I'll just say that to my knowledge we still can't beat the eyes/ears with sensors. They can be better at very specific things, for instance a microphone tuned to 40Khz, but for overall use, humans are still way better at sensing things.
I'll just say that to my knowledge we still can't beat the eyes/ears with sensors. They can be better at very specific things, for instance a microphone tuned to 40Khz, but for overall use, humans are still way better at sensing things.
In reply to tuna55:
I don't think that is even close to true.
Humans MAY be better at INTERPRETING the things they sense, but they are not better at sensing things.
Visual sensors can read in greater resolution, and magnify. Audio sensors can hear frequencies human ears are not capable of. IR, radar, GPS, radiowave, microwave, proximity sensors, inter-car communications, mapping technologies, thermal scan, etc. etc. are all ways in which computers can sense things, which humans are incapable of.
But better interpretation of data is just more programming- and the exponential advancement of computer data interpretation makes the interpretation only a SHORT matter of time.
SVreX wrote: In reply to Aspen: I don't see it. The range of available input sensors is far greater than the human eye and ear, the resolution can be significantly better, and the reaction time for any response is much better. Regardless of the driving condition, I think properly equipped autonomous cars should outperform their human counterparts on all measures. There may be a predetermined liability threshold which basically says "Unsafe conditions", but those conditions would be more unsafe with a human driver. If a driver chooses to override, it's just a dumb decision, like any other dumb human driver decision.
We will see. Currently the Tesla can't distinguish a while tractor trailer from a light background. Add in a snow packed road, 3 foot snow banks and a decent amount of falling snow and see what it can detect. I think you are correct that an array of various sensors tied together with GPS might be the ticket, but how much would that cost and how well will they all integrate reliably? IIRC it was Google that said that winter/snow was a no go for now at least.
In reply to Aspen:
I think the cost is thoroughly inconsequential.
A couple years ago I did a cost analysis- as a small business owner with a people transport business, I was asking myself what price point would an autonomous car need to be at to be profitable for me.
After figuring differences in labor costs, insurance costs, maintenance, fuel efficiency, increased productivity, increased market share, the price point I came up with was $150,000.
I figured if I could buy an autonomous car, I could make it profitable even if I had to pay $150K for it. No amount of sensor array is going to bring the cost anywhere near that.
And Tesla is a bad example. They put something on the road before it was ready, just to prove they could. Ford won't do that.
Uber is starting "driverless" cars in Pittsburgh THIS MONTH- they are Ford Fusions. Sounds to me like Ford is further along then people give them credit.
alfadriver wrote:STM317 wrote: In reply to alfadriver: Sorry for steering it off the course you intended? What did you want to talk about?It's one thing to think about the technology, and consider it's impact on us, and society. But to stretch that into a prediction that cars will be banned?? I don't see that move.
I don't want to start an argument (really I don't), but I need to point out that that's not what I predicted.
So, in the early 1900s people moved from horses to the thing that scared horses. Repeat 100 years later? And while it's a big change it doesn't all happen at one time. The tough part will be the transition and mixing of modes.
In reply to STM317:
So when you post this
That, and they're protecting themselves from a time in the future when owning a vehicle controlled by a sack of meat could become legislated/priced out of reason for the vast majority of the buying public.
You don't actually mean that cars being driven by a sack of meat being legislated/priced out of the majority of buying public isn't banning cars.
Seems pretty close.
Even still, it's a prediction of the future without cars, as I read it.
I never see that happening, anyway- personal mobility has always been a big deal to this country. Instead of banning cars because of their direct impact on society and the environment, rules were put in place to keep the mobility and not harm everything. Even in places that have the best of the best public transportation, there are cars available. And the notion of "sharing" cars will only cover a part of society- not all of it.
Where it helps the most is that the US can use it's freeway system as kind of a light rail system without having to build it. And with CO2 output being tightened considerably- IF the system is optimized, we (the US) can use the system that we have in place and not even need a major public transportation system that isn't there at the moment.
In reply to alfadriver: Let me draw your attention to my post on page 2 immediately before your post complaining about the direction of the thread. You must've been so lathered up to complain about my prediction of a "dystopian future" that you missed that post because the very first sentence says "I'm not suggesting the government will make it illegal to operate your own vehicle...but there are ways owning a current vehicle could be dis-incentivized" and then I go on to talk about ways that owning a manually driven vehicle could be difficult and expensive in the automated future. Nothing there about "banning cars".
