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I have not heard of a Google AI Car crashing into another car. I have heard that one of the Google AI Cars was involved in a small crash (the other car crashed

by driax 14y ago

I have not heard of a Google AI Car crashing into another car. I have heard that one of the Google AI Cars was involved in a small crash (the other car crashed into the Google Car) while it was driven manually just outside Google's headquarters. Is that the incident you are referring to?

w0utert 14y ago
No, I didn't even know about that crash, reading the reports it apparently involved 4 cars, and the AI Prius running into the back of the car in front of it. Obviously, Google declared afterwards that it was driven by a human at that time, and that the crash was due to human error. What else would you expect them to do? There's no way to verify Google's statement, and why would anyone want to anyway, blaming it on one of the Google employees that are still required to be in the Google vehicles works out much better for every party involved in such an incident, and for Google in particular. The incident I was referring to was a video of a Google AI car doing laps on a small test track that they set up on a parking lot. The car basically missed a turn and left the track, hit the brakes and skid into a car parked next to the track. Somehow (coincidentally?) the video is nowhere to be found using Google, but I remember watching it like it was yesterday. You could see 2 Google employees chatting a bit next to the track until the car crashed in the background and they got pretty upset. Just to make myself clear: I'm not trying to talk down the great achievements Google has made with their driverless cars, I'm just a little sceptic about how far they actually are if you strip down all the PR coming from Google.
- vecinu 14y ago
  I would really like to see this video because if it is true, then they are covering up their mistakes just to increase their credibility.
- Retric 14y ago
  So, because in Alpha testing they had two issues that where later corrected your suggesting the hole thing is impossible? Will self driving cars be perfect, of course not. However, the threshold is simply will the first generation of self driving cars be hit by people more often than they hit people and I think that's vary obtainable as in 7-12 years from now they will be expensive but on public highways. PS: #1 reason they will be adopted after the price drops? Ability for them to drive you home after a night of drinking.
  - w0utert 14y ago
    I'm not suggesting anything, I'm just saying that extrapolating publicly available information about the performance of Google AI cars, does not give me any clue about how they would do in real traffic. I don't think 'just as bad as some human drivers' will be good enough for driverless cars to ever become reality by the way. I'm amazed how so many people adhere to this strange way of reasoning: because some people are bad drivers and have accidents, it's ok for AI cars to do better than the average driver, but still worse than the responsible, safe driver? I'd say we'd better spend the time and energy trying to reduce the number of bad drivers, or limit the damage they can do when they screw up (for example by AI assistance as opposed to AI drivers). It's exactly arguments like this that put me off in the driverless-cars debate, just like the eternal 'but we have driverless planes for years and they work' argument I see a lot of people make. It only goes to show how love for technology clouds some peoples judgement (I hope I don't have to explain why comparing AI cars to planes doesn't make any sense on about any level imaginable?) Anyway, judging from the votes I get, it was a bad idea to post my thoughts about driverless cars here, as I already feared. Just like the discussions I sometimes have with my colleagues who all also love technology, it goes nowhere. It's almost as if driverless cars have become a religion for some, anytime I try to put things into perspective I only get back a lot of negativity and non-sequitur arguments. I guess some people really want to believe in driverless cars.
    - to3m 14y ago
      Don't worry - you are not the only one. I don't see computers as being good enough at general driving to make it work. And, perhaps cynically, I don't see society in general liking the idea that accidents can be caused with nobody to punish. So, I imagine that even if the computer can drive it 100% perfectly 100% of the time, you'll need to have a human watching out. Which means you need a human driver. Which means it's going to be like driving, basically, only even MORE boring. Will you be able to catch up on your reading? No. Will you be legally conveyed in your late-night state of merry intoxication? No. Can you have a quick snooze? No. So... um, what's the point? Unless a driverless cars is as good as taking the train, or going in an aeroplane, or - yes - simply being a passenger in a car that's being driven by the traditional human, frankly you might as well not bother. Of course, it doesn't matter what I believe. There are lots of people working on this problem, whose IQs and imaginations clearly far exceed my own, and I don't mind to admit that I am already surprised by just how much progress has been made. So who knows? Nevertheless, I think I will be proven right. (On the plus side, even once the push for autonomous cars fails, we'll have a mind-boggling set of amazing driving assists.)
