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The car **** up and loves to blow goats
Thank you. (happy smiley)
There’s nothing wrong with giving us all the safety enhancing aids that the research for these projects create though.
Absolutely.
There’s nothing wrong with giving us all the safety enhancing aids that the research for these projects create though.
yeah that’s true. The overprotective auto panic brake feature on my Golf isn’t AT ALL annoying when it gets spooked by stationary traffic in a different lane... 😂😡
Interesting but obvious insight to human attention span.. Personally I think the 'safety drivers' should be swapped out every hour or so to insure they are as fresh minded as possible and have a chance of intervening effectively before becoming bored and subconsciously switching off.
This is an experimental test on a live road after all.
Imagine going on a two hour taxi journey... Twice a day, 5 times a week, can't really blame the human here.
The car in question clearly isn't ready for such a test, as demonstrated. It should have easily detected the pedestrian with the bike, but it didn't.
Actually, I think the safety enhancing aids are going to make things less safe. An automatic braking system means you can check that text message really quickly because the car will take care of it if anything goes wrong.
Total automation would make it more safe. The two hundred million Nigel mansells on the US roads kill 30000 a year-ish do they not? I reckon the machines would cut that dramatically despite this aberration.
One day, the stabiliser, not yet. It isn't an aberration now because the cars' systems aren't good enough - yet. IMO they are on the roads prematurely. A bit like the code for this forum's relaunch, it's full of bugs but hopefully they'll sort it out one day.
An automatic braking system means you can check that text message really quickly because the car will take care of it if anything goes wrong.
Sorry but that's a guff statement. We already have that with ABS, but you don't stomp on the brakes and let the car deal with it, to send a text, well you could but it would end in carnage.
yeez is it hard of thinking day in here or something:
1) I never said the car wasn't at fault.
If you think i did, please POST THE QUOTE. If you can't post the quote where i said "the car wasn't at fault" then shut up (btw the car was at fault. Quite clearly at fault)
2) I maintain that the AVERAGE human driver would have had a low statistically probable chance of avoiding this accident.
I've worked my whole life in the automotive arena, spent 6 years at Prodrive as a Senior Principal Engineer (not a "tech" btw!!) and have literally thousands of hours of seat time in a massive range of cars and with a massive range of drivers, from Damon Hill the F1 driver to Nancy Hill from 3 acacia avenue. I've been involved with several objective studies on driver behavior, and i've spent a lot of time sat next to "average" drivers doing driver training, both on the road and under high dynamic conditions on a test facility. I've consulted to various advanced driver organisations and been published as an "expert" in books written by those organisations.
My experience, along with objective data i have personally gathered, suggests that in reality, with an average driver, paying the average amount of attention, with the average reaction time, and average attitude and skill set, they would not have prevented this accident.
This is backed up by the fact there WAS a human driver in the car at the time. Who failed to even spot the victim (just like the car failed to spot that person). Despite, remember, the entire reason for them being in the car (and remember this was their job, they were paid to be there) to be a "failsafe" to prevent faults with the autonomy from resulting in accidents.
The big difference is what happens next.
Usually, in a typical 'human only' case, the driver would have said "i just didn't see them" and that would have been that. The driver may have been prosecuted if there was enough evidence, but in the vast majority of cases, often without even basic 3rd party witness statements, the death would be recorded as "accidental" the family would bury their relative with little closure or real explanation for what ocured and how.
This time though, we have hard, objective data and the ability to analyse, process and apply that data as a hard lesson. That data can also be analysed in the cold light of day by external entities, be that the judge in any subsequent legal proceedings, or by Uber, or any other entity.
(i should also mention that "threshold braking" IS important, very, very important. Studies have shown that in many cases average human drivers simply fail to press the brakes hard enough (hence various automated assistance systems that have been developed). Stop at 0.1g not 1g and you may as well not bother braking. And it matters most in the inital stages of the braking event, because your velocity (distance divided by time) is the highest. Ie you travel further per unit of time, and it's the distance to the impact that matters and not the time to impact. (This is also why do just a few extra mph can mean a large difference in the speed you hit something)
The danger point of this is now onwards, until the day it is total autonomy...
A combination of fallible human drivers, less than perfected and proven software, new behaviours and reactions from humans and digital controllers.
The key thing is the 'driver' of the test vehicle wasn't paying attention. That is both good and bad for the purposes of the test...
A) you wouldn't expect a driver to be paying any attention in a fully automated vehicle.
B) the car failed, see point A.
What we do know now is uber, and possibly others are being negligent with thier testing on live roads in the race to get a product to market.
Negligence is for the courts to decide.
However, if they can demonstrate (to the courts satisfaction) that their system is, on average, at least as "safe" as the average for human drivers, i see no long term issue. People will continue to be killed by cars for many years, and yet,t he sooner we start the sooner we can bring the numbers killed down.
Lets face it, we give driving licences to pretty much anyone. Never need a retest, never need to do more than pass some very basic theory questions and drive round the block without crashing. Watch those "learner" or "OAP" driver progs on the telly and marvel at how many people are , frankly, completely unsuited to the act of driving, for example:
39 times before he passed. Do we think he'd nail a 0.5sec reaction time and then a perfect ABS stop, timed with an instant and yet mm correct swerve around an unexpected pedestrian in the road? Fat Chance.
