6 ms·

When you have a CEO like Elon who swears up and down that you only need cameras for autonomous driving vehicles, and skimping out on crucial extras like Li-DAR,

When you have a CEO like Elon who swears up and down that you only need cameras for autonomous driving vehicles, and skimping out on crucial extras like Li-DAR, can anyone be surprised by this result? Tesla also likes to take the motto of "move fast and break things" to a fault.

DoesntMatter22 10mo ago
Turns out Waymo hits a lot of things too. Why isn't Lidar stopping that?
- mmooss 10mo ago
  What is Waymo's accident rate? (Edit: Tesla's is in the article, at least for that region.)
  - tasty_freeze 10mo ago
    and there is a linked article about Waymo's data reporting, which is much more granular and detailed, whereas Tesla's is lumpy and redacted. Anyway, Waymo's data with more than 100M miles of self-supervised driving shows a 91% reduction in accidents vs humans. Tesla's is 10x the human accident rate according to the Austin data.
- TheAmazingRace 10mo ago
  Last I checked, Robotaxi has a safety driver, whereas Waymo is completely self driving, yet has a very good safety record. That speaks volumes to me. https://waymo.com/safety/impact/ https://waymo.com/safety/impact/
  - natch 10mo ago
    [flagged]
    - dang 10mo ago
      Could you please not post in the flamewar style to HN? We're trying for something else here. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
      - natch 10mo ago
        Yes, I will try to find better ways to engage. Thanks for your moderating hand here.
        dang 10mo ago
        Appreciated!
  - themafia 10mo ago
    Completely self driving? Don't they go into a panic mode, stop the vehicle, then call back to a central location where a human driver can take remote control of the vehicle? They've been seen doing this at crime scenes and in the middle of police traffic stops. That speaks volumes too.
    - daheza 10mo ago
      Incorrect humans never take over the controls. An operator is presented with a set of options and they choose one, which the car then performs. The human is never in direct control of the vehicle. If this process fails then they send a physical human to drive the car.
      - themafia 10mo ago
        > humans never take over the controls > presented with a set of options and they choose one > they send a physical human to drive the car. Those all sound like "controls" to me. "Fleet response can influence the Waymo Driver's path, whether indirectly through indicating lane closures, explicitly requesting the AV use a particular lane, or, in the most complex scenarios, explicitly proposing a path for the vehicle to consider. " https://waymo.com/blog/2024/05/fleet-response/ https://waymo.com/blog/2024/05/fleet-response/ So they built new controls that typical vehicles don't have. Then they use them. I fail to see how any of this is "incorrect." It is, in fact, _built in_ to the system from the ground up. Semantic games aside, it is obviously more incorrect to call them "completely self driving" especially when they "ask for help." Do human drivers do this while driving?
        Mawr 10mo ago
        I don't know what you're trying to prove here. Stopping safely and waiting for human input in edge cases is fine (Waymo). Crashing into things is not fine (Tesla).
guywithahat 10mo ago
The more I've looked into the topic the less I think the removal of lidar was a cost issue. I think there are a lot of benefits to simplifying your sensor tech stack, and while I won't pretend to know the best solution removing things like lidar and ultrasonic sensors seem to have been a decision about improving performance. By doubling down on cameras your technical team can remain focused on certain sensor technology, and you don't have to deal with data priority and trust in the same way you do when you have a variety of sensors. The only real test will be who creates the best product, and while waymo seems to have the lead it's arguably too soon to tell.
- vjvjvjvjghv 10mo ago
  Usually you would go in with the max amount of sensors and data, make it work and then see what can be left out. It seems dumb to limit yourself from beginning if you don’t know yet what really works. But then I am not a multi billionaire so what do i know?
  - fpoling 10mo ago
    Well we know that vision works based on human experience. So few years ago it was a reasonable bet that cameras alone could solve this. The problem with Tesla is that they still continue to insist on that after it became apparent that vision alone with the current tech and machine learning does not work. They even do not want to use a radar again even if the radar does not cost much and is very beneficial for safety.
    - bsder 10mo ago
      > Well we know that vision works based on human experience. Actually, we know that vision alone doesn't work. Sun glare. Fog. Whiteouts. Intense downpours. All of them cause humans to get into accidents, and electronic cameras aren't even as good as human eyes due to dynamic range limitations. Dead reckoning with GPS and maps are a huge advantage that autonomous cars have over humans. No matter what the conditions are, autonomous cars know where the car is and where the road is. No sliding off the road because you missed a turn. Being able to control and sense the electric motors at each wheel is a big advantage over "driving feel" from the steering wheel and your inbuilt sense of acceleration. Radar/lidar is just all upside above and beyond what humans can do.
rich_sasha 10mo ago
Musk's success story is taking very bold bets almost flippantly. These things have a premium associates with them, because to most people they are so toxic that they would never consider them. Every time when he has the choice to do something conservative or bold, he goes for the latter, and so long as he has a bit of luck, that is very much a winning strategy. To most people, I guess the stress of always betting everything on red would be unbearable. I mean, the guy got a $300m cash payout in 1999! Hands up who would keep working 100 hour weeks for 26 years after that. I'm not saying it is either bad or good. He clearly did well out of it for himself financially. But I guess the whole cameras/lidar thing is similar. Because it's big, bold, from the outset unlikely to work, and it's a massive "fake it till you make it" thing. But if he can crack it, again I guess he hits the jackpot. Never mind cars, they are expensive enough that Lidar cost is a rounding error. But if he can then stick 3d vision into any old cheap cameras, surely that is worth a lot. In fact wasn't this part of Tesla's great vision - to diversify away from cars and into robots etc. I'm sure the military would order thousands and millions of cheapo cameras that work 90% as well as a fancy Lidar - while being fully solid state etc. That he is using his clients as lab rats for it is yet another reason why I'm not buying one. But to me this is totally in character for Musk.
- BrenBarn 10mo ago
  The fact that he's able to fake it until he makes it is a failure of our society. He should be impoverished and incarcerated.
  - randoglando 10mo ago
    He's a complicated figure. He has done so much good as well. EVs in the US and reusable rockets owe a lot to him. OTOH, so does the cesspool that is X.
    - cn-watch 10mo ago
      There are no elon musk museums. There are no elon musk hospitals. There are no elon musk centers for unwed mothers. How could the richest man in the world give so little back.
jauntywundrkind 10mo ago
I just find it distracting to pretend like we know exactly what albatross to hang around the neck of the problem here. While I do tend to think lidar is probably useful, I also think this isn't a solved shut knowable case where the lidar absolutely is essential & makes all the difference. Making assertions like this rests more assurity than I think can be granted, and harms the overall idea: that Tesla doesn't seem to have serious proof that their things are getting better, that they are more trustworthy. The data is just not there for us outsiders to make any kind of case, and thats the skimping out crucial baseline we need.
tim333 10mo ago
I'm not surprised, more because there was info on Reddit that Tesla FSDs were having disengagements every 200 miles or some such in urban environments. Camera only probably could work in the future but seemingly not yet.
- fragmede 10mo ago
  It's easy to argue that LIDAR is expensive and unnecessary, but radar has been a standard for luxury cruise control for decades so it's got a variety of OEM suppliers. Thus Tesla's lack of radar because of the CEO's ego is damnable. The problem with camera-only is fog. My human eyes don't penetrate fog. Radar does. Proving that camera-only is possible is stupid and ego driven and doesn't come from a place of merit and science and technology.

