Tesla Whistleblower Says ‘Autopilot’ System Is Not Safe Enough To Be Used On Public Roads::“It affects all of us because we are essentially experiments in public roads.”

  • cm0002@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    I lost all trust in their ‘Autopilot’ the day I read Musk said (Paraphrasing) “All we need are cameras, there’s no need for secondary/tertiary LIDAR or other expensive setups”

    Like TFYM? No backups?? Or backups to the backups?? On a life fucking critical system?!

    • mosiacmango@lemm.ee
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      1 year ago

      The crazier and stupier shit was that part of his justification was that “people drive and they only have eyes. We should be able to do the same.”

      Its a stunningly idiotic justification, and yet here we are with millions of these “eyes only” teslas on the road.

    • Ottomateeverything@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      or other expensive setups

      As much as I lost trust in his bullshittery a long time ago, his need to mention the cost of critical safety systems is what stuck out to me the most here. That’s how you know the priorities are backwards.

        • AlexWIWA@lemmy.ml
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          1 year ago

          Hell every iphone has lidar and the pro models have two lidar cameras. The tech is not very expensive, epecially not for a $80,000 car.

          My partner’s econobox has lidar for its cruise control, but Tesla can’t seem to figure out how to make it work.

          • Sondermotor@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            Hell every iphone has lidar and the pro models have two lidar cameras. The tech is not very expensive, epecially not for a $80,000 car.

            Around the time Elon made the claim Lidar for automotive purposes was quite expensive. That additional cost would make the self driving product a lot less desirable. Up selling cruise control into “self driving” earned them a lot of money.

            Funnily enough all other aspects where Tesla has taken the expensive option the cult retail investors would claim it was brilliant decisions because economy of scale would kick in and make it cheaper in the long run.

            Lidar was obviously exempt from any such scale and future tech improvements, because reasons.

            My partner’s econobox has lidar for its cruise control, but Tesla can’t seem to figure out how to make it work.

            It could be very expensive for Tesla to start using Lidar, because they’ve sold a lot of cars with the promise that they have the hardware for self driving. Retrofitting a million cars would not only cost a lot in terms of gear and work, but it would put additional stress on an already poor service network.

            They have painted themselves into a corner. All because leadership thought self driving was a more or less solved problem almost a decade ago.

            • AlexWIWA@lemmy.ml
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              1 year ago

              Good point. I thought Teslas had radar for awhile though and they took it out?

              Was lidar that expensive in a car though? Because Infiniti started adding it in 2014 for the cruise control and those cars usually sell new for $50k if you get it fully loaded.

              And they could have added radar and sonar to assist the cameras at least. The radar couldn’t give 3d data, but it could say “yo bro that’s a solid object, not the skyline” at least.

              Good point on the promises though. They really fucked themselves with Elon’s claims.

              • Sondermotor@lemmy.world
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                1 year ago

                I thought Teslas had radar for awhile though and they took it out?

                They decided radar was superfluous at one point during the pandemic. By sheer coincidence by the time supply chains were getting fucked. Hitting delivery targets were more important than safety.

                And they could have added radar and sonar to assist the cameras at least. The radar couldn’t give 3d data, but it could say “yo bro that’s a solid object, not the skyline” at least.

                They did do that. It can be pretty difficult to make sense of conflicting data like that. Tesla may have decided to not bother to solve such issues and hope less sensor data makes it easier to interpret.

                This is what Elon had to say about Tesla’s sophisticated radar data interpretation capabilities in 2016:

                In fact, an additional level of sophistication – we are confident that we can use the radar to look beyond the car in front of you by bouncing the radar signal off the road and around the car. We are able to process that echo by using the unique signature of each radar pulse as well as the time of flight of the photon to determine  that what we are seeing is in fact an echo in front of the car that’s in front of you. So even if there’s something that was obscured directly both in vision and radar, we can use the bounce effect of the radar to look in front of that car and still brake.

                It takes things to another level of safety.

                I guess the ability to see around cars in front of you got lost in some software update along the line. Otherwise removing radar necessarily meant reducing the safety of the system, or Elon lied in 2016.

                Was lidar that expensive in a car though? Because Infiniti started adding it in 2014 for the cruise control and those cars usually sell new for $50k if you get it fully loaded.

                It depends on what you want to do with the sensors. Somewhat accurately mapping what’s immediately in front of the car to slightly improve speed matching and false positive/negative rates for emergency breaking comes at a cheaper price than the capability to fully map the surroundings fast and accurately enough for a computer to make correct decisions.

    • chitak166@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      To be fair, humans have proven all you need are visual receptors to navigate properly.

      • Maalus@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        To be fair, current computers / AI / whatever marketing name you call them aren’t as good as human brains.

        • chitak166@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          No, but they can be improved to the point where all that’s necessary are cameras and the means to control the vehicle.

              • Maalus@lemmy.world
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                1 year ago

                No, they don’t and that’s the entire point in all of this. Tesla autopilot sucks and it will suck and kill people. But fanboys like you would rather “look to the future” instead of realistically looking at it.

      • cm0002@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago
        1. And how many vehicle accidents and deaths are there today? Proven that humans suck at driving maybe

        2. No we don’t, we use sight, sound and touch/feeling to drive at a minimum

        • chitak166@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Touch? Sure, barely. But you can drive without being able to hear.

          I’d also wager you can get a license if you have that rare disease that prevents you from feeling. Since, you know, how little we use touch and hearing to drive.

          But hey? Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe you can provide a source that says you can’t get licensed if you have that disease or if you’re deaf. That would prove your point. Otherwise, it proves mine.

      • ImFresh3x@sh.itjust.works
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        1 year ago

        Uhhhh…

        …any level 4 car actually, according to the federal governments and all the agencies who regulate this stuff.

        NAVYA, Volvo/Audi, Mercedes, magna, baidu, Waymo.

        Tesla isn’t even trying to go past level 3 at this point.

        • Gargantu8@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Why the fuck did I get down voted for looking for an ev Tesla alternative… This place makes no sense. Are you all Tesla fan boys or what?

          • chakan2@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            It sounded like sarcasm rather than an honest question. Like “Find me a better autopilot” rather than “What manufacturer would you recommend for autopilot?”

            • Gargantu8@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              It… sounded?? How does my question not appear genuine? I literally just asked a question. I want to buy an EV with excellent software in the next few years. That’s it. No sarcasm. Would prefer not a Tesla.

              • n3m37h@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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                1 year ago

                I took it as condescending, just poorly written. Also lots of Tesla fanboys on here. Glad your not

                • Gargantu8@lemmy.world
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                  1 year ago

                  So condescending to ask for a better technology option with multiple sensors. /s

      • AlexWIWA@lemmy.ml
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        1 year ago

        A 2014 Infiniti can drive itself more safely on the highway than a Tesla. The key here is they didn’t lie about the cars capabilities so they didn’t encourage complacency.

        In the city though, yeah you’ll need to look at other level 4 cars.

      • chakan2@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        What brand of car has better autopilot with other sensors?

        All of them. The other automakers didn’t fire their engineers during a hissy fit.