- Cushman 14y ago
  > There's no way to verify Google's statement This seems absurdly paranoid. Why is it, on the face of things, more likely that the LIDAR-packing robot which is scanning 360 degrees hundreds of times per second got into a fender-bender than that the human engineer who sometimes has to drive that same car did? What reason do you think Google has to lie about this to the public-- considering that if it were the result of a software bug, and that bug made it to production, and somebody died, that little white lie could easily be worth millions of dollars of liability and you better believe that Google PR knows it? > Google AI car doing laps And this is even sillier. You use a track precisely because you are not confident that the car will not go off the road, which is very likely to happen while you are building a robotic car. Allowing the car into traffic indicates that they are confident. This project is trying to alter the future of transportation. The self-driving car could wind up being the most valuable property of Google's. The technological challenges were difficult; the legal and political ones will be Sisyphean. They must make their case to lawyers and legislators solidly in the pocket of the industries they plan to destroy. Why on Earth do you think the fickle opinion of the tech-press-consuming public matters to them at all?
  - w0utert 14y ago
    > This seems absurdly paranoid. Why is it, on the face of things, more likely that the LIDAR-packing robot which is scanning 360 degrees hundreds of times per second got into a fender-bender than that the human engineer who sometimes has to drive that same car did? For all I know there could be a million other reasons why it crashed, none of them related to the hardware. Maybe it was a combination of a software problem and failure of the human driver to intervene properly. Maybe the sensors picked up something that confused the software thinking the car ahead was still moving. Maybe there was some kind of hardware failure. Maybe the AI simply never had to do the kind of unexpected emergency stop that caused this incident and the minimum stopping distance wasn't programmed properly for the road conditions at the time of the incident. Or, maybe, it actually was fully operated by a human. Neither of us knows for sure. > What reason do you think Google has to lie about this to the public-- considering that if it were the result of a software bug, and that bug made it to production, and somebody died, that little white lie could easily be worth millions of dollars of liability and you better believe that Google PR knows it? You don't really have to ask that question do you? Google has already spent millions upon millions on this technology, and probably had to pull out all the stops to lobby for the legislation changes they need for their tests. Incidents like this could instantly kill their ambitions and severely hurt the credibility of this technology. There basically is no risk blaming the driver, who was, in fact, in the car and behind the wheel when it happened. Current legislation actually demands there is a human driver behind the wheel for exactly this purpose: to be able to assign responsibility for what the car does to someone in case of an accident. Legally, the 'driver' likely even was accountable for the incident, even if he wasn't driving the car at all. Nobody is served by saying it was the computer: not the owners of the other cars, not law enforcement, not the government that allowed these cars to drive around town, and definitely not Google. > And this is even sillier. You use a track precisely because you are not confident that the car will not go off the road, which is very likely to happen while you are building a robotic car. I brought the other incident up just to make the point that you don't hear anything when the Google cars fail, just success stories that don't include any details about failures or incidents. You don't assume the Google cars are perfect yet, right? So if Google is so open and honest about everything, like you seem to assume, why don't they tell us how often the cars require human intervention, or what kind of situations are still a problem for the AI? > Allowing the car into traffic indicates that they are confident. You realize that none of these cars actually goes on the road without a human driver ready to step in when it fails, right? And that all the routes the cars drive are carefully selected and likely full of pre-programmed and scripted details? This not to say the technology is worthless just because Google is still learning, but it's statements like yours that nicely show what's so strange about this driverless cars discussion. Just because Google is confident to have AI cars with people behind the wheel driving through town, you are confident that you have any insight at all about how those cars would actually do without a human backup driver behind the wheel. Unless you are a Google employee working on these cars, you know nothing more than what Google wants you to know, and that most likely will not include all the possible points of failure of this technology.

by driax 14y ago

w0utert 14y ago

No, I didn't even know about that crash, reading the reports it apparently involved 4 cars, and the AI Prius running into the back of the car in front of it. Obviously, Google declared afterwards that it was driven by a human at that time, and that the crash was due to human error. What else would you expect them to do? There's no way to verify Google's statement, and why would anyone want to anyway, blaming it on one of the Google employees that are still required to be in the Google vehicles works out much better for every party involved in such an incident, and for Google in particular. The incident I was referring to was a video of a Google AI car doing laps on a small test track that they set up on a parking lot. The car basically missed a turn and left the track, hit the brakes and skid into a car parked next to the track. Somehow (coincidentally?) the video is nowhere to be found using Google, but I remember watching it like it was yesterday. You could see 2 Google employees chatting a bit next to the track until the car crashed in the background and they got pretty upset. Just to make myself clear: I'm not trying to talk down the great achievements Google has made with their driverless cars, I'm just a little sceptic about how far they actually are if you strip down all the PR coming from Google.

vecinu 14y ago
I would really like to see this video because if it is true, then they are covering up their mistakes just to increase their credibility.
Retric 14y ago
So, because in Alpha testing they had two issues that where later corrected your suggesting the hole thing is impossible? Will self driving cars be perfect, of course not. However, the threshold is simply will the first generation of self driving cars be hit by people more often than they hit people and I think that's vary obtainable as in 7-12 years from now they will be expensive but on public highways. PS: #1 reason they will be adopted after the price drops? Ability for them to drive you home after a night of drinking.
- w0utert 14y ago
  I'm not suggesting anything, I'm just saying that extrapolating publicly available information about the performance of Google AI cars, does not give me any clue about how they would do in real traffic. I don't think 'just as bad as some human drivers' will be good enough for driverless cars to ever become reality by the way. I'm amazed how so many people adhere to this strange way of reasoning: because some people are bad drivers and have accidents, it's ok for AI cars to do better than the average driver, but still worse than the responsible, safe driver? I'd say we'd better spend the time and energy trying to reduce the number of bad drivers, or limit the damage they can do when they screw up (for example by AI assistance as opposed to AI drivers). It's exactly arguments like this that put me off in the driverless-cars debate, just like the eternal 'but we have driverless planes for years and they work' argument I see a lot of people make. It only goes to show how love for technology clouds some peoples judgement (I hope I don't have to explain why comparing AI cars to planes doesn't make any sense on about any level imaginable?) Anyway, judging from the votes I get, it was a bad idea to post my thoughts about driverless cars here, as I already feared. Just like the discussions I sometimes have with my colleagues who all also love technology, it goes nowhere. It's almost as if driverless cars have become a religion for some, anytime I try to put things into perspective I only get back a lot of negativity and non-sequitur arguments. I guess some people really want to believe in driverless cars.
  - to3m 14y ago
    Don't worry - you are not the only one. I don't see computers as being good enough at general driving to make it work. And, perhaps cynically, I don't see society in general liking the idea that accidents can be caused with nobody to punish. So, I imagine that even if the computer can drive it 100% perfectly 100% of the time, you'll need to have a human watching out. Which means you need a human driver. Which means it's going to be like driving, basically, only even MORE boring. Will you be able to catch up on your reading? No. Will you be legally conveyed in your late-night state of merry intoxication? No. Can you have a quick snooze? No. So... um, what's the point? Unless a driverless cars is as good as taking the train, or going in an aeroplane, or - yes - simply being a passenger in a car that's being driven by the traditional human, frankly you might as well not bother. Of course, it doesn't matter what I believe. There are lots of people working on this problem, whose IQs and imaginations clearly far exceed my own, and I don't mind to admit that I am already surprised by just how much progress has been made. So who knows? Nevertheless, I think I will be proven right. (On the plus side, even once the push for autonomous cars fails, we'll have a mind-boggling set of amazing driving assists.)
Cushman 14y ago
