What most people forget but every high school student has mastered is that it is possible to stare at teacher and be elsewhere in thought. Eyes on road just as hands on wheel is no guarantee to prevent or prove attentiveness. People responsible for behaving responsibly and should be responsible if not. Car manufacturers are not responsible for customers inatentiveness
Thanks for the clarification. I mean 2018 GM "Cadillac Super Cruise™" with a camera on top of the steering column to track driver's eyes:
Very good point. I myself prefer to focus on the accident avoidance competency of the system rather than diverting effort to a nanny system to prove that hands-on-wheel and eyes-on-road is a proof of driver competency.
Lane keeping + TACC ("autopilot") doesn't really have any accident avoidance compentency. AEB does avoid (or at least mitigate) accidents, but that feature is a passive safety feature that is always on, whether the driver turns on AP or not. Lane Keeping + TACC is basically a convenience feature.
Maybe because it doesn't. The Model 3 does, but AP2.5 in the S/X do not have an interior camera. (At least as far as what we have seen.)
That doesn't make any sense. Having the car automatically regulate distance and steering plays a pretty key role in preventing fatigued/distracted drivers from triggering AEB/FCW scenarios anyway. Maybe in some cars where ACC is restricted to 30% of braking force and only looks 200ft ahead, but Tesla TACC is quite proactive and long-distance, and easily plays a safety role too.
No question that TACC has value. Not sure that lane keeping has any safety value. If you're dozing off, you shouldn't be driving. If anything TACC + lanekeeping actually encourages folks to keep driving when they should be pulling off the road.
I don't think it'll be so clear cut. What independent testing will be in place to confirm a manufacturer's claims of Level 5? Will it be a similar situation that has developed with emissions testing, where car makers simply create systems which can pass the required "Level 5 test"? Full autonomy is a tough challenge. Sufficient autonomy is always going to be easier.
Just because Autopilot is classified as "convenience", there is no reason that its function can not be improved to avoid accidents. It has done that for me already: Such as it has applied braking on its own to slow down to a halt from full freeway speed at a stop-and-go traffic jam without my intervention at all. Now, the effort needs to focus on how it can do it better and reliably even when there's another Florida scenario as discussed in this thread.
Once again, this is AEB and/or TACC. Adding lane keeping to the mix isn't really a safety feature. Hard to come up with a safety benefit (let alone a significant safety benefit) from adding lane keeping.
Tesla AEB is not designed to brake to a halt. When my Tesla applies brake on its own without my intervention to a complete stop from 70 MPH in order to avoid slamming into a freeway traffic jam in front, this is clearly not a function of Tesla AEB as stated in owner's manual: I think what you are trying to say is: Autosteer is not a safety feature. It may not be for now, but someday, it will be able to steer into a freeway exit correctly so that human don't have to take risk to swerve into an exit at the last second due to inattentiveness. Even with this current function, I think Autosteer is doing a better job than human is as I notice quite a few instances when other cars keep intruding lane markers, some white lines, some yellow lines. That, to me, is a safety issue that Autosteer is addressing.
Not departing your lane (e.g. properly functioning lane keeping) is absolutely a safety feature. There are many driving situations (e.g. around a cliff, hilly shoulders, stopped car on shoulder) where departing your lane can be a accident-causing, unrecoverable event. A car with the ability to automatically hold your lane with human or better-than-human abilities is absolutely a safety feature. Note that with that said, I don't think Autosteer in AP1 or AP2 is there yet. I'm talking about the hypothetical world where there truly exists a lane holding system that's as good as a human.
Yes, but IME (and I didn't believe it until I had experienced it myself on multiple occasions). AP + long Journey definitely reduces my fatigue, and therefore means I finish my journey safely whereas before, regular journey, same time of night, quite late, before-AP I frequently fought sleep for the last 10 miles. if I was to be in a position where I ought to stop what would I do? If close to home I would probably "carry on". No difference (in making that decision) whether I have AP or not. But with AP at least I'm less at risk. If not close to home, and therefore I must stop, what then? With AP it would beep at me when I nodded off, and wake me up. How many times would that have to happen before I decided I was not fit to drive? One would probably do me, perhaps a couple before I was convinced, so in that situation I would remain safe until I pulled over, and rest, rather than have an accident.
I am perplexed on how car companies make sure your not distracted in cars withOUT AP systems. Seems a lot larger problem (based on numbers of cars and lack of car taking notice). Why don't they demand automakers put in systems to avoid distracted drivers on ALL cars?
Had this been about AP1, I would agree. Generalizing it to include AP2, though, is not IMO correct. It is a very tiresome and stressful companion much of the time.
Sorry to hear that, I have no experience of AP2 but here's hoping that it soon levels out with AP1, and then surpasses it, very soon.