Autonomous Car Progress

[Reciprocity]

So, just stopping is a good idea in the middle of a busy freeway at freeway speeds? What about a busy city street or expressway?

Please do the former with your car, even if it's just a gradual coast to stop and stay inside your car w/it stopped in the middle of traffic. Let's see what happens to your car and the cars around you.

I've had a driver's license for over 25 years. I've NEVER had an engine seize nor have I ridden in a 4+ wheel vehicle in my life where that happened. I also can't think of a time where I've had a sudden and/or unexpected loss of propulsion when driving on a public road.

Unrelated: Uber self-driving trucks are now moving cargo for Uber Freight customers

You have never driven in LA then because there are cars stopped in the middle of the road all the time.

The likely hood of a catastrophic failure is just as unlikely. My point is that cars die on the road all the time and a wrecker comes and moves it. That is if the car cannot pull over on it's own, again, it has enough info and cameras at the instant it loses a sensor to do so. If everything fails at once then there has to be a redundant way to stop the car period. Failures should be few and far between and in many cases will be anticipated before hand.

Again, I'm not saying there is 0 redundancy, just not duplicates of every part of the system.

 

[cwerdna]

You have never driven in LA then because there are cars stopped in the middle of the road all the time.

I have driven in LA. I had a car in college in the city of Los Angeles for ~1.5 years. I've visited a bunch of times since then, including last year, where I drove down there and back.

It is not that frequent and esp. not on the highway in the MIDDLE of the highway, not the shoulders. Yes, it can tend to happen towards the travel lanes on the edges.

Guess what happens when there is a massive differential in speed, esp. if one or more vehicles is stopped? A MUCH greater chance of an accident.

The likely hood of a catastrophic failure is just as unlikely.

No, you've now added more points of failure, for which you propose to simply stop the car.

 

[mongo]

So, just stopping is a good idea in the middle of a busy freeway at freeway speeds? What about a busy city street or expressway?

Please do the former with your car, even if it's just a gradual coast to stop and stay inside your car w/it stopped in the middle of traffic. Let's see what happens to your car and the cars around you.

I've had a driver's license for over 25 years. I've NEVER had an engine seize nor have I ridden in a 4+ wheel vehicle in my life where that happened. I also can't think of a time where I've had a sudden and/or unexpected loss of propulsion when driving on a public road.

Unrelated: Uber self-driving trucks are now moving cargo for Uber Freight customers

People do run out of gas, have tire blow outs, or engine fires on the freeway. Those can cause the car to not make it to the shoulder. Debating scenarios is not a systematic way to approach the problem.
No one is saying pulling an "Anger Management" sing along in the middle of the highway is a good idea.


The RPN from the FMEA shows where to focus.
If total sudden HW failure is very unlikely and first order severity is low, it becomes a low priority failure mode.

The second order severity of being hit by another car can be mitigated by autonomous driving with rational safety factors. Designing against the worst case human driver will cause any usable system to fail.

 

[Reciprocity]

I have driven in LA. I had a car in college in the city of Los Angeles for ~1.5 years. I've visited a bunch of times since then, including last year, where I drove down there and back.

It is not that frequent and esp. not on the highway in the MIDDLE of the highway, not the shoulders. Yes, it can tend to happen towards the travel lanes on the edges.

Guess what happens when there is a massive differential in speed, esp. if one or more vehicles is stopped? A MUCH greater chance of an accident.

No, you've now added more points of failure, for which you propose to simply stop the car.

Dude what are the odds every camera and radar fail at the same time with no warning? Are self driving cars going to have 2 copies of everything? The answer is no. They won't have 2 computers, they won't have 2 breaking systems, they won't have 2 camera ever where they have one nor will they have 2 lidar everywhere they have one.

If the forward facing camera fails, you have two. The car can easily pull to the side of the road and call for help. You also realize that other drivers won't just run into a car that slows and moves to the side of the road slowly with hazards on right?

I wonder what the greater odds are. Someone dies while driving and an automated driving system suffering a complete failure and has 0 control.

We have to assume I am right because Tesla doesn't have compete redundancy so they must have a plan and I'm guessing they went through the various scenarios and determined the minimal redundancy required.

 

[mspohr]

I have driven in LA. I had a car in college in the city of Los Angeles for ~1.5 years. I've visited a bunch of times since then, including last year, where I drove down there and back.