Every day i see poor driving, excessive speed, poor obeservation, anger, in-attention, lack of mechanical sympathy etc etc etc, not from one or two drivers but from LOTs of drivers. And that's before we get to drink, drugs and other substance abuses.
If you are a road cyclist i'm pretty sure every time you go out on your bike you may well have some sort of close call, a pass that's too close, the horrible sound of a scrunch of tyres into tarmac as someone suddenly spots you, too late, and realises they can't actually fit past you and the car coming the other way, the SMIDSYs, and even the "you don't pay any road tax" anger directed at cyclists by everyday drivers just for you being on a bike on the road.
Yes but there is something just a little bit.more organic about being mown down by a person in a car, the feel of metal on flesh just isn't the same whe a robot does it. Hence people would rather continue with bad drivers.
For all those talking about the driver of an autonomous vehicle 'intervening' - in my opinion that simply isn't an option.
I don't know how many of you have ever driven a semi autonomous vehicle but its a bit of an eye opener. I had a Tesla Model S on extended test drive (a week) as was thinking of getting one and it had AP2.(AA) This allows reasonably autonomous driving i.e adaptive cruise, lane control plus auto lane changing,traffic aware radar, 360 sensors etc etc.
1. Its scary as hell for the first day and you say to your wife - well we ain't using this bag of tricks again.
2. Then curiosity gets the better of you and you start to use it
3. Within 3 days its like you have always had it.
4. in 5 days you have forgotten how to drive.
I have been driving for 30 years. I do a fair few miles and rarely do less than 20k PA. I have never crashed or even had a speeding ticket despite driving some reasonable cars and a few bikes. I am the sort of driver that concentrates hard - probably because I also ride a motorbike and commute by cycle where the stakes are higher if you mess up.
But the few days after I handed back the Tesla I nearly crashed up the back of other traffic (mainly entering roundabouts and in slow moving traffic) several times till I got used to a 'dumb' car again. I even checked my phone etc.....I NEVER do that when driving!
My point is it takes years to learn to drive but only days to hand that responsibility over to a computer and once you do you are no way going to intervene in a situation like this terrible accident. i don't know what the uber driver/monitor brief is but I wouldn't take that job as if uber expect the guy in the driving seat to be a 'driver' then that is an impossible task.
Personally, looking at that video I think most 'good' drivers (those that concentrate) would have been on the brakes at point of impact. However I suspect that many drivers would not have been concentrating any more than the rubbish uber software. But I certainly don't blame the person in the driving seat.
What the video shows is that an imperfect driverless system is not made any safer by putting in a bored human monitor. You really might as well not have the human in there because there is a high likelihood that they will fail to monitor the car correctly and when an incident happens they won’t be able to react. That is the lesson I think I would be learning form this incident.
You really might as well not have the human in there because there is a high likelihood that they will fail to monitor the car correctly and when an incident happens they won’t be able to react.
Indeed. There's plenty of data out there to show that there's no way a human will be able to stay attentive while 'monitoring' this level of automation. Nothing to do = distracted car sitter.
Plenty of people saying the car failed to stop when it should have. Clearly the car should of detected the pedestrian before she steeped out on the road. Did it? We don't know, all we know is that it didn't stop. If the car behaved as some commentators would like then it'd never get anywhere as it would be stopping every time there was a potential hazard in another lane.
I doubt most human drivers would have stopped in time for the same reasons as MaxTorque has discussed. They may have been able to slow down enough to not kill her, but I doubt that as well tbh.
It's most certainly a tragic accident, but it's one that happens every single day on the roads of the world and no one bats an eye lid.
I seriously hope that self driver car technology doesn't get binned due to this as the majority of human drivers are crap. The sooner we hand over cars to (well written and tested) software, the better.
I don't know how the law is applied to these tests but in the UK I'd have expected that the person supervising the car would be held to be the driver legally i.e. the same laws and potential for prosecution would exist as if they'd actually been driving the car. In that case then under UK legislation I'd expect that person could be looking at jail time because there is a very good case to say that it's at best death by careless driving, or quite possible even death by dangerous driving (given the obvious risks of taking eyes of the road as long as that person did). I'd also suspect that there is going to be a massive lawsuit heading Uber's way.
It's obvious to me from the video that a reasonably attentive driver would have seen that person and her bike in plenty of time for some action to be taken. To anyone with experience of comparing what a video camera sees at night to what a human eye can it's obvious that the cyclist would have been visible well beyond the point where the video shows her - quite likely while she was still on the other side of the road. it's also worth noting that an observant driver would have had several courses of action possible - none of which the car even attempted to take:
1) Hitting the brakes - and there is obviously time for that to have had at least some effect
2) Steering round her - there was no oncoming traffic and it wouldn't haven't taken much of a deviation for the person to have survived, even if the bike itself still got hit
3) Hitting the horn when she was still on the other side of the road to alert her to the danger.
Even if you believe that the cone of light shown in the video was the utmost limit of what a driver could have possibly seen (despite other videos clearly showing that not to be the case) then you'd have to accept that the car (which was speeding) was going too fast for the conditions (i.e. the capabilities of its own lighting).
Wherever you sit on this argument though you'd have to accept that it's 100% proven that the technology used in the vehicle is not ready for road testing. It didn't observe the speed limit and it didn't take action when an object was in the road in front of it - two things you'd think should be advantages to a system like that. If a cyclist had been cycling along that road it'd have presented a smaller radar target than was the case here, so it's highly likely the car would have just plowed into the back of them without slowing as well.
