3 ms·

Its tough. On one hand I feel for your condition and I can see how in your case the autopilot is a net benefit, but on the other hand this sort of sentiment is

Its tough. On one hand I feel for your condition and I can see how in your case the autopilot is a net benefit, but on the other hand this sort of sentiment is just reinforcing the "my car is driving, so it's ok that I switched my brain off" colloquialism. Just in the past week I've encountered multiple Tesla's being driven by someone with no observable mental capacity: in one case, a Tesla floored its way into a left turn at a 4 way stop intersection while my and my friend were walking directly in its path on the crosswalk. Luckily, the Tesla eventually did slam its breaks in the middle of the intersection (blocking all other traffic), but the weirdest part for me was that when I looked at the driver and gave the universal "what gives" hand motion, which I'd usually expect to be met with the "my b" wave, she had a completely blank expression. It was as if she had no recognition of anything that was happening at that moment, much less the idea that accelerating into pedestrians at a crosswalk is dangerous and illegal. In another, a Tesla was being driven at an impossibly slow rate on a main road (~10 mph on a 40 limit), and blocking tons of cars behind it. I honked at it for maybe 10 seconds before they finally pulled into the center divider and let people pass, then proceeded to merge back into the lane. I figured maybe they were trying to make it home on a dead battery or something - annoying but whatever. Fast forward like 10 minutes and I'm coming back the other way after dropping my friend off, and I see the same Tesla now going the other direction at ~10 mph, but this time swerving back and forth erratically. My suspicion is the "driver" was plastered drunk (it was ~1am) and tried to get autopilot to take them home, but for whatever reason it wasn't doing it so now the drunkard was (very slowly) careening through the streets.

dheera 3y ago
> Its tough. On one hand I feel for your condition and I can see how in your case the autopilot is a net benefit, but on the other hand this sort of sentiment is just reinforcing the "my car is driving, so it's ok that I switched my brain off" colloquialism. I definitely don't use it that way. I'm always actively driving the car and very frequently override the FSD (in a fair percentage of cases for safety reasons, in a larger percentage of cases because it's being annoying to other drivers e.g. not leaving enough space for other cars to zipper merge or not leaving space for a car to parallel park). For me I'm always the driver, FSD is a backup for the "what if", not the other way around. But I agree, many people may use it the other way around. The other way around is really the way it should be long term but its tech isn't there yet. I really wish they would stop using the driver facing camera and wheel force to determine if the driver is attentive. It very frequently judges against me because my arm is light, so I'm punished even though I'm gripping the wheel. The driver facing camera is blocked easily by the sun shade so that also causes inadvertent punishment. I shouldn't have to look at the sun just to appease the camera. I wish they had some kind of capacitive sensing lining the steering wheel instead if that's what they need to be compliant.
- basil-rash 3y ago
  > I really wish they would stop using the driver facing camera and wheel force to determine if the driver is attentive. Interesting, I didn't know they had a driver facing camera like that - that makes my encounter with that woman make a bit more sense, if she is required to be eyes open, looking forward, hands on wheel for autopilot to work, there's nothing to stop her from maintaining that position but being lost in a totally separate daydream and having no recognition of what's going on around her, which is in line with what I observed. Frightening. As for the capacitance sensing, wouldn't that not work with gloves? In general I don't think there's really any way to mechanically determine if someone is "paying attention". So any system that relies on driver attention and disaster intervention for safe operation is destined to be unsafe, and in my opinion and observation much more unsafe than a purely human driver.
  - dheera 3y ago
    > if she is required to be eyes open, looking forward, hands on wheel for autopilot to work Once FSD switches on, the behavior I have gathered is that if it thinks you're looking away from the road for too large a percentage of the time (you're allowed some percentage of time to look at the mirrors etc.) or if you don't apply force to the steering wheel for a certain period of time, it classifies you as not attentive and starts warning you with a flashing blue gradient on the screen and a small-font text at the bottom saying "Please pay attention to the road" or similar. The weird thing is, because my arm is too light for the force sensor to pick up, and the camera's judgement is easily obstructed by sun shade or by sunglasses, I have to pay attention to the screen to avoid missing the flashing blue gradient, and jerk the steering wheel as soon as I see the gradient. (Yeah, even if there are trucks on both sides, it requires you to jerk the wheel slightly to prove you're there or you get punished) If you don't see the flashing blue gradient for several seconds, it beeps for about 2 seconds, turns fiery red, and punishes you with an FSD strike (5 strikes and your software is downgraded to a more dangerous version for a week) and not allowed to use self-driving until the next time you exit and re-enter the car. Sometimes I'm often too distracted by the road to notice these stupid gradients on the screen and get a FSD strike. But there are really no better cars on the market that serve my medical needs. Almost all the alternative cars' lane keep products are programmed to crash, not drive, if the driver loses consciousness. So while I hate Tesla's driver attentiveness implementation, it's still the only brand with a lane keep implementation that's designed to actually keep the driver alive. > As for the capacitance sensing, wouldn't that not work with gloves? Capacitive sensing can easily work with gloves. It's not required to be pixel-accurate like a mobile phone, it just needs to sense whether or not there's a hand there and that can easily be done through gloves.