DoesntMatter22 10mo ago

Turns out Waymo hits a lot of things too. Why isn't Lidar stopping that?

mmooss 10mo ago
What is Waymo's accident rate? (Edit: Tesla's is in the article, at least for that region.)
- tasty_freeze 10mo ago
  and there is a linked article about Waymo's data reporting, which is much more granular and detailed, whereas Tesla's is lumpy and redacted. Anyway, Waymo's data with more than 100M miles of self-supervised driving shows a 91% reduction in accidents vs humans. Tesla's is 10x the human accident rate according to the Austin data.
TheAmazingRace 10mo ago
Last I checked, Robotaxi has a safety driver, whereas Waymo is completely self driving, yet has a very good safety record. That speaks volumes to me. https://waymo.com/safety/impact/ https://waymo.com/safety/impact/
- natch 10mo ago
  [flagged]
  - dang 10mo ago
    Could you please not post in the flamewar style to HN? We're trying for something else here. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
    - natch 10mo ago
      Yes, I will try to find better ways to engage. Thanks for your moderating hand here.
      - dang 10mo ago
        Appreciated!
- themafia 10mo ago
  Completely self driving? Don't they go into a panic mode, stop the vehicle, then call back to a central location where a human driver can take remote control of the vehicle? They've been seen doing this at crime scenes and in the middle of police traffic stops. That speaks volumes too.
  - daheza 10mo ago
    Incorrect humans never take over the controls. An operator is presented with a set of options and they choose one, which the car then performs. The human is never in direct control of the vehicle. If this process fails then they send a physical human to drive the car.
    - themafia 10mo ago
      > humans never take over the controls > presented with a set of options and they choose one > they send a physical human to drive the car. Those all sound like "controls" to me. "Fleet response can influence the Waymo Driver's path, whether indirectly through indicating lane closures, explicitly requesting the AV use a particular lane, or, in the most complex scenarios, explicitly proposing a path for the vehicle to consider. " https://waymo.com/blog/2024/05/fleet-response/ https://waymo.com/blog/2024/05/fleet-response/ So they built new controls that typical vehicles don't have. Then they use them. I fail to see how any of this is "incorrect." It is, in fact, _built in_ to the system from the ground up. Semantic games aside, it is obviously more incorrect to call them "completely self driving" especially when they "ask for help." Do human drivers do this while driving?
      - Mawr 10mo ago
        I don't know what you're trying to prove here. Stopping safely and waiting for human input in edge cases is fine (Waymo). Crashing into things is not fine (Tesla).