More pseudo tech from Maxtorque.
The last time you posted some nonsense about recovering a car from completely sideways on an autostrada thanks to fantastic rally-tuned reflexes (but you've never driveen a rally).
You slowly toned it down to a bit sideways and then spouted half a page about each tenth of seconds with yaw angle and driver inputat each stage - and all that without telemetry data to refer to.
If the incident ever happened the reality was - something broke, it went a bit sideways and you caught it. Or that's how any properly competitive driver would explain it.
So having made claims that you caught something that would require a reaction time of less than half a second from breakage to steering imput you're now claming it takes over 1.5 seconds from something happening to "threshold" braking.
Seiously, Maxtorque you need to make your mind up about reaction times and how long it takes to push a bit of hydraulic fluid through a pipe. Do your own test in a car without ABS. If you're as good as you claim theer will be labout half a second from a big red light on the dash to smoking tyres. Even if you're not anticipating the red light it'll be a second.
Yup, anecdote and opinion always always always trumps actual hard data. No question about it.
Sorry but that’s a guff statement. We already have that with ABS, but you don’t stomp on the brakes and let the car deal with it, to send a text, well you could but it would end in carnage.
I don't think you can dismiss the idea that driver aids make people pay less attention on the road. This advert is a good example of that.
The idea that sometimes you get distracted and that's perfectly normal is the attitude of the majority of drivers. I can see driver aids making this even more ingrained. Prior to driver aids you would never try to text and drive. Now you have automatic braking, lane keeping, etc so a surely quick text can't do any harm?
I think the most dangerous point in this transition is going to be when driver aids become the norm but AVs haven't taken over completely.
When will the driving gods of STW realise that not everyone driving on the road today is as good as they are?
When did you last practice / do an emergency stop?
I practiced a few when learning, did one to pass my test in 1996 and one in 1998 (when I was still inexperienced and driving like I wouldn't these days). I'd like to think I'm capable of doing a good quick stop - am I really - how do I know?
We all like to think we have amazing reactions and would have braked in time (because it's unpleasant to think the opposite - that we're a bit rubbish and would have killed someone) Not everyone's reactions are that good particularly when you haven't practiced the skill following the reaction. Even doing the classic drop a ruler through the fingers to measure your reaction time at school is scary - yes most kids can do this successfully with a 30cm ruler, some can't and you need a 60cm - 1m ruler and there are some who will require multiple practice attempts with a 1m ruler before they manage to catch the ruler. In 5 years time these kids will be driving around on the road and we expect them to do an emergency stop!
Annecdotes are great.
Whether a human driver would have done better isn't the point.
We were told these cars were safer, and if something went wrong the human driver would take over.
This has been shown to be 100% wrong. The technology failed in the most basic way possible, and the human didn't do anything (not really surprising).
It wasn't a difficult situation, with lots of traffic, it was one object that either was missed or ignored. I love tech, but this is many years away from being something I'd be happy to share a road with.
I don’t think you can dismiss the idea that driver aids make people pay less attention on the road.
You *can't* dismiss it as it's very very well documented.
Which is why most of the major players (or at least those who have a reasonable sense of self preservation) are striving for level 4 or 5 and missing out level 3 altogether.
Level 3 seems to be the worst of all worlds. At least with level 2 you get regular warnings and wake up calls and need to interact with the controls on a regular basis. Level 3 you get nothing until there is an issue. (or until after the issue has been and gone and is now a huge problem.)
Level 4 and 5 you get nothing at all. As the car is driving for you. Once it decides it's not driving for you, it'll pull up and park if you don't respond to multiple requests to take over over a relatively long period, i.e. when you get to the end of your planned autonomous journey. (At least level 4 anyway, level 5 doesn't have anything to take over......)
When did you last practice / do an emergency stop?
Practice bout half a dozen times in the last three months. Each time there was fresh snow on the road to assess how much grip there was and if the Winter tyres were adequate or whether I shoud fit chains.
Real emergency, a few years back to let in an on-coming driver who had misjudged an overtake.
The main question for this is:
a) Did a person die "despite" the driverless car
or
b) Did a person die "because" of the driverless car
Based on what I've seen I think it's option b in this case. That's a real disappointment because I for one am really looking forward to being able to stick my car into auto mode for the long drives back and forward between Edinburgh and London that I do several times a year. Based on that incident though I'd have said it's necessary for the testing to take a step back as it doesn't look safe for real world use yet,
Practice bout half a dozen times in the last three months. Each time there was fresh snow on the road to assess how much grip there was
Unless it was done as a complete surprise and directed by a 3rd party that isn't practicing an emergency stop it's just braking hard.
@epicsteve I'll wait for the report
Level 3 seems to be the worst of all worlds. At least with level 2 you get regular warnings and wake up calls and need to interact with the controls on a regular basis. Level 3 you get nothing until there is an issue. (or until after the issue has been and gone and is now a huge problem.)
This times a lot. It’s a big human factors fail to expect someone with nothing to do to stay alert and focused. I’d imagine you’re all “eyes on stalks” at first, but after 1000 uneventful miles, you’re clearly on your phone.
From a consumer point of view, it also doesn’t deliver what I’d want from an autonomous car, which is transporting me while working/sleeping/drunk. If I’ve still got to sort of drive but not, what’s the point of me buying one?