It is not that frequent and esp. not on the highway in the MIDDLE of the highway, not the shoulders. Yes, it can tend to happen towards the travel lanes on the edges.

Guess what happens when there is a massive differential in speed, esp. if one or more vehicles is stopped? A MUCH greater chance of an accident.

No, you've now added more points of failure, for which you propose to simply stop the car.

Clearly you must be familiar with freeway traffic which has all lanes stop and go for miles. A rare AV failure wouldn't be any different than "normal" traffic.

 

[mspohr]

Government to review law before self-driving cars arrive on UK roads
Government to review law before self-driving cars arrive on UK roads

UK will do a three year study of AV law. Good idea but three years is too slow. The world will pass them by.

 

[mspohr]

Humans are fighting back
Rage against the machine: self-driving cars attacked by angry Californians
Rage against the machine: self-driving cars attacked by angry Californians

Of course, these incidents happened in the Mission which is always in the vanguard.

 

[mspohr]

An indication of how difficult this is to sort out
For de Blasio, Crash That Killed 2 Children Strikes Close to Home

A car and driver with a long record of violations killed two children a few days ago in NYC. No charges filed.
Would / should it be different with an AV?

 

[Bladerskb]

this is the #1 reason why i hat everything elon currently stands for.
*sugar* like this.

There have been some serious incidents in trials in the US where driverless vehicles have failed to “see” obstacles. The first recorded death involving a driverless vehicle was in July 2016 when a car under autonomous control failed to brake as a tractor and trailer crossed its path.

Government to review law before self-driving cars arrive on UK roads

 

[mspohr]

this is the #1 reason why i have everything elon stands for.
*sugar* like this.



Government to review law before self-driving cars arrive on UK roads

"#1 reason why i have everything elon stands for"
Where can I buy?

 

[Bladerskb]

Absolutely not true. You can even try it on your own. Have someone blind fold you while you are driving and see if you cant stop the car safely without running into someone just based on your memory of what the road looked like the instance before you lost vision. A computer would do this a million times better. It knows what the road looked like and can anticipate enough of the road and conditions to safely stop. There would need to be some redundancy but not every single system and every single wire.

The problem is people THINK certain things are required but have not thought about why they wouldnt be. It might still be mandated by law which is a different story then being necessary for a system to work.

Yeah because the road is made of straight lines!

You tesla fans are comical.

You ignore the fact that at 65 MPH you are going 100 ft per second and that there's more to driving than straight lines, you could be performing the dozens of possible driving maneuvers that driving situations require on the road when a sensor failure happens.
But no, lets ignore that and go to a fairy land where roads are complete straight lines with no traffic, debris, peds and obstacles.

Its laughable at best now. I only come here for comedic relief cause there are no more real discussion going on.
all you see is fandom.

 

[Reciprocity]

Yeah because the road is made of straight lines!

You tesla fans are comical.

You ignore the fact that at 65 MPH you are going 100 ft per second and that there's more to driving than straight lines, you could be performing the dozens of possible driving maneuvers that driving situations require on the road when a sensor failure happens.
But no, lets ignore that and go to a fairy land where roads are complete straight lines with no traffic, debris, peds and obstacles.

Its laughable at best now. I only come here for comedic relief cause there are no more real discussion going on.
all you see is fandom.

You do turns at 65? Wow. Yes, the car can see far enough in advance even in a curve on the freeway. You still assume 0 redundancy which is dumb. There will be paths from the high def maps to backup vision as well. Think harder. If you can think long enough, you can figure out ways to backup one system with another to accomplish this. I won't solve it for you because I have a life.

We have a saying where I'm from. "They got breaks too."

 

[cwerdna]

You do turns at 65? Wow.

Depends on what type of turns.

There's a junction I take from highway 17 south to 85 south almost every weekday at Google Maps. The "recommended (?)" speed sign says 40 mph for that left curve which is way too slow for dry pavement. Google Maps is the "street" view.

I took it at over 66 mph yesterday in my Leaf along with many other vehicles, some heavier and larger than mine (I think there was at least 1 SUV or van or minivan around me) w/no drama and no squealing tires. I again it took it today at 65+ mph in my Leaf w/no issue. I'm running on Bridgestone Ecopia EP422 Plus tires, which aren't exactly high performance tires that'd go on a sports car.

