3 ms·

Excellently said. I would love to see a regulatory world where experimentation outside of the high-end is more prolific. Even the constraints that were put on

by nurple 3y ago

Excellently said. I would love to see a regulatory world where experimentation outside of the high-end is more prolific. Even the constraints that were put on UAVs by the FAA have stifled that spirit in a real way. Where is the hacker culture in aviation that we've been amazed by in the AI space? Even people doing cool things as small groups, like the black arrow guys, are just building in the same local minima.

ceejayoz 3y ago
> Where is the hacker culture in aviation that we've been amazed by in the AI space? I mean, if you mess up your AI model, it generates photos of black Nazis or people with an extra arm. Everyone laughs at you a bit. If you mess up your plane, it kills people. There are absolutely people building experimental aircraft, but for good reasons there's a bit more caution involved.
- the8472 3y ago
  Planes that kill freely consenting adults would be fine. But the tricky part is that this would also exclude employees of aircraft companies since they can't be directed to fly on such a plane. If the CEO of Boeing were willing to pilot an uncertified deathtrap of their own making over the ocean that should be allowed.
  - FridgeSeal 3y ago
    But it’s ok though, because the rest of us will just pick up the bill and clean everything up when Timmy-the-cowboys-unhinged-plane falls out of the sky over a populated area, or the ocean or something. No big deal right? Fuel and emissions don’t have an environmental impact, so people can just fly whatever they please around and the rest of us should just put up with it, because god forbid we put a stumbling block for those mighty captains of industry.
    - the8472 3y ago
      "sky over a populated area" seems like you're putting words in my mouth. I explictly said that having them fly over the ocean to avoid exactly this kind of externalty. As for the environment, well, this is a self-limiting problem. Either it was only a small aircraft or they're rich and now dead and their money can be used for cleanup.
mschuster91 3y ago
> Where is the hacker culture in aviation that we've been amazed by in the AI space? Even people doing cool things as small groups, like the black arrow guys, are just building in the same local minima. Well, a basic body + wings shape, anyone with moderate skill can construct that with a kit in their garden shed and fly it. But all these exotic design ideas? These require immense amounts of compute power to design them so that they'll actually take off and substantial investment into manufacturing tooling to manufacture them, far surpassing the capabilities of all but a very few very rich hobbyists, and people with that kind of money generally don't subject themselves to the high operational risk of general aviation. Even in cars there's no one working on home-builds for carbon composite stuff, and the potential for failures and the risk of said failures to not just the pilot but everyone on the ground there is orders of magnitude lower than with planes. And on top of that come the regulatory issues associated with anything that flies. There are many MANY MANY orders of magnitude less people with pilot licenses in the first place, most of Europe doesn't allow flights from anything else than a licensed airstrip (although the US is different there IIRC), and new designs require an immense amount of certification paperwork, which is also the reason why it took until last year to get unleaded fuel certified (whose rollout will take at least 3-5 years).

by nurple 3y ago

ceejayoz 3y ago

> Where is the hacker culture in aviation that we've been amazed by in the AI space? I mean, if you mess up your AI model, it generates photos of black Nazis or people with an extra arm. Everyone laughs at you a bit. If you mess up your plane, it kills people. There are absolutely people building experimental aircraft, but for good reasons there's a bit more caution involved.

the8472 3y ago
Planes that kill freely consenting adults would be fine. But the tricky part is that this would also exclude employees of aircraft companies since they can't be directed to fly on such a plane. If the CEO of Boeing were willing to pilot an uncertified deathtrap of their own making over the ocean that should be allowed.
- FridgeSeal 3y ago
  But it’s ok though, because the rest of us will just pick up the bill and clean everything up when Timmy-the-cowboys-unhinged-plane falls out of the sky over a populated area, or the ocean or something. No big deal right? Fuel and emissions don’t have an environmental impact, so people can just fly whatever they please around and the rest of us should just put up with it, because god forbid we put a stumbling block for those mighty captains of industry.
  - the8472 3y ago
    "sky over a populated area" seems like you're putting words in my mouth. I explictly said that having them fly over the ocean to avoid exactly this kind of externalty. As for the environment, well, this is a self-limiting problem. Either it was only a small aircraft or they're rich and now dead and their money can be used for cleanup.

mschuster91 3y ago

> Where is the hacker culture in aviation that we've been amazed by in the AI space? Even people doing cool things as small groups, like the black arrow guys, are just building in the same local minima. Well, a basic body + wings shape, anyone with moderate skill can construct that with a kit in their garden shed and fly it. But all these exotic design ideas? These require immense amounts of compute power to design them so that they'll actually take off and substantial investment into manufacturing tooling to manufacture them, far surpassing the capabilities of all but a very few very rich hobbyists, and people with that kind of money generally don't subject themselves to the high operational risk of general aviation. Even in cars there's no one working on home-builds for carbon composite stuff, and the potential for failures and the risk of said failures to not just the pilot but everyone on the ground there is orders of magnitude lower than with planes. And on top of that come the regulatory issues associated with anything that flies. There are many MANY MANY orders of magnitude less people with pilot licenses in the first place, most of Europe doesn't allow flights from anything else than a licensed airstrip (although the US is different there IIRC), and new designs require an immense amount of certification paperwork, which is also the reason why it took until last year to get unleaded fuel certified (whose rollout will take at least 3-5 years).