When did you last practice / do an emergency stop?
Practice bout half a dozen times in the last three months. Each time there was fresh snow on the road to assess how much grip there was and if the Winter tyres were adequate or whether I shoud fit chains.
Real emergency, a few years back to let in an on-coming driver who had misjudged an overtake.
So we know that STWs resident driving God has done an emergency stop in the last few years and done some hard braking in the last few months. Is everyone else on the road as conscientious and diligent at practicing their braking?
No they're not - absolutely nowhere near.
ghostlymachine
You *can’t* dismiss it as it’s very very well documented.
Which is why most of the major players (or at least those who have a reasonable sense of self preservation) are striving for level 4 or 5 and missing out level 3 altogether.
Level 3 seems to be the worst of all worlds. At least with level 2 you get regular warnings and wake up calls and need to interact with the controls on a regular basis. Level 3 you get nothing until there is an issue. (or until after the issue has been and gone and is now a huge problem.)
Level 4 and 5 you get nothing at all. As the car is driving for you. Once it decides it’s not driving for you, it’ll pull up and park if you don’t respond to multiple requests to take over over a relatively long period, i.e. when you get to the end of your planned autonomous journey. (At least level 4 anyway, level 5 doesn’t have anything to take over……)
Good to see someone else pointing out that there are different levels (which is a point I think several people are missing). Ford are ignoring level 3 and aiming to release level 4 cars in 2021, or so they say, and I'd have to imagine that tallies with what you're saying.
epicsteve
The main question for this is:
a) Did a person die “despite” the driverless car
or
b) Did a person die “because” of the driverless car
Based on what I’ve seen I think it’s option b in this case.
Again, just to flog a dead horse, surely that depends on the level of autonomy the car is purported to have and the legal status granted to cars of that level in that state. From what I can gather, if the driver had been in any other state in the US or anywhere in Europe he would have been at fault legally speaking.
Couple of things to note:
1. It's very likely that there was more visibility to the human eye than the footage suggests. We cannot take this as being what the occupant could see without closely examining how it was recorded.
2. Doesn't this technology work in the dark? (This is a genuine question, and there may well be limitations, but radar, lidar, etc... it doesn't require light to function?) This is where any comparisons to humans fall down, because in this case, it may as well have been the middle of the day - the amount of light becomes irrelevant. (I'm happy to be corrected on that one)
3. My understanding is that it did not react at all prior to the collision despite a slow moving pedestrian being visible to the cameras for 2 seconds: one of the major selling points on this technology being that it has virtually instant reaction time.
I'm all for autonomy, but failing to see someone crossing the road isn't really acceptable.
Sorry but that’s a guff statement. We already have that with ABS, but you don’t stomp on the brakes and let the car deal with it, to send a text, well you could but it would end in carnage.
ABS really isn't comparable to automatic braking systems. One improves the performance of your brakes to assist your own driving. The other takes over your driving duties for you, if you fail to do so yourself. If you have technology in your car designed to prevent collisions without any human intervention, then it stands to reason drivers will become less attentive. This is something well documented and observed in real world scenarios. It's one of the major factors in Google pushing for full autonomy.
I for one look forward to hearing about the reasons for the failure in this case. But it's notable that the police response was to blame the cyclist 100% and not even consider that the car/driver might have been a teensy bit at fault.
But it’s notable that the police response was to blame the cyclist 100% and not even consider that the car/driver might have been a teensy bit at fault.
That's an American thing. Jaywalking is a crime. Therefore the driver/car is unlikely to get into major trouble. Will see if I am proven to be wrong on this.
Doesn’t this technology work in the dark?
Some of the very basic/early systems need visible light to function at 100%. As they rely on cameras. So at a very basic level, less light = less functionality. Anything driving around now, engineered by anyone who is paying attention, will have at least 3 systems using different media. (Visible light, lidar, radar, ultrasonic etc) and you'll need to physically block the sensor to cause any major issue.
I don't see how jaywalking being a crime could absolve the driver/operator from any guilt. Unless by the same logic I'm allowed to beat to death any driver I see using a phone or breaking the speed limit.
I don’t see how jaywalking being a crime could absolve the driver/operator from any guilt.
On a personal level, neither do i. But it happens with depressing regularity. Even in Europe.
It's possible that the US takes a different view than the UK, however we saw in the Charlie Alliston case last year that it's not acceptable under our laws to disregard the safety of pedestrians, even if the pedestrian had initially put themselves in danger by their own actions.If the driver could reasonably have been expected to have been able to take action to avoid or mitigate the collision then they can be held to account for their failure to do so. In my view, from the evidence I've seen, I think something could/should have been possible to mitigate the outcome but wasn't due to a combination of a completely ineffective safety system in the vehicle along with the almost complete inattention of the person that is supposed to supervise those systems. If it turns out there was any corporate awareness of the potential ineffectiveness of the system in those sorts of situation then we could be looking at manslaughter type charges (again, as was the case with the Charlie Allliston trial i.e. where a vehicle known to have its safety compromised was driven in a way that it would be reasonable to assume that it was risky).
On the other hand - if this was a normal car being driven by a person without (or possibly even with!) the video evidence being available then the police would probably just be chalking it up as a tragic accident due to the victims actions, even if they thought (but couldn't prove) that driver inattention was a factor.
Regardless of the technical reason, it's all about speed.