 

[BinaryField]

Reading some recent replies to this thread, I think that there is a fundamental lack of understanding of what sensor redundancy actually is for safety-critical systems. The shutdown of equipment that has been discussed vehemently by some users is an extremely trivial fault mode. If a non-redundant piece of equipment is lost, then the system obviously must stop and force the user to takeover or enter some kind of failsafe condition. The real danger is when your radar reports that the car in front of you is 10m away when in reality it is 3m. Redundant equipment is necessary to monitor and detect this insidious fault mode.

 

[Reciprocity]

Depends on what type of turns.

There's a junction I take from highway 17 south to 85 south almost every weekday at Google Maps. The "recommended (?)" speed sign says 40 mph for that left curve which is way too slow for dry pavement. Google Maps is the "street" view.

I took it at over 66 mph yesterday in my Leaf along with many other vehicles, some heavier and larger than mine (I think there was at least 1 SUV or van or minivan around me) w/no drama and no squealing tires. I again it took it today at 65+ mph in my Leaf w/no issue. I'm running on Bridgestone Ecopia EP422 Plus tires, which aren't exactly high performance tires that'd go on a sports car.

Autonomous cars will adhere to the posted speed limits and it won't even need to see the signs because that will be coded into the maps. With high def 3D maps a car could drive for some time completely blind just based on the maps and telemetry data. This is by no means safe but would allow a car to limp to the shoulder in a safe way that would not cause other drivers to lose their minds and go careening off the road. Remember, they got breaks too. Safe zones where cars could park in an emergency could even be coded into the maps.

You don't even have to take my word for it. Tesla does not have redundancy in every system or piece of hardware and they spent billions on these types of issues. You can trust forum trolls or the experts. I choose to trust Elon and Tesla as they have yet to let me down, aside from the time line.

 

[R.S]

With high def 3D maps a car could drive for some time completely blind just based on the maps and telemetry data. This is by no means safe but would allow a car to limp to the shoulder in a safe way that would not cause other drivers to lose their minds and go careening off the road. .

Or limp right into a car/truck on the right. Every autonomous vehicle will need redundancy. And if the first system fails, the car needs to get to a safe spot ASAP. You can't just let it drive blind with just maps and telemetry, since there are other cars on the road. And you can't do a stop in the middle of the road.

In a time where even electric steering has full redundancy, it's hard to believe that an autonomous sensor suite would work without any redundancy. Though I guess Tesla already has some of that, with camera overlap and additional radar (and maybe sonar in a very limited sense)

 

[mongo]

Or limp right into a car/truck on the right. Every autonomous vehicle will need redundancy. And if the first system fails, the car needs to get to a safe spot ASAP. You can't just let it drive blind with just maps and telemetry, since there are other cars on the road. And you can't do a stop in the middle of the road.

In a time where even electric steering has full redundancy, it's hard to believe that an autonomous sensor suite would work without any redundancy. Though I guess Tesla already has some of that, with camera overlap and additional radar (and maybe sonar in a very limited sense)

I get your point, but at some level everything stops lacking redundancy. Current cars have (rare) failure modes that render the vehicle directionless, powerless, or just pain unmovable. It is going to be interesting how they rate fault occurrence probability, especially since all electronic device fail given sufficient time (at a minimum due to to migration of dissimilar metals at junctions causing increased resistance). Will FSD HW have a mandatory replacement period (hours of operation or fixed time)?

 

[Reciprocity]

Or limp right into a car/truck on the right. Every autonomous vehicle will need redundancy. And if the first system fails, the car needs to get to a safe spot ASAP. You can't just let it drive blind with just maps and telemetry, since there are other cars on the road. And you can't do a stop in the middle of the road.

In a time where even electric steering has full redundancy, it's hard to believe that an autonomous sensor suite would work without any redundancy. Though I guess Tesla already has some of that, with camera overlap and additional radar (and maybe sonar in a very limited sense)

I am not saying the car will continue on for miles and miles.. only meters and meters. Again.. Think a bit. If you are saying that all 2 forward facing cameras and sonar and radar failed? Then the car just comes to a quick stop and turns of the hazards. I am confused as to why you dont understand that a car can safely get out of the way after losing a camera or a radar or a sonar or all sonar. Who cars if it limps into another car anyway? Cars have blowouts all the time and tap other cars. Cars will also make every attempt to not be run into. I know I do it all the time, its called defensive driving and you are actually at fault in an accident in some cases if you do not use defensive driving.

