Uber goes Death Race 3000

[Formerly Rockymtnole]

We are not there yet, but in the end I think we will find that is by far safer than drivers or humans being able to take over at some point. The reality is the autonomous cars can and will react in a microfraction of the time we take to respond. They will avoid rear end accidents better and faster, and will indeed reduce them by a ton (almost all are caused by folks traveling too closely and/or losing attention, where those will calculate speed and distance and likely other factors to A not be in a situation where they are just way too close and B will react so much faster then we ever do once a situation arises). I think adding humans to the mix make it a lot worse than it's worth, but again not for quite a long time. Like I said, I think relying on humans to take over is the worst of the long term options because humans who are not in total control won't pay near as much attention, and we don't pay enough even when we are in control.

So we'll only be able to go where we're allowed to go by the limits of the navigation system and public infrastructure. Every stop planned in advance and tracked. People that have no idea how to drive if they ever leave the most-developed countries. No thanks.

I hope that by the time this happens I am six feet under or out in the sticks way way off the grid.

 

[AllNoles]

They can address that by having a driver mode that works in the few places driverless won’t.

 

[kc78]

There are times I want to enjoy the car, feel the control over it. Then there are tons of times, especially on long drives and especially with kids, where I'd like to be able to do anything but focus on the road for hours at a time.

 

[Formerly Rockymtnole]

They can address that by having a driver mode that works in the few places driverless won’t.

Who is "they"?

 

[DMoriarty]

Who is "they"?

The Aliens who are slowly and quietly injecting all this technology into our lives.

 

[AllNoles]

Lol. Whatever group comes up with the answers to all this. I’m sure it will be government and those making the tech and people like that. It’s a game changer and will require some major shifts in thinking, but I don’t know how anyone can look at the pace of tech advancement and not think that at some point in the near future (relatively speaking) we will have a vast majority of autos be autonomous. Some solutions will need to be identified for areas where they aren’t available or don’t work, but I can’t see society long term tolerating people wanting to drive themselves if it’s objectively much less safe for the rest of us.

I love this area of tech. Just love it. It brings so much into play, and your concerns are valid ones we need to address. I think by the time it all happens at a macro level it won’t bother nearly as many people as it would if you dropped it on people today. I remember when I first heard of Uber and thought it was a fad. I’m an old guy. It sounded silly. Now I use Uber/Lyft regularly, whether it’s to go out on weekends with no risk of being stupid to using them on vacation once I get to my location (it driving there) or in lieu of a rental car because it’s always so much easier, I can get work done if I’m in traffic, I don’t have to worry about parking, etc.

Like I said I would love to get to where I didn’t have a car at all. I just don’t think we get there within my lifetime. At least not in my lifetime of driving and stuff. But I’d be one of the first to dump my car.

 

[AllNoles]

Reports are Uber limited safety features.

 

[seminole97]

There are times I want to enjoy the car, feel the control over it.

Me too, but then I had to get a second car seat and the wife nixed the plan to mount it to the passenger side floor, so I sold the ZO6.

Then there are tons of times, especially on long drives and especially with kids, where I'd like to be able to do anything but focus on the road for hours at a time.

I got up this morning and drove to Pensacola from Tally and then back. I would love to have just been along for the ride.

 

[Formerly Rockymtnole]

So Uber has settled with the family of the homeless person hit by the self-driving car.

Seems screwed up that the family could somehow profit under the circumstances.

 

[ericram]

So Uber has settled with the family of the homeless person hit by the self-driving car.

Seems screwed up that the family could somehow profit under the circumstances.

They had to settle to minimize the damages and fallout from them not having all the sense needed. Uber skimped on the safety features and a woman died.

 

[AllNoles]

Eh, I think the bigger issue is the employee wasn’t paying attention. None of the tech is ready for undersupervised autonomy on public roads. We’re a decade away from that. But like I said earlier this worries me because it seems it would be really hard to focus as if you’re driving when you’re not driving. We don’t even pay enough attention these days when we are actively behind the wheel.

(I’m not saying the sensor issue wasn’t a problem but we won’t know unless it’s all published. I don’t think it was a “skimping” issue from what I read, but rather a false positives problem where the sensors activated too often)

 

[ericram]

Eh, I think the bigger issue is the employee wasn’t paying attention. None of the tech is ready for undersupervised autonomy on public roads. We’re a decade away from that. But like I said earlier this worries me because it seems it would be really hard to focus as if you’re driving when you’re not driving. We don’t even pay enough attention these days when we are actively behind the wheel.

(I’m not saying the sensor issue wasn’t a problem but we won’t know unless it’s all published. I don’t think it was a “skimping” issue from what I read, but rather a false positives problem where the sensors activated too often)

From what I understand is most of the other companies are who are testing these have 6 sensors to prevent blind spots. This one did but then deactivate 5 of them at the request of Uber. It remains to be seen as to why they did that.

 

[AllNoles]

Really won’t matter at this point. The reason for having the person is to allow various options to be tested safely. I don’t have an issue with them monkeying with anything since it’s all about testing and gathering data, but it’s not going to work if the babysitter isn’t paying attention. That was by far the worst part of the video.

 

[kc78]

Really won’t matter at this point. The reason for having the person is to allow various options to be tested safely. I don’t have an issue with them monkeying with anything since it’s all about testing and gathering data, but it’s not going to work if the babysitter isn’t paying attention. That was by far the worst part of the video.

Psychologically I think some of the points made above are right. If you're not actively driving the car it's going to be extremely difficult to stay focused on the road for long stretches of time. Maybe they'll need to change the process so that the car drives in shorter spurts so that the driver can more easily focus on the road while not actually controlling the car and give some other breaks to stop and write up a report or do something a bit different.

 

[ericram]

Final report released. Uber did turn off various sensors and the driver was not on her phone.

https://arstechnica.com/cars/2018/0...-ubers-self-driving-software-ntsb-says/?amp=1

 

[ericram]

I stand corrected, the Uber driver was streaming a show on Hulu.

https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-u...driving-car-crash-police-report-idUKKBN1JI0L9

 

[AllNoles]

This will be the most dangerous time of moving to self driving cars - the problem of having safety drivers who don’t focus like they should. People get distracted enough when they are actually driving. It’s really hard to focus like you’re driving when you’re not.

 

[funksouljon]

I stand corrected, the Uber driver was streaming a show on Hulu.

https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-u...driving-car-crash-police-report-idUKKBN1JI0L9

I saw this as well, and had a couple thoughts....
What do you think they were paying her? Guessing $45k? Based on the fiscal/image impact of her negligence, the cost was far greater than the salary they were likely willing to pay. Which loops back to the standard approach for salaries being as low as possible to find a person. And that perhaps isn't the best approach for determining salaries. Perhaps companies should consider the impact of a person NOT doing their job and how much they should pay people vs just finding the rock bottom price. In no way am I suggesting she isn't at fault, but depending on the pay, Uber may very well likely have set themselves up to fail. This same discussion comes up with police officer salaries (and apparently a trend in hot, horny teachers) and I have always thought the debate has merit.