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It must be interesting being an Uber driver right now and literally watching the robots that will replace you driving around with you. This has been a 15+ year
by ericmcer 11mo ago
It must be interesting being an Uber driver right now and literally watching the robots that will replace you driving around with you.
This has been a 15+ year process and will probably take a few more years. I don't feel too bad if they didn't manage to pivot in that time period.
- pa7ch 11mo agoYou say the term pivot like its a startup founder who has every option in life. You should feel bad for anyone who would struggle for a basic job.
- dekhn 11mo agothe history of humans on earth has been pivots, even amongst people who had few options. I don't subscribe to feeling guilty every time somebody loses a job. I feel empathy, but telling people to "feel bad" is not constructive.
- phainopepla2 11mo ago"Feel bad for" is not the same as "feel bad". The former is the same as feeling empathy, in colloquial English
- kannanvijayan 11mo agoIn a society where having a job is, for that vast majority not in the non-gilded classes, the only mechanism by which a person can secure their core needs.. losing a job is indeed a pitiable situation for most. If we've built a society that when it "pivots" leaves swathes of people smeared out as residual waste, I'd argue we should feel bad. We've certainly reached a point of technological advancement where many of these consequences at the individual level are avoidable. If they're still happening, it's because we've chosen this outcome - perhaps passively. But the clear implication of would be that we're collectively failing ourselves, as a species that tends to put some degree of pride in our intelligence. And we should feel bad about that failure. It's OK to feel bad about that failure. We tend not to improve things we don't feel bad about.
- starluz 11mo ago[dead]
- SirFatty 11mo ago"It must be interesting being an Uber driver right now and literally watching the robots that will replace you driving around with you." You mean the way taxi drivers had to watch as Uber and Lyft replaced them?
- umeshunni 11mo ago> You mean the way taxi drivers had to watch as Uber and Lyft replaced them? For the most part, they were the same drivers I think
- adventured 11mo agoI imagine most traditional taxi drivers converted into Uber and Lyft drivers. Unique regulatory circumstances in places like NYC might have delayed that process some of course (eg trying to pay off a medallion). Uber and Lyft drivers are taxi drivers.
- SoftTalker 11mo agoDrivers rarely owned the medallion. They leased the cab for 8-12 hours and drove it on behalf of the medallion owner.
- jvanderbot 11mo agoWhat a stupid process. It bothers me that farmers rarely own the land too. We can't shake our tendency to let wealth turn us into tiny little kings that live off the rent. (not so tiny in the case of farms, but you get it).
- Isamu 11mo ago>It bothers me that farmers rarely own the land too You will be glad to learn that most farmland is farmer owned: https://www.ers.usda.gov/topics/farm-economy/land-use-land-value-tenure/farmland-ownership-and-tenure https://www.ers.usda.gov/topics/farm-economy/land-use-land-v...
- cynicalsecurity 11mo ago> It must be interesting being an Uber driver right now and literally watching the robots that will replace you driving around with you. You mean just like programmers watching AI replacing them?
- ang_cire 11mo agoAI doesn't replace programmers, it's used by programmers for efficiency. Waymo is most definitely not being used by taxi or rideshare drivers to be more efficient.
- lotsofpulp 11mo agoAs I understand, Waymo still uses humans in some circumstances. Theoretically, the drivers could do this job instead. https://waymo.com/blog/2024/05/fleet-response/ https://waymo.com/blog/2024/05/fleet-response/
- JeremyNT 11mo agoWaymo definitely uses human drivers in some markets... currently Just like AI still uses human programmers... currently
- sentientslug 11mo agoSorry, what? Waymo does not use human drivers for passenger trips, unless you’re referring to training drives (with no passenger). Edit: I think I get what you mean now, you mean when humans have to remotely intervene for whatever reason and pilot the car
- dqh 11mo agoIf a programmer is more efficient with AI then you need fewer programmers, assuming a fixed amount of work is needed. So in that sense AI would be replacing programmers.
- PlunderBunny 11mo ago
- vinni2 11mo agoActually i spoke a uber driver about this and he said he was waiting for cars with FSD available to buy then he could make his car work for him.
- tuhgdetzhh 11mo agoIf he can create a buisness of operating a fleet of self driving cars fine, but 99% of regular taxi/uber drivers will loose their job.
- mensetmanusman 11mo agocleaning 1 car can be a full time job.
- treis 11mo agoIt's interesting that we're on the cusp of a major change in our world and no one is really talking about it. Self driving cars will have a profound impact on society. Everything from real estate to logistics will be impacted.
- HPsquared 11mo agoLooking forward to when they get rid of traffic lights and the networked cars just whiz through and avoid hitting each other. They'll also seamlessly zip lanes together on the highway, and traffic waves will be a thing of the past. Maybe China will do it first.
- onemoresoop 11mo agoNo thoughts on pedestrians? With no traffic lights it'd be a total nightmare to be a pedestrian
- HPsquared 11mo agoYou could still have pedestrian crossings with buttons etc which signal the cars to stop, just the same logic as we have now. Maybe even physical lights for redundancy. Pedestrians are pretty rare in most places though so this shouldn't slow things down too much.
- Moomoomoo309 11mo agoAnd if the button doesn't work, what should pedestrians do?
- seanmcdirmid 11mo agoWalk? Waymo already stops at crosswalks (marked or unmarked) if a pedestrian looks like they are crossing or starting to cross. That is more than I can say for human drivers. I’m confused why you don’t think this is just a win for pedestrians given how messed up things are now.
- xnx 11mo ago> This has been a 15+ year process and will probably take a few more years. In 1995 Navlab 5 completed the first autonomous US coast-to-coast journey. Traveling from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania to San Diego, California. The history is long, but the technology is finally here. Hopefully soon the technology will be everywhere.