Robocars - Autonomous Drive, Self-driving, Driver-less cars

You'll be banned before you can say 'pie'.

One of the most stupid things about self-driving cars may be that 'interference' in what will be perceived as an optimised 'system' will be tolerated increasingly less.

I'll be dead before they ban me from the roads.

If self-driving cars come along and they're the non-owned roaming type everyone is talking about, then all the road-side parking space that pricks use now will be freed and there's your cycling lane.

Also, since they have to cater for bikes and peds during the 'introduction' phase, they will be able to cope going forward. Why would they then remove the ability for the cars to deal with peds and bikes - they're not going to suddenly disappear from roads.

This is interesting. Autonomous vehicles and their moral dilemmas

http://moralmachine.mit.edu/

Anyone watch the Guy Martin thing?

Ah, that's why it's been floating around the internet then. Didn't catch that, but saw this under a tweet talking about Guy Martin.

I retweeted that just now. I didn't watch the show but have it on the tivo

Uber self driving car - avec driver - killed woman.

It's confusing, some say pedestrian, some say cyclist.

Ask the software :-S

Ah:

Following up on my earlier tweet, Uber car was in autonomous mode with
a human safety driver and it struck a woman (not a bicyclist) who
walked into street. She has died. We think this is the first
pedestrian killed by an autonomous vehicle. Uber is cooperating. Story
coming

https://twitter.com/daiwaka/status/975771533745336320

It's confusing, some say pedestrian, some say cyclist.

It was a homeