...not a meaningful distinction. A meaningful distinction would involve how much "monitoring" or "supervision" is being employed. For example, if the robotaxi

...not a meaningful distinction. A meaningful distinction would involve how much "monitoring" or "supervision" is being employed. For example, if the robotaxi needs remote help maintaining it's lane, I'd argue it is not really "autonomous" at all --- every car would probably require 1 active, dedicated remote human "monitor". Given the inherent shortcomings of wireless communication, I'd argue Waymo crashes would be occurring on an everyday basis if this were the case. On the other hand, if 1 person is remotely "monitoring" 100 cars waiting for a remote request from either a vehicle or it's occupant, I'd argue this is indeed a very significant level of autonomy. The obvious problem with the original claim is that it is lacking this sort of meaningful insight. Based on my research, Waymo claims to employ 2800 people across 6 continents to deliver 20K robo trips per day at all hours. Either everybody working at Waymo is a "monitor" or there is some significant autonomy going on to achieve this.