So, I had my first experience where (production) FSD seemed like a genuine safety improvement today.
The situation was a fairly tight commute environment on a 3-lane highway at maybe 50mph. AP/NoA was driving in the middle lane, with not a lot of space to merge right for an upcoming exit. It found a spot that worked -- about three or four car lengths behind a box truck -- and signaled. I looked behind, decided it looked good (but personally was dubious it's be brave enough to do it), and wiggled the wheel to approve. Interestingly the car did it right away, no hesitation. And it did it fine.
But JUST as the car was entering the lane the truck about 20' ahead stomped on its brakes and decelerated. Not a problem, I saw it and slowed down manually (I didn't have the nerve to wait to see if AP would do it).
But here's the thing: I saw the truck stop because I was looking forward and scanning, if I as a human driver had been executing that same lane change, my eyes would have been glued behind me, looking at the car I was squeezing in front of. I won't say I definitely would have hit that truck, but... yeah, it seems not unlikely. FSD allows a level of situation awareness for the human driver that you can't get if you have to do it all yourself.
The situation was a fairly tight commute environment on a 3-lane highway at maybe 50mph. AP/NoA was driving in the middle lane, with not a lot of space to merge right for an upcoming exit. It found a spot that worked -- about three or four car lengths behind a box truck -- and signaled. I looked behind, decided it looked good (but personally was dubious it's be brave enough to do it), and wiggled the wheel to approve. Interestingly the car did it right away, no hesitation. And it did it fine.
But JUST as the car was entering the lane the truck about 20' ahead stomped on its brakes and decelerated. Not a problem, I saw it and slowed down manually (I didn't have the nerve to wait to see if AP would do it).
But here's the thing: I saw the truck stop because I was looking forward and scanning, if I as a human driver had been executing that same lane change, my eyes would have been glued behind me, looking at the car I was squeezing in front of. I won't say I definitely would have hit that truck, but... yeah, it seems not unlikely. FSD allows a level of situation awareness for the human driver that you can't get if you have to do it all yourself.