If you cannot stop after sighting an obstacle, you're going too fast for the conditions. That's regardless of whether you're an auto car or a driver.
The problem is most drivers in poor visibility conditions operate on the probability of the road being clear rather than the possibility there may be an soft squishy human there.
So it's that simple, if you can't stop, you're too fast.
uber auto was at fault IMO, as was the 'driver'. they've been playing catch-up WRT the tech. taking too many risks?
jeez edukator, i hope you're a nicer person in real life than you come across on this forum.
BTW, there is a decent, informed, review of the events here:
http://ideas.4brad.com/it-certainly-looks-bad-uber
by someone directly involved in autonomy.
they’ve been playing catch-up WRT the tech.
They do seem to have taken a few different innovative approaches to that though. Hence the recent court case.
I like how someone says, after watching a video where the events were known “i’d have managed to avoid her”. Sorry, but, no you wouldn’t
I'm guessing you haven't seen the video of a chap driving the same stretch of road at the same time of night?
It appears that visibility was no where near as bad as it seemed to be in the actual video of the incident...
BTW, there is a decent, informed, review of the events here:
http://ideas.4brad.com/it-certainly-looks-bad-uber
/a>by someone directly involved in autonomy.
Very interesting reading. If it turns out the LIDAR was turned off to test effectiveness of just using the other systems, there was only one inattentive operator, and the car was driving at its limit then that is unforgivable.
However, this being the US, the fact she was jaywalking will probably trump all that.
"Epicyclo
If you cannot stop after sighting an obstacle, you’re going too fast for the conditions. That’s regardless of whether you’re an auto car or a driver."
Which is true when there's an obstacle already in the road. When the obstacle walks in front of you it doesn't really apply.
That's not to say it's alright, just that this particular argument doesn't seem to hold up
When the obstacle walks in front of you it doesn’t really apply.
Depends on what you mean by "walks in front" really. Jumps out from hiding then maybe yes. Assuming what was hiding them wasnt something that should make you suspicious (for example a school bus).
If they walk across a multi lane road then despite cursing them should probably be able to avoid them. Speed depending.
In this case the sight lines (if you aint relying on a crap camera with no dynamic range) were reasonable. Not ideal but should have had at least some reaction.
Driver reaction Time is not a black and white science (like most things) but generally, most studies split "having to stop suddenly" events into three broad categories:
"Expected Sudden Braking Requirement"
Sounds a bit contrary, but covers for example driving towards a green traffic light, which you have observed in plenty of time, but know can suddenly change to STOP at any given moment, you just don't know when. In this case, an observant driver is prepared, and reaction times (lights change to start of braking) can be as little as 0.7 seconds latency as the driver may be already coasting up to the lights covering the brake pedal
"Unexpected Sudden Braking Requirement"
Where you have spotted a potential hazard in good time, but it is unusual to actually have to brake. Example is a pedestrian standing on a pavement waiting to cross. Most times, they have seen you, and wait till you have passed, but occasionally they haven't and might step out in front of you. Again, a good driver is watching them and is prepared to have to suddenly stop. In this case however, they are still on the accelerator, and so an extra delay occurs in moving their foot to the brake, and often in deciding if they should not stop, stop, or swerve. Sometimes it's not clear that there will be a collision until rather late (often the "will they won't they" initial step off the pavement happens followed by them wavering having seen you, but then continuing regardless). Average reaction time to these events is considered to be in the order of 1.2 seconds
"Surprise Sudden Braking Requirement"
Here the driver has NO prior warning. You are just driving along and suddenly something is in your way. You did not, nor reasonably could have expected them to be there (like the pedestrian in this current case) They probably have made a poor judgement decision eg choosing a poor crossing place for example. Here reaction time is typically, on average (as shown by the majority of studies) to be around 1.5 seconds.
.
.
In all cases, the time to get to fully developed threshold braking is longer, studies show that for most drivers that takes an additional 300ms, assuming they do eventually press the brakes hard enough to get to max retardation (many tests and studies have shown that most drivers not only don't know what "full braking" actually is, are unaware of how hard they need to press the brakes to achieve it, and can be 'spooked' into lifting off the brakes when the ABS kicks in)
You need to post some links, Maxtorque.
How about the ruler test someone mentioned above
20cm is about 200ms. Have ago
How about learning to drive sites. There's one below somewhere
How about the debates about jump starts in formula one (drivers generally take about a quarter of a second to react so less is suspect).
What about in other disciplines such as music. Most rock is between 140 and 170 bpm so three down picks a second for Chuck Berry and he still corrects left hand fluffs between beats.
I've been watching old motorsport vids today with tenth of second clocks running. Drivers react to errors or the unexpected in about 0.3 seconds.
Rather than talking about studies, link us some because your times fly in the face of traditional wisdom taught to learners the world over. It's conservative so as not to be misleading and cause road users to be overly optimistic.
https://www.permisdeconduire-online.be/snelheidwet6.htm
And getting back to the Uber car then if the woman was pushing the bike at walking pace then she was in the road for 4-5 seconds before the car hit her so even using your slow reaction times a calculation says a normally vigilant driver would have been stopped or travelling very slowly. The Uber car didn't react at all.
You're very happy to marvel at cars that do 0-100kmh in 5 seconds but won't believe drivers can stop a car from half that. A Tesla will reach 35mph in under two seconds and almost any modern car will stop from 35mph in under 2 seconds.
