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The goal here is not to see who is the best under imaginary conditions, it's to determine whether driverless cars are safe in real life as currently deployed. T

by brabel 3y ago

The goal here is not to see who is the best under imaginary conditions, it's to determine whether driverless cars are safe in real life as currently deployed. The question you're asking is irrelevant because a world in which all humans don't drink, text or have anger issues is not real.

graeme 3y ago
I think the question would be better framed as “would I, someone who doesn’t do dumb things while driving, be safer in a driverless car?” Despite the universality of what you cite, driving accidents are likely an 80:20 issue where a small fraction of people cause most of the harm.
- brabel 3y ago
  "Would I" is the wrong question entirely. Almost everyone thinks they're better than average, which is statistically impossible, of course. No one caring about public safety will ever ask "would i", but "would the average person" because while they cannot avoid one specific accident, they're not trying to, they're trying to reduce the average: hence only average matters. To be completely honest, that's not completely true either, but it's the starting point... other things they must definitely consider is "would this AI cause fatal accidents by doing extremely dumb things, even if very rarely?" - because imagine that deaths are reduced by 90% when most vehicles are self-driving... but that every accident that happens is due to some extremely dumb bug, like "every 2 million parkings, the car will just reverse too fast without checking for obstacles and runover a child". That kind of thing would make for very bad PR and people are very sensitive to that kind of thing - even though that's not the most rational behaviour (as countless other children would've been saved in the grand scheme of things).
_xivi 3y ago
>> "if you excluded humans that drink, text, have anger issues etc. then the humans probably win out." > The goal here is not to see who is the best under imaginary conditions, it's to determine whether driverless cars are safe in real life as currently deployed. But the cars are constrained within specific geographic zones. Ignoring anything else, that alone lead to many assumptions that need to be taken into consideration. This isn't "real world". This is more like open air lab expirement, where some subjects (Waymo) have special constraints. The drivers they're comparing against, don't share the same constraints. You can't draw a generic statement from that, no matter how you twist it. This is a marketing stunt first and foremost.
zw123456 3y ago
On the contrary. That's the exact point I am making by positing the obvious unrealistic assumption that one could exclude drinkers (or other substance) distracted drivers etc.

by brabel 3y ago

graeme 3y ago

I think the question would be better framed as “would I, someone who doesn’t do dumb things while driving, be safer in a driverless car?” Despite the universality of what you cite, driving accidents are likely an 80:20 issue where a small fraction of people cause most of the harm.

brabel 3y ago
"Would I" is the wrong question entirely. Almost everyone thinks they're better than average, which is statistically impossible, of course. No one caring about public safety will ever ask "would i", but "would the average person" because while they cannot avoid one specific accident, they're not trying to, they're trying to reduce the average: hence only average matters. To be completely honest, that's not completely true either, but it's the starting point... other things they must definitely consider is "would this AI cause fatal accidents by doing extremely dumb things, even if very rarely?" - because imagine that deaths are reduced by 90% when most vehicles are self-driving... but that every accident that happens is due to some extremely dumb bug, like "every 2 million parkings, the car will just reverse too fast without checking for obstacles and runover a child". That kind of thing would make for very bad PR and people are very sensitive to that kind of thing - even though that's not the most rational behaviour (as countless other children would've been saved in the grand scheme of things).

_xivi 3y ago

>> "if you excluded humans that drink, text, have anger issues etc. then the humans probably win out." > The goal here is not to see who is the best under imaginary conditions, it's to determine whether driverless cars are safe in real life as currently deployed. But the cars are constrained within specific geographic zones. Ignoring anything else, that alone lead to many assumptions that need to be taken into consideration. This isn't "real world". This is more like open air lab expirement, where some subjects (Waymo) have special constraints. The drivers they're comparing against, don't share the same constraints. You can't draw a generic statement from that, no matter how you twist it. This is a marketing stunt first and foremost.

zw123456 3y ago

On the contrary. That's the exact point I am making by positing the obvious unrealistic assumption that one could exclude drinkers (or other substance) distracted drivers etc.