This is my last post on the subject. I really am not trying to convince anyone. I look at this from a different point of view obviously. I look at it from the point of view of trying to figure out how Tesla will solve the problem with the current hardware as they are confident that it is enough so I am confident it is enough. The reason is that I have not done a billion dollars worth of due diligence and investment into the problem and they have. So I am trying to figure out what is possible with the limited information I have. Thinking there is no way that Tesla could innovate their way around the problems you have proposed is silly. All they do is innovate. All thy do is deliver the "impossible" that that so called "experts" who actually have more expertise then your local forum troll. So excuse me if I choose to defer to Tesla as they have all at risk and no one here has anything at risk.

My blind faith might be rewarded with disappointment, but I prefer to stay optimistic and there really is nothing anyone can do to dissuade from that. Until Elon comes out and says.. "Yeah, I screwed up.. its not going to work and here is our new hardware.." Until then, I have them the benefit of the doubt. That is my cross to die on. If that infact happens, I have zero problem coming back to this thread and eating a large pile of crow. Everyone knows where I stand. I am not getting any tattoos that say.. bladerskab was right or Mobileye is my daddy. But I will happily eat a huge plate of crow.

 

[Bladerskb]

You do turns at 65? Wow. Yes, the car can see far enough in advance even in a curve on the freeway. You still assume 0 redundancy which is dumb. There will be paths from the high def maps to backup vision as well. Think harder. If you can think long enough, you can figure out ways to backup one system with another to accomplish this. I won't solve it for you because I have a life.

We have a saying where I'm from. "They got breaks too."

yes there are situations where you are making turns at 65 mph and even higher and no HD maps isn't enough because HD maps can't show you the dozens of obstacles, debris, objects and even other cars parked on the shoulder of the highway nor will it show you the parked cars, peds, debris, objects in a surface street scenario.

AP2 has 0 redundancy. as pointed out by @BinaryField there are more than one point of failure.

Your love for elon has completely clouded your judgment that you can't think.

1) There's the actual sensor hardware failure (which also be the result of increment whether such as rain,snow, dust, mud, sand, etc)

2) then there's the software detection failure / inaccuracies (which also be the result of increment whether..etc),
3) then there's the computer hardware failure,
4) then there's software actuation algorithm failure (which also be the result of increment whether..etc),
5) then there's the complete software failure,
6) then there's the actual car automotive failure.

AP2 covers NONE of this.

You don't even have to take my word for it. Tesla does not have redundancy in every system or piece of hardware and they spent billions on these types of issues. You can trust forum trolls or the experts. I choose to trust Elon and Tesla as they have yet to let me down, aside from the time line.

Who told you Tesla spent billions in R&D on corner cases?

Corner cases are discovered during advanced stages of testing and Tesla began actual development and initial testing of their FSD software in 2017. They simply slapped their cars with 8 cameras copying the exact same configuration (trifocal, two looking back and two looking forward..) from mobileye and almost exact same FOV as mobileye (from 2014) and claimed they now have a level 5 FSD car.

There were no R&D what so ever.


But no lets trust Elon who said his cars will be fully self driving and level 5 before December 2017. Lets trust Elon who later said his cars will be level 5 without needing a driver and doing summon from across the country to find you before Jan 2018 and then again before June 2018 and then later on said you can sleep in your tesla before april 2019 and then now currently pushed to 2020.

Lets trust a guy who has never been right in any of his autonomous based statements, promises and vows who keeps coming up with new dates every 6 months.

 

[Bladerskb]

This is my last post on the subject. I really am not trying to convince anyone. I look at this from a different point of view obviously. I look at it from the point of view of a tesla fanboy

Fixed that for you.

All they do is innovate.

Name me ONE innnovation that Tesla has done. Do you even know what innovation is?

All thy do is deliver the "impossible" that that so called "experts" who actually have more expertise then your local forum troll.

Name me ONE impossible thing that Tesla has done. Heck i will help you out and broaden your horizon. Name me ONE impossible thing that elon has done.

My blind faith might be rewarded with disappointment, but I prefer to stay optimistic and there really is nothing anyone can do to dissuade from that. Until Elon comes out and says.. "Yeah, I screwed up.. its not going to work and here is our new hardware.."

And this is why you should not post in the AV forum and thread. We are trying to have evidence based discussion not a circle jerk with a bunch of tesla fairies who live and die by elon's next tweet.

Thank gawd this is your last post here. Take that crap to the other forums! We don't need more blind faith, we need facts!