Have you founf the post where peoplesaid the car was not at fault yet?
Honestly I'd have to agree with maxtorque there, it correlates highly with what I see everyday,
F1, you ar are anticipating the green light it WILL happen, nobody drives around with that level of anticipation
Ruler test again you KNOW it WILL happen
If a random stranger across the street threw a ruler at you would you catch it? Are you prepared for anyone to throw a ruler at you at any point?
Every day thereis evidence that people do not react in time.
Oh my God. Circular argument is circular.
Edukator; you can’t compare reaction times of highly alert racing drivers to everyday joe drivers in mundane situations. It would be useful if you actually explained what exactly you disagree with of Maxtorques assertions. You actually seem to agree on a lot of points.
Maxtorque; I think it’s fair to say (and I think you agree) that the Uber technology failed badly. I think it’s also fair to say that a competent driver, paying a normal amount of attention could have at least started to take evasive action; which would have undoubtedly increased the survivability of the incident. If the driver could see much further, due to vastly superior dynamic range of the human eye, than the poor dash cam footage suggests, then it would make it even more likely that an attention paying human could have avoided or mitigated the collision.
So could a computer controlled car. The question is why didn’t it?
and that’s for Uber to answer, probably in court.
[i]v8ninety wrote:[/i]
Maxtorque; I think it’s fair to say (and I think you agree) that the Uber technology failed badly. I think it’s also fair to say that a competent driver, paying a normal amount of attention could have at least started to take evasive action; which would have undoubtedly increased the survivability of the incident. If the driver could see much further, due to vastly superior dynamic range of the human eye, than the poor dash cam footage suggests, then it would make it even more likely that an attention paying human could have avoided or mitigated the collision.
So could a computer controlled car. The question is why didn’t it?
As one of the more vociferous supporters of autonomous cars earlier in this thread, I have to agree with all that - given the evidence we now have it seems likely a human paying attention would have done better (though of course we come back to how much attention the average human pays - the actions of the safety driver tends to be evidence in favour of fully automated cars, ones which work properly!) The automated car did a rubbish job - TBH any decent implementation should have spotted the woman and stopped. I'm still not sure whether an average driver would have avoided the collision, but an autonomous car should do much better than an average driver.
This certainly isn't evidence against autonomous cars, but it is evidence that Uber need to do a much better job, and likely that they are criminally negligent (as is the "safety" driver).
This certainly isn’t evidence against autonomous cars, but it is evidence that Uber need to do a much better job, and likely that they are criminally negligent
That's very much my thoughts on the situation. The mobile phone video posted early in the thread by an independent person showed that visibility was good.
The pedestrian was already half way if not more across the multi lane road with no other traffic complications.
And darkness /shadow wouldn't have affected the radar /vidar or whatever it's called, so something was clearly very wrong with the scenario, and it wasn't the bored human driver.
I can't help but think the rush to market, and the relaxed acceptance criteria for live road tests in that region are the real reasons for that poor woman getting mowed down.
I guess you don't like me then Edukator? Is it because you feel threaten by me that you feel you need to attack and insult me in every post you make?
Anyway, back on topic:
It's not about me (how i drive) or about you (how you drive) it's about how an average person drives, and there are plenty of Reaction time studies (google them) to back up the figures i have suggested above.
Of course an F1 driver can react to the "Lights" in less than 1 second. Drag racers can even react BEFORE the lights change by pre-empting that change. However, that is completely irrelevant to how the average person drives, especially when the thing to which they are reacting is completely unexpected.
I have made an attempt to describe these facts, with some objective figures where ever possible, and you just call me names and insult me. Well thanks, but no thanks.
Please don't insult me again.
TBH any decent implementation should have spotted the woman and stopped
All we know is that car didn't stop. We don't know why. It's entirely possible the car did see her and for whatever reason, decided not to stop.
We don’t know why. It’s entirely possible the car did see her and for whatever reason,
Exactly. I would take a wild guess that the reason was that that something failed (hardware or software) as can't believe such an oversight was known (or didn't come up in testing) yet the car was still released for use on the road.
Even after another 10-20 years of development where they will clearly be better than any driver there will still be accidents (things go wrong, software or hardware, and not every single situation can be accounted for)
Taking the UK, if the deaths dropped from 1700 to 100 per year that would be a success. Not sure why anyone would be against that progress and highlight the 100 deaths as being the reason we shouldn't have Autonomous vehicles
^thats very much my view. The other thing is, each serious failure will be studied and learnt from and improvements can be rolled out fairly quickly across the whole fleet, whereas when a human driver cocks up, people just shrug and ignore it.
From the link above:
http://ideas.4brad.com/it-certainly-looks-bad-uber
/a>
Uber needs to say why this did not happen. I have seen one report -- just a rumour from somebody who spoke to an un-named insider, that the LIDAR was off in order to test operations using just camera and radar. While that might explain partly what happened, it is hard to excuse. Even if you want to do such tests -- many teams are trying to build vehicles with no LIDAR -- the LIDAR should remain on as a backup, triggering braking in exactly this sort of situation when the other systems have failed for some reason, or at least triggering a warning to the safety driver. It would be highly unwise to just turn it off.
And from this BBC link:
http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-43523286
Our Lidar can see perfectly well in the dark, as well as it sees in daylight, producing millions of points of information.