OldGray320i wrote: 12 years ago, there was a project at my old job that required a terabyte of memory, but it wasn't available. Now you're buying multiples of terabytes for your laptop or iPad.
Sorry, but I don't believe that. I am assuming a high end server can have a TB of RAM but not an ipad.
As for the cars, until they can drive on roads with no lines or signs, while in a blinding rain/snow storm they will not work in rural area. If we are forced to own cars that can't do that then some years peaple will go broke from all the work they missed.
In reply to STM317 and alfadriver:
Don't worry so much about who's right or who's wrong on this. It's a good conversation. Defensiveness and arguing is a distraction.
Here's another thought on the unpredictable 19 year old driver (or other erratic driver)...
Maybe autonomous cars COULD predict them better than human drivers...
What if they were "tagged" by the system? There could be registration requirements for new drivers (like current graduated licensing systems) that identified them as a new driver, even if they were not driving an autonomous car. A GPS locator (on their phone, the car's computer, or a chip in their license) would identify their location, and autonomous cars could then use "extra caution mode" when in their proximity.
Too much "Big Brother"? OK. The autonomous cars could do it themselves...
Just as human drivers currently have to identify erratic drivers and make decisions about driving near them, autonomous cars would have to. But when human drivers pass an erratic driver, they go on their merry way, and the next guy has to figure it out for himself. Hundreds of individual drivers all have to make separate decisions, until the idiot hits someone.
An autonomous car could make the determination that a car was driving erratically, then notify the ENTIRE autonomous fleet. Individual cars would not have to make decisions. Once warned by another autonomous vehicle, they could just stay away.
If the car is horribly erratic, or identified by multiple autonomous cars, the system could notify authorities, and he could be arrested and gotten off the road before he hurts someone.
SVreX wrote: Here's another thought on the unpredictable 19 year old driver (or other erratic driver)... Maybe autonomous cars COULD predict them better than human drivers... What if they were "tagged" by the system? There could be registration requirements for new drivers (like current graduated licensing systems) that identified them as a new driver, even if they were not driving an autonomous car. A GPS locator (on their phone, the car's computer, or a chip in their license) would identify their location, and autonomous cars could then use "extra caution mode" when in their proximity. Too much "Big Brother"? OK. The autonomous cars could do it themselves... Just as human drivers currently have to identify erratic drivers and make decisions about driving near them, autonomous cars would have to. But when human drivers pass an erratic driver, they go on their merry way, and the next guy has to figure it out for himself. Hundreds of individual drivers all have to make separate decisions, until the idiot hits someone. An autonomous car could make the determination that a car was driving erratically, then notify the ENTIRE autonomous fleet. Individual cars would not have to make decisions. Once warned by another autonomous vehicle, they could just stay away. If the car is horribly erratic, or identified by multiple autonomous cars, the system could notify authorities, and he could be arrested and gotten off the road before he hurts someone.
I think autonomous cars will do all of those things, and possibly add a couple more. Since they can be connected with the vehicle with the erratic driver in question, the autonomous cars can have the signal that the driver hit the brake (or lifted from the gas) as soon as the car being driven does. The autonomous cars surrounding a human driven car - and all other cars really - can be on a connected network knowing each other's control inputs.
It's still not predicting, but it is shaving a whole ton of reaction times (steering input to rack movement, wheel direction change to tire reaction, suspension movement, and finally change if direction of vehicle for other drivers to see).
In reply to STM317:
Mixed messages are confusing. Even if you say that you are not implying that cars will be made non legal, it was a clear prediction of the future where cars are no longer available to everyone. For a board like this- not exactly a positive prediction.
In reply to alfadriver:
Doesn't matter. Can we move on?
In reply to SVreX:
Plus, computers have no ego. We tend to see someone on the road driving erratically and think, "oh, I don't need to slow down and adjust my speed to avoid this idiot - I'll just try to squeeze past and glare at them."
A computer, on the other hand, can simply be programed to stay away from idiots. Might get to your destination a little later, but with a better chance of actually getting there.
I can definitely imagine a time where human-driven cars become the minority and are restricted to secondary roads and insurance premiums start pushing more people to not physically own a car, but to use an Uber-type service. I don't think the classic car hobby will go away, it'll just be different.
You'll need to log in to post.