dheera 3y ago

> Its tough. On one hand I feel for your condition and I can see how in your case the autopilot is a net benefit, but on the other hand this sort of sentiment is just reinforcing the "my car is driving, so it's ok that I switched my brain off" colloquialism. I definitely don't use it that way. I'm always actively driving the car and very frequently override the FSD (in a fair percentage of cases for safety reasons, in a larger percentage of cases because it's being annoying to other drivers e.g. not leaving enough space for other cars to zipper merge or not leaving space for a car to parallel park). For me I'm always the driver, FSD is a backup for the "what if", not the other way around. But I agree, many people may use it the other way around. The other way around is really the way it should be long term but its tech isn't there yet. I really wish they would stop using the driver facing camera and wheel force to determine if the driver is attentive. It very frequently judges against me because my arm is light, so I'm punished even though I'm gripping the wheel. The driver facing camera is blocked easily by the sun shade so that also causes inadvertent punishment. I shouldn't have to look at the sun just to appease the camera. I wish they had some kind of capacitive sensing lining the steering wheel instead if that's what they need to be compliant.

basil-rash 3y ago
> I really wish they would stop using the driver facing camera and wheel force to determine if the driver is attentive. Interesting, I didn't know they had a driver facing camera like that - that makes my encounter with that woman make a bit more sense, if she is required to be eyes open, looking forward, hands on wheel for autopilot to work, there's nothing to stop her from maintaining that position but being lost in a totally separate daydream and having no recognition of what's going on around her, which is in line with what I observed. Frightening. As for the capacitance sensing, wouldn't that not work with gloves? In general I don't think there's really any way to mechanically determine if someone is "paying attention". So any system that relies on driver attention and disaster intervention for safe operation is destined to be unsafe, and in my opinion and observation much more unsafe than a purely human driver.
- dheera 3y ago
  > if she is required to be eyes open, looking forward, hands on wheel for autopilot to work Once FSD switches on, the behavior I have gathered is that if it thinks you're looking away from the road for too large a percentage of the time (you're allowed some percentage of time to look at the mirrors etc.) or if you don't apply force to the steering wheel for a certain period of time, it classifies you as not attentive and starts warning you with a flashing blue gradient on the screen and a small-font text at the bottom saying "Please pay attention to the road" or similar. The weird thing is, because my arm is too light for the force sensor to pick up, and the camera's judgement is easily obstructed by sun shade or by sunglasses, I have to pay attention to the screen to avoid missing the flashing blue gradient, and jerk the steering wheel as soon as I see the gradient. (Yeah, even if there are trucks on both sides, it requires you to jerk the wheel slightly to prove you're there or you get punished) If you don't see the flashing blue gradient for several seconds, it beeps for about 2 seconds, turns fiery red, and punishes you with an FSD strike (5 strikes and your software is downgraded to a more dangerous version for a week) and not allowed to use self-driving until the next time you exit and re-enter the car. Sometimes I'm often too distracted by the road to notice these stupid gradients on the screen and get a FSD strike. But there are really no better cars on the market that serve my medical needs. Almost all the alternative cars' lane keep products are programmed to crash, not drive, if the driver loses consciousness. So while I hate Tesla's driver attentiveness implementation, it's still the only brand with a lane keep implementation that's designed to actually keep the driver alive. > As for the capacitance sensing, wouldn't that not work with gloves? Capacitive sensing can easily work with gloves. It's not required to be pixel-accurate like a mobile phone, it just needs to sense whether or not there's a hand there and that can easily be done through gloves.