However, it is up to the rest of the system to interpret and use the data to make decisions. We do not know how the Uber system of decision-making works.
The other youtube video's showing how well lit that road is are pretty damning for both Uber and for anyone who's attempting to argue there wouldn't have been time for a human driver to react.
Based on those video's and how good the visibility actually was, then I'm 100% sure I wouldn't have killed that woman if I'd been driving.
Northwind
...Which is true when there’s an obstacle already in the road. When the obstacle walks in front of you it doesn’t really apply...
Which gets back to my comment on probability versus possibility.
Gambling on the probability of there being nothing on the road in poor visibility conditions (usually a safe bet), as opposed to driving based on the possibility of something appearing.
If you can't react safely in the range of your visibility (and that includes peripheral), you're going too fast.
who is actually mad enough to get into a coffin on wheels with a bit of software in charge?
About 3.5 billion a year as far as i can tell. ;o) And most of them are several thousand metres up. 😉
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you are kidding rigght?
Comparing a highly regulated system of trained pilots and air traffic controllers with multiple safeguards with a bunch of drivers trying to deliver parcels, do the school run, tweeting and god knows what else that have completed a driving test which is a minimum standard that they probably passed many years ago...
...has got to be one of dumbest things I've heard in a while 😉
carry on .
As ever "theory of errors" there are multiple mistakes and errors here no one of which is wholly responsible.
the woman walked in front of a car
the autonomous systems failed / were turned off
The "driver" was not paying attention
I am interested in how errors happen in my (nuring) world. anytime you do analysis there is always a string of errors that when they ocur individually cause no issues but when they occur together you get catastrophe
"A human would have been able to react"
Lets say it again shall we, repeat after me everyone:
THERE. WAS. A. HUMAN. IN. THE. CAR
And even worse, they were there with the explicit understanding that they were the FAILSAFE. They had the overall responsibility to prevent the autonomy from causing an accident! And worse, they were PAID to be there!
It wasn't someone just driving to pick their kids up from school, someone nipping down the shops for a newspaper. no, it was someone who was driving to achieve a task where the driving was "secondary", their entire raison d'être was to be there as back up.
And they failed. For exactly the same reasons that un-assisted human drivers regularly fail, they also failed.
Arguing that an average human driver would have easily avoided this accident is silly, because we have already proven without doubt that in this case, the human driver did not avoid this accident!
However, for the avoidance of any doubt, I am not saying that under idealised conditions an alert, skilled,observant driver, couldn't have at the very least mitigated the severity of the impact. An F1 driver driving that car with a much higher experience and skill level may well have spotted the pedestrain earlier, braked quicker, braked harder, precisely severed around them, but, inevitably, it wasn't an F1 driver in the driving seat. In fact his case proves the very reason we need Autonomy in the first place, which is "average human drivers" are not actually very good at driving.
Like most accidents, there is unlikely to be a single cause, and there will be multiple small affectors (the swiss cheese model) where any of which being removed would have prevented the accident occurring:
Until all the facts are known, there is no way to know what was the most important factor. But as i have said before, the difference this time is that, thanks to this being an autonomous vehicle we do have objective data from which to make a valid conclusion, and that conclusion can then be used to prevent the same accident occurring again!
Arguing that an average human driver would have easily avoided this accident is silly, because we have already proven without doubt that in this case, the human driver did not avoid this accident!
No we havent. What was proved was someone couldnt switch from being an observer to being a driver.
Note that the observer role has several aspects not just monitoring the road for missed obstacles but also monitoring the vehicle readouts. They also have to deal with an even more high probability of getting distracted than the average driver since they have more excuses.
But as i have said before, the difference this time is that, thanks to this being an autonomous vehicle we do have objective data from which to make a valid conclusion
Maybe, maybe not. Depends on whether the issue can be identified. It is also quite possible even if it is solved then it will be applicable only for Uber and, of course, could introduce a dozen new bugs.
The dude sitting in the car shouldn't have been pissing around with his phone. If the video is accurate then it looks like the cars lights were turned off, no car has a low beam that is that poor.
Surely uber should vet who they are hiring for something as important as this project.
While it seems that the observer in the car should have been behaving as a driver it's very clear that they were not - so it's just plain stupid to use them being there as validation therefore that a driver couldn't have avoided the collision.
The dashcam footage shows the observer, in the time leading up to the impact, as looking away from the road for over 5 seconds. Before that they'd have a quick look having previously been looking away from the road for over 7 seconds. Now it is possible a very reckless driver looking at their phone might have done the same, however if they did then they'd very likely (in the UK at least) to be charged with causing death by reckless.- particularly if they were also speeding at the time. I'm pretty sure that, if they were in the UK, that observer would be going back to jail. Arizona does seem very keen to have the driverless car testing done there though...
The dude sitting in the car shouldn’t have been pissing around with his phone. If the video is accurate then it looks like the cars lights were turned off, no car has a low beam that is that poor.
The video gives a pretty bad idea of the lights - apparently as standard the dipped beam on the Volvo that was involved should light even a pitch black road clearly for about 4 seconds worth of driving at 38mph - not the 1.5 seconds or so that the video implies.
Lets say it again shall we, repeat after me everyone:
THERE. WAS. A. HUMAN. IN. THE. CAR
But the point is: THE. HUMAN. WASN'T. DRIVING
The computer driving the car must have been distracted.. checking it's Facebook or twitter feed rather than using its processing power for actually driving..
