5 ms·

> This isn’t like the game of Go where processing power eventually wins...[it's] the definition of too complicated for a computer. Isn't that sentiment how peo

> This isn’t like the game of Go where processing power eventually wins...[it's] the definition of too complicated for a computer. Isn't that sentiment how people used to think about computers playing Go, writing an essay, beating humans at Jeopardy, or transcribing spoken language? Betting on the side of "computers will never be able to X" seems like a generally bad bet. > We could have public transportation, but we just can’t imagine a world where someone doesn’t privately own a thing someone else rents. The concept of self driving cars isn't mutually incompatible with public transportation.

lelanthran 3y ago
> Isn't that framing what the sentiment used to be towards computers playing Go, No. I was a student in the mid-90s, and the position of everyone regarding Go was "We'll have enough compute power one day". It was only after AlphaGo hit the news with its wins that I started seeing this revisionist history of "They said the computer will never win at Go". To which I have to reply "No. They did not".
- hotpotamus 3y ago
  XKCD is relevant as a historical reference in this case which is pretty neat. https://xkcd.com/1002/ https://xkcd.com/1002/
  - KineticLensman 3y ago
    Well played!
- slug 3y ago
  I went to a talk given by computer experts on the game of Go about 10 years before AlphaGo and the consensus was that the solution space was so large[0] that it was impossible to solve by a computer, whatever its capability, in the foreseeable future, by the methods known at the time. We now know that AlphaGo followed a somewhat new approach, but I don't remember that being obvious or expected back then... [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Go_and_mathematics#Game_tree_complexity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Go_and_mathematics#Game_tree_c...
  - 6D794163636F756 3y ago
    There is a difference between being better than humans and having solved a game. Could you clarify what exactly the experts were saying? Everything in the Wikipedia article you linked seems to be talking only about solving it so I'm really curious.
__MatrixMan__ 3y ago
> The concept of self driving cars isn't mutually incompatible with public transportation. No, but it does make individual vehicle ownership look pretty silly: Why buy a vehicle if you're just going to let it sit there for 95% of the time when it could be, you know, doing vehicle things? And if you're going to let it drive strangers around, what (besides a maintenance burden and a parking burden) have you gained by owning it as compared to, say, owning stock in a company who maintains a fleet of said vehicles? The knowledge that nobody has farted in this seat besides the people I invited to just isn't worth that much.
- VoodooJuJu 3y ago
  >You will own nothing. And you will be happy.
  - Gud 3y ago
    To be honest, a car is one of those things I’m glad I don’t own, but still wish to have available to me at a moments notice.
    - CaptainZapp 3y ago
      You can absolutely have that. At least in my part of the world. https://www.mobility.ch/en/private-customers https://www.mobility.ch/en/private-customers
      - Gud 3y ago
        Thanks for the link! I'm mostly in the same part of the world.
- andrei_says_ 3y ago
  100% instant availability. In cities like Los Angeles where public transportation takes 3-5x the time if an option at all, this is a necessity.
  - 3y ago
screye 3y ago
> The concept of self driving cars isn't mutually incompatible with public transportation. It is. Just like Uber with $25B in funding is mutually incompatible with small time taxi services around the world. The only way Uber ever pays its investors back is by establishing a global monopoly over taxi-transportation and making narrow margins over economies of scale. The self-driving industry has received upwards of $200billion in funding. If cities start moving towards public transit, that signals an existential threat to the ability of these VCs to make their money back. Note: Some industries are zero sum games. The total number of places people want to go to is limited. Better taxi technology will not mean a larger addressable market. The only way self-driving companies win, is by defeating other means of transport.
- theappsecguy 3y ago
  Start moving toward public transit? Public transit is not some new discovery that’s been put on hold because of self-driving attempts. You say this as if it’s cheap or easy to make any kind of significant public transit improvement in an already established city.
  - screye 3y ago
    It is incredibly cheap and easy. Public transit is hard is in the same way that going to Harvard as a black person in 1900 was hard. It was hard because malicious forces (whether they accepted the accusation or not) made it impossible. Painting a BRT line and some traffic cones is all you need to set up public transit. Hell, almost all pre-established cities had entire street car networks that we disassembled due to car-centric post-1950s development. Here's SF, Seattle and LA pre-1950. https://i0.wp.com/transitmap.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/tumblr_mk7dri0zYe1r54c4oo1_1280.jpg https://i0.wp.com/transitmap.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/... http://www.tundria.com/trams/USA/SanFrancisco-1944.shtml http://www.tundria.com/trams/USA/SanFrancisco-1944.shtml https://la.curbed.com/2015/11/9/9902244/red-car-map-los-angeles https://la.curbed.com/2015/11/9/9902244/red-car-map-los-ange...
- buzzert 3y ago
  The quality of public transportation has been getting steadily worse and worse the time I've lived in SF, and it's not because of self-driving cars. Perhaps, maybe, we fund things based on consent rather than force?
vidarh 3y ago
The issue with self-driving cars and public transportation is tricky. Self-driving cars might both drive down the cost of taxi-services, and drive up the convenience, both by not needing drivers and allowing providers to dynamically move cars to ideal position based on local demand, and so they might well drive up the use of personal transportation. On the other end of the scale, while this would be possible with human drivers too, driving down the cost and response times of being able to automatically reposition and provision a fleet of cars would potentially make deep integration with public transport in ways that'd make public transport more attractive possible as well. E.g. imagine a public transport provider guaranteeing a maximum X minutes wait to drive demand, and plugging holes by dynamically provisioning cars to meet that guarantee on lower demand routes, or in case of full buses. Or an "end to end" service where you input where you want to go and instead of just getting the route, you're told to get on bus Y, and when you get of at station Z a car is there waiting to take you to your final destination. Most of my Uber use is for journeys where public transport would be feasible but where being able to guarantee low waits and/or predictable arrival times makes a difference, and sometimes where a short leg (distance wise) of the public-transport option is too time consuming, and where it'd be "easy" to cut down on the car use if the transport system was better integrated. If you can make the experience smooth enough to reduce the "end to end" convenience advantage of a car, even if it means using cars for part of it, it might well be a net improvement in public transport use.

