention, all of which I doubt would change much, well, that's a choice they can make. And as an actual San Francisco resident, I personally favor cutting back on the number of robot cars until they're demonstrably much safer.
JumpCrisscross 3y ago
> means you believe there is a world where these incidents happening 10 more frequently will not impede safety We don’t know how these interactions scale with deployment and learning. 10x the cars does not necessitate 10x the interactions. And while tying up public workers’ time is a nuisance that can cause harm, that doesn’t mean it will. These are real-world tests: we should have real examples. > a bunch of people whose whole job is public safety saying that public safety is impeded is a decent case I guess I’m deeply sceptical of collections of anecdotes on the eve of a vote. Will this be a challenge for San Francisco’s police and firefighters? Of course. Does that give them a veto? No, particularly not without a game plan other than standing by.
- wpietri 3y ago
  So your model is that 100% of the incidents that can cause harm will not cause harm? No matter how many cars they put on the road? Again, I'd ask you to back that up. Because otherwise it sounds to me that because of your particular political convictions, you're just handwaving away 100% of the evidence here. If you get to be skeptical of all of the evidence that's collected because there's an upcoming relevant decision, I get to be at least as skeptical of how your skepticism is applied.
  - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
    > you're just handwaving away 100% of the evidence here The evidence is a collection of inconvenient interactions. No actual harm. Contrast that with Tesla: actual harm. In the absence of evidence of actual harm, I don’t see an argument for limiting scope. Hence actual, measured harm versus theoretical harm one would assume would manifest from the frequency of interactions.
    - wpietri 3y ago
      Again, I want to see you explain why those "inconvenient interactions" will never add up to a safety problem, because all I'm seeing is handwaving. In my view, "inconveniencing" a firefighter in the middle of fighting a fire is a clear safety issue Your notion that you have to see blood before taking it seriously is pretty wild to me. In college I knew a guy who regularly drove drunk using pretty similar logic because he'd never had a problem.

SR2Z 3y ago

I'd expect our public safety people to arrive with real numbers about human vs AV obstructions. SF's bias against change is pretty well-understood at this point, and I'm not at all convinced that this is a good reason to block expansion.

lesuorac 3y ago
Not that SF has taken this stance, but I think the stance of share your data with us or else we won't approve would be fine by me. > Also upsetting to firefighters was “zero transparency” of data from self-driving car companies. Because Waymo and Cruise do not disclose internal counts of unexpected stops or other incidents that impede first responders, the fire department is forced to depend on information from members of the public, city employees, firefighters or transit operators, which oftentimes resulted in incomplete or duplicate reports. Although later in the article they do provide some numbers. > She said the 55 — and counting — examples that the fire department has cited of driverless cars’ interference with law enforcement or first responder operations “demonstrated that these vehicles themselves are not understanding human traffic control.” > Just one week ago, that number was 50. “We think that the companies are ready to move forward with broad expansion when that number has gone down and does not continue to go up,” said Friedlander.
wpietri 3y ago
One, they've got some data. Two, why is it their job to prove the problem rather than the job of the people proposing the change to demonstrate safety? Three, why is it San Francisco's job to be a proving ground for this? I think there's pretty good theoretical reason to think automated cars are, asbsent AGI, fundamentally unable to be good traffic participants: traffic is social. And I'm hardly alone here; robot scientist and iRobot founder Rodney Brooks is very skeptical of the current self-driving efforts. His predictions have turned out to be much more accurate than the boosters. And that's before we even get to the question of other impacts. So I think the burden of proof here should not be on the city. It should be firmly on the people making self-driving cars. Why aren't they arriving with real numbers?
- JumpCrisscross 3y ago
  I wish the debate took this form. Why should San Francisco be at the bleeding edge and what will these companies give it in return?
  - SR2Z 3y ago
    > Why should San Francisco be at the bleeding edge and what will these companies give it in return? Other than lots of high-paying jobs, tax revenues, and transit options? Other than the pedestrian that dies basically every week to cars, or the severe injury every 14 hours due to cars? San Francisco is owed nothing. It's a city government; it really should not be in the business of twisting companies arms to extract concessions for imagined slights. It can pass fair, objective laws in good faith. It has historically been horrible at doing that.
    - wpietri 3y ago
      San Francisco is a government that represents the people who live there. If the people of San Francisco want no robot cars until they're reasonably safe, that's a call they should get to make. If that means the loss of the things you mention, all of which I doubt would change much, well, that's a choice they can make. And as an actual San Francisco resident, I personally favor cutting back on the number of robot cars until they're demonstrably much safer.

JumpCrisscross 3y ago

> means you believe there is a world where these incidents happening 10 more frequently will not impede safety We don’t know how these interactions scale with deployment and learning. 10x the cars does not necessitate 10x the interactions. And while tying up public workers’ time is a nuisance that can cause harm, that doesn’t mean it will. These are real-world tests: we should have real examples. > a bunch of people whose whole job is public safety saying that public safety is impeded is a decent case I guess I’m deeply sceptical of collections of anecdotes on the eve of a vote. Will this be a challenge for San Francisco’s police and firefighters? Of course. Does that give them a veto? No, particularly not without a game plan other than standing by.

wpietri 3y ago
So your model is that 100% of the incidents that can cause harm will not cause harm? No matter how many cars they put on the road? Again, I'd ask you to back that up. Because otherwise it sounds to me that because of your particular political convictions, you're just handwaving away 100% of the evidence here. If you get to be skeptical of all of the evidence that's collected because there's an upcoming relevant decision, I get to be at least as skeptical of how your skepticism is applied.
- JumpCrisscross 3y ago
  > you're just handwaving away 100% of the evidence here The evidence is a collection of inconvenient interactions. No actual harm. Contrast that with Tesla: actual harm. In the absence of evidence of actual harm, I don’t see an argument for limiting scope. Hence actual, measured harm versus theoretical harm one would assume would manifest from the frequency of interactions.
  - wpietri 3y ago
    Again, I want to see you explain why those "inconvenient interactions" will never add up to a safety problem, because all I'm seeing is handwaving. In my view, "inconveniencing" a firefighter in the middle of fighting a fire is a clear safety issue Your notion that you have to see blood before taking it seriously is pretty wild to me. In college I knew a guy who regularly drove drunk using pretty similar logic because he'd never had a problem.