They were supposed to be though. In the same way that the human is driving when in a car with lane assist and active cruise control. Ultimately it's the human who is responsible and they failed. Not the only thing to fail, though you do wonder if the car was in a standard mode and this accident could have happened any time, it's just that as with bad human drivers they'd been lucky to avoid such situations.
I'm not sure I agree with all of maxtorque's post - given other videos available I'm now thinking I'd have avoided that collision if I'd been driving - but he's right that this is also evidence of the need for fully autonomous cars, given there are already vehicles on the road with enough assists to encourage drivers to act in the same way as here.
Ultimately it’s the human who is responsible and they failed.
I am not so sure. Its going to be natural for someone to lose concentration in that sort of scenario.
Its poor design that the car was operating at level 3 but doesnt seem to have anything in place to ensure the operator is prepared to take over. Especially since Uber had cut back to a single operator rather than a pair.
given there are already vehicles on the road with enough assists to encourage drivers to act in the same way as here.
Or you make sure those assists are restricted in usage and the driver is forced to remain fully active.
I do think level 3 should be banned. Go from limited 2 to 4.
[i]dissonance wrote:[/i]
Ultimately it’s the human who is responsible and they failed.
I am not so sure. Its going to be natural for someone to lose concentration in that sort of scenario.
Well exactly, they failed. That it's natural doesn't change that they failed, because that was their job.
Or you make sure those assists are restricted in usage and the driver is forced to remain fully active.
Horse has already bolted.
Well exactly, they failed. That it’s natural doesn’t change that they failed, because that was their job.
But they were always going to fail. How the MMI functions is every bit as important as the algorithms used and the performance of the sensors. It is an integral part of the driverless car issue. Uber have effectively ignored it.
That it’s natural doesn’t change that they failed, because that was their job.
It shows that the job description was wrong for all but a few. So a failure of recruitment and the safety processes used,
Epicsteve
The video gives a pretty bad idea of the lights – apparently as standard the dipped beam on the Volvo that was involved should light even a pitch black road clearly for about 4 seconds worth of driving at 38mph – not the 1.5 seconds or so that the video implies.
Which makes me wonder if the video hasn't been doctored to make it look darker so that the bike appeared more suddenly.
Was the video released by Uber or by the police from an original unedited recording?
What's going to happen when autonomous cars start getting a few years old? You know, dirty sensors, electrical failures of sensors etc? It happens with other sensors in a car, so why not with those?
(I'm not against self driving cars, I welcome them because in a few years time I'll probably be of an age where I shouldn't be behind the wheel.)
dissonance
Its poor design that the car was operating at level 3 but doesnt seem to have anything in place to ensure the operator is prepared to take over. Especially since Uber had cut back to a single operator rather than a pair.
Where did you find out that it was level 3?
I do think level 3 should be banned. Go from limited 2 to 4.
As I understand it (might be wrong) level 3 autonomy is limited by GPS which monitors speed and location to determine when it's safe for the car to take over. So below 40mph, outside the city, it'll take over, at least those are the parameters Audi are using.
What’s going to happen when autonomous cars start getting a few years old? You know, dirty sensors, electrical failures of sensors etc? It happens with other sensors in a car, so why not with those?
They'll probably have to develop some kind of annual road worthiness testing procedure for cars over a certain age.
[i]epicyclo wrote:[/i]
Which makes me wonder if the video hasn’t been doctored to make it look darker so that the bike appeared more suddenly.
Probably just a cheap sensor in the dashcam which isn't good in low light.
What’s going to happen when autonomous cars start getting a few years old? You know, dirty sensors, electrical failures of sensors etc? It happens with other sensors in a car, so why not with those?
I guess they'll have to make them so they self test and detect failures (and poor performance because they need cleaning) and don't let the car operate if there's a problem.
jimjam
...They’ll probably have to develop some kind of annual road worthiness testing procedure for cars over a certain age...
Aye, I thought of that. The MoT is good at spotting physical deterioration in mechanical devices, but electronic stuff usually doesn't show signs of degradation, just goes phhht.
There's going to need to be some continuous self- testing procedure - or failsafe redundancy.
Who do Uber and Google (and the rest) need to convince that driverless cars are safe? Is there an automotive version of the FAA and CAA?
There’s going to need to be some continuous self- testing procedure – or failsafe redundancy.
Yep and unlike now where you can drive off with sensors telling you that a heap of stuff isn't working.
And a quick Google tells me that a branch of the federal government in the US approves them. Basically same as everything else.
Where did you find out that it was level 3?
They said the operator was expected to take over at any time which would put it at level 3. Although probability is they were hoping it would actually be a 4/5.
As I understand it (might be wrong) level 3 autonomy is limited by GPS
Its all a bit vague. However that sounds more like level 4 which is where the car can be fully trusted within certain a geofenced area. So can drive itself round a major town but not your local village.
Level 3 is the car can handle it but the driver must be ready to take over. Which in my eyes is a real danger. Since if the shit hits the fan chances of any normal person being capable of coming fully alert, analysing the situation and then responding sensibly is pretty much zero.
Audi are saying their one is a level 3. They might have used some geofencing etc as well though. The rules aint set in stone.
uber's testing suspended in arizona as of last night.
So they've carried on testing until now rather than suspending immediately? 😮
Suspended by the state.