> There's no way to verify Google's statement This seems absurdly paranoid. Why is it, on the face of things, more likely that the LIDAR-packing robot which is scanning 360 degrees hundreds of times per second got into a fender-bender than that the human engineer who sometimes has to drive that same car did? What reason do you think Google has to lie about this to the public-- considering that if it were the result of a software bug, and that bug made it to production, and somebody died, that little white lie could easily be worth millions of dollars of liability and you better believe that Google PR knows it? > Google AI car doing laps And this is even sillier. You use a track precisely because you are not confident that the car will not go off the road, which is very likely to happen while you are building a robotic car. Allowing the car into traffic indicates that they are confident. This project is trying to alter the future of transportation. The self-driving car could wind up being the most valuable property of Google's. The technological challenges were difficult; the legal and political ones will be Sisyphean. They must make their case to lawyers and legislators solidly in the pocket of the industries they plan to destroy. Why on Earth do you think the fickle opinion of the tech-press-consuming public matters to them at all?
- w0utert 14y ago
  > This seems absurdly paranoid. Why is it, on the face of things, more likely that the LIDAR-packing robot which is scanning 360 degrees hundreds of times per second got into a fender-bender than that the human engineer who sometimes has to drive that same car did? For all I know there could be a million other reasons why it crashed, none of them related to the hardware. Maybe it was a combination of a software problem and failure of the human driver to intervene properly. Maybe the sensors picked up something that confused the software thinking the car ahead was still moving. Maybe there was some kind of hardware failure. Maybe the AI simply never had to do the kind of unexpected emergency stop that caused this incident and the minimum stopping distance wasn't programmed properly for the road conditions at the time of the incident. Or, maybe, it actually was fully operated by a human. Neither of us knows for sure. > What reason do you think Google has to lie about this to the public-- considering that if it were the result of a software bug, and that bug made it to production, and somebody died, that little white lie could easily be worth millions of dollars of liability and you better believe that Google PR knows it? You don't really have to ask that question do you? Google has already spent millions upon millions on this technology, and probably had to pull out all the stops to lobby for the legislation changes they need for their tests. Incidents like this could instantly kill their ambitions and severely hurt the credibility of this technology. There basically is no risk blaming the driver, who was, in fact, in the car and behind the wheel when it happened. Current legislation actually demands there is a human driver behind the wheel for exactly this purpose: to be able to assign responsibility for what the car does to someone in case of an accident. Legally, the 'driver' likely even was accountable for the incident, even if he wasn't driving the car at all. Nobody is served by saying it was the computer: not the owners of the other cars, not law enforcement, not the government that allowed these cars to drive around town, and definitely not Google. > And this is even sillier. You use a track precisely because you are not confident that the car will not go off the road, which is very likely to happen while you are building a robotic car. I brought the other incident up just to make the point that you don't hear anything when the Google cars fail, just success stories that don't include any details about failures or incidents. You don't assume the Google cars are perfect yet, right? So if Google is so open and honest about everything, like you seem to assume, why don't they tell us how often the cars require human intervention, or what kind of situations are still a problem for the AI? > Allowing the car into traffic indicates that they are confident. You realize that none of these cars actually goes on the road without a human driver ready to step in when it fails, right? And that all the routes the cars drive are carefully selected and likely full of pre-programmed and scripted details? This not to say the technology is worthless just because Google is still learning, but it's statements like yours that nicely show what's so strange about this driverless cars discussion. Just because Google is confident to have AI cars with people behind the wheel driving through town, you are confident that you have any insight at all about how those cars would actually do without a human backup driver behind the wheel. Unless you are a Google employee working on these cars, you know nothing more than what Google wants you to know, and that most likely will not include all the possible points of failure of this technology.