lelanthran 3y ago

> Isn't that framing what the sentiment used to be towards computers playing Go, No. I was a student in the mid-90s, and the position of everyone regarding Go was "We'll have enough compute power one day". It was only after AlphaGo hit the news with its wins that I started seeing this revisionist history of "They said the computer will never win at Go". To which I have to reply "No. They did not".

hotpotamus 3y ago
XKCD is relevant as a historical reference in this case which is pretty neat. https://xkcd.com/1002/ https://xkcd.com/1002/
- KineticLensman 3y ago
  Well played!
slug 3y ago
I went to a talk given by computer experts on the game of Go about 10 years before AlphaGo and the consensus was that the solution space was so large[0] that it was impossible to solve by a computer, whatever its capability, in the foreseeable future, by the methods known at the time. We now know that AlphaGo followed a somewhat new approach, but I don't remember that being obvious or expected back then... [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Go_and_mathematics#Game_tree_complexity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Go_and_mathematics#Game_tree_c...
- 6D794163636F756 3y ago
  There is a difference between being better than humans and having solved a game. Could you clarify what exactly the experts were saying? Everything in the Wikipedia article you linked seems to be talking only about solving it so I'm really curious.

__MatrixMan__ 3y ago

> The concept of self driving cars isn't mutually incompatible with public transportation. No, but it does make individual vehicle ownership look pretty silly: Why buy a vehicle if you're just going to let it sit there for 95% of the time when it could be, you know, doing vehicle things? And if you're going to let it drive strangers around, what (besides a maintenance burden and a parking burden) have you gained by owning it as compared to, say, owning stock in a company who maintains a fleet of said vehicles? The knowledge that nobody has farted in this seat besides the people I invited to just isn't worth that much.

VoodooJuJu 3y ago
>You will own nothing. And you will be happy.
- Gud 3y ago
  To be honest, a car is one of those things I’m glad I don’t own, but still wish to have available to me at a moments notice.
  - CaptainZapp 3y ago
    You can absolutely have that. At least in my part of the world. https://www.mobility.ch/en/private-customers https://www.mobility.ch/en/private-customers
    - Gud 3y ago
      Thanks for the link! I'm mostly in the same part of the world.
andrei_says_ 3y ago
100% instant availability. In cities like Los Angeles where public transportation takes 3-5x the time if an option at all, this is a necessity.
- 3y ago

screye 3y ago

> The concept of self driving cars isn't mutually incompatible with public transportation. It is. Just like Uber with $25B in funding is mutually incompatible with small time taxi services around the world. The only way Uber ever pays its investors back is by establishing a global monopoly over taxi-transportation and making narrow margins over economies of scale. The self-driving industry has received upwards of $200billion in funding. If cities start moving towards public transit, that signals an existential threat to the ability of these VCs to make their money back. Note: Some industries are zero sum games. The total number of places people want to go to is limited. Better taxi technology will not mean a larger addressable market. The only way self-driving companies win, is by defeating other means of transport.

theappsecguy 3y ago
Start moving toward public transit? Public transit is not some new discovery that’s been put on hold because of self-driving attempts. You say this as if it’s cheap or easy to make any kind of significant public transit improvement in an already established city.
- screye 3y ago
  It is incredibly cheap and easy. Public transit is hard is in the same way that going to Harvard as a black person in 1900 was hard. It was hard because malicious forces (whether they accepted the accusation or not) made it impossible. Painting a BRT line and some traffic cones is all you need to set up public transit. Hell, almost all pre-established cities had entire street car networks that we disassembled due to car-centric post-1950s development. Here's SF, Seattle and LA pre-1950. https://i0.wp.com/transitmap.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/tumblr_mk7dri0zYe1r54c4oo1_1280.jpg https://i0.wp.com/transitmap.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/... http://www.tundria.com/trams/USA/SanFrancisco-1944.shtml http://www.tundria.com/trams/USA/SanFrancisco-1944.shtml https://la.curbed.com/2015/11/9/9902244/red-car-map-los-angeles https://la.curbed.com/2015/11/9/9902244/red-car-map-los-ange...
buzzert 3y ago
The quality of public transportation has been getting steadily worse and worse the time I've lived in SF, and it's not because of self-driving cars. Perhaps, maybe, we fund things based on consent rather than force?

vidarh 3y ago

The issue with self-driving cars and public transportation is tricky. Self-driving cars might both drive down the cost of taxi-services, and drive up the convenience, both by not needing drivers and allowing providers to dynamically move cars to ideal position based on local demand, and so they might well drive up the use of personal transportation. On the other end of the scale, while this would be possible with human drivers too, driving down the cost and response times of being able to automatically reposition and provision a fleet of cars would potentially make deep integration with public transport in ways that'd make public transport more attractive possible as well. E.g. imagine a public transport provider guaranteeing a maximum X minutes wait to drive demand, and plugging holes by dynamically provisioning cars to meet that guarantee on lower demand routes, or in case of full buses. Or an "end to end" service where you input where you want to go and instead of just getting the route, you're told to get on bus Y, and when you get of at station Z a car is there waiting to take you to your final destination. Most of my Uber use is for journeys where public transport would be feasible but where being able to guarantee low waits and/or predictable arrival times makes a difference, and sometimes where a short leg (distance wise) of the public-transport option is too time consuming, and where it'd be "easy" to cut down on the car use if the transport system was better integrated. If you can make the experience smooth enough to reduce the "end to end" convenience advantage of a car, even if it means using cars for part of it, it might well be a net improvement in public transport use.