guywithahat 10mo ago

The more I've looked into the topic the less I think the removal of lidar was a cost issue. I think there are a lot of benefits to simplifying your sensor tech stack, and while I won't pretend to know the best solution removing things like lidar and ultrasonic sensors seem to have been a decision about improving performance. By doubling down on cameras your technical team can remain focused on certain sensor technology, and you don't have to deal with data priority and trust in the same way you do when you have a variety of sensors. The only real test will be who creates the best product, and while waymo seems to have the lead it's arguably too soon to tell.

vjvjvjvjghv 10mo ago
Usually you would go in with the max amount of sensors and data, make it work and then see what can be left out. It seems dumb to limit yourself from beginning if you don’t know yet what really works. But then I am not a multi billionaire so what do i know?
- fpoling 10mo ago
  Well we know that vision works based on human experience. So few years ago it was a reasonable bet that cameras alone could solve this. The problem with Tesla is that they still continue to insist on that after it became apparent that vision alone with the current tech and machine learning does not work. They even do not want to use a radar again even if the radar does not cost much and is very beneficial for safety.
  - bsder 10mo ago
    > Well we know that vision works based on human experience. Actually, we know that vision alone doesn't work. Sun glare. Fog. Whiteouts. Intense downpours. All of them cause humans to get into accidents, and electronic cameras aren't even as good as human eyes due to dynamic range limitations. Dead reckoning with GPS and maps are a huge advantage that autonomous cars have over humans. No matter what the conditions are, autonomous cars know where the car is and where the road is. No sliding off the road because you missed a turn. Being able to control and sense the electric motors at each wheel is a big advantage over "driving feel" from the steering wheel and your inbuilt sense of acceleration. Radar/lidar is just all upside above and beyond what humans can do.

rich_sasha 10mo ago

Musk's success story is taking very bold bets almost flippantly. These things have a premium associates with them, because to most people they are so toxic that they would never consider them. Every time when he has the choice to do something conservative or bold, he goes for the latter, and so long as he has a bit of luck, that is very much a winning strategy. To most people, I guess the stress of always betting everything on red would be unbearable. I mean, the guy got a $300m cash payout in 1999! Hands up who would keep working 100 hour weeks for 26 years after that. I'm not saying it is either bad or good. He clearly did well out of it for himself financially. But I guess the whole cameras/lidar thing is similar. Because it's big, bold, from the outset unlikely to work, and it's a massive "fake it till you make it" thing. But if he can crack it, again I guess he hits the jackpot. Never mind cars, they are expensive enough that Lidar cost is a rounding error. But if he can then stick 3d vision into any old cheap cameras, surely that is worth a lot. In fact wasn't this part of Tesla's great vision - to diversify away from cars and into robots etc. I'm sure the military would order thousands and millions of cheapo cameras that work 90% as well as a fancy Lidar - while being fully solid state etc. That he is using his clients as lab rats for it is yet another reason why I'm not buying one. But to me this is totally in character for Musk.

BrenBarn 10mo ago
The fact that he's able to fake it until he makes it is a failure of our society. He should be impoverished and incarcerated.
- randoglando 10mo ago
  He's a complicated figure. He has done so much good as well. EVs in the US and reusable rockets owe a lot to him. OTOH, so does the cesspool that is X.
  - cn-watch 10mo ago
    There are no elon musk museums. There are no elon musk hospitals. There are no elon musk centers for unwed mothers. How could the richest man in the world give so little back.

jauntywundrkind 10mo ago

I just find it distracting to pretend like we know exactly what albatross to hang around the neck of the problem here. While I do tend to think lidar is probably useful, I also think this isn't a solved shut knowable case where the lidar absolutely is essential & makes all the difference. Making assertions like this rests more assurity than I think can be granted, and harms the overall idea: that Tesla doesn't seem to have serious proof that their things are getting better, that they are more trustworthy. The data is just not there for us outsiders to make any kind of case, and thats the skimping out crucial baseline we need.

tim333 10mo ago

I'm not surprised, more because there was info on Reddit that Tesla FSDs were having disengagements every 200 miles or some such in urban environments. Camera only probably could work in the future but seemingly not yet.

fragmede 10mo ago
It's easy to argue that LIDAR is expensive and unnecessary, but radar has been a standard for luxury cruise control for decades so it's got a variety of OEM suppliers. Thus Tesla's lack of radar because of the CEO's ego is damnable. The problem with camera-only is fog. My human eyes don't penetrate fog. Radar does. Proving that camera-only is possible is stupid and ego driven and doesn't come from a place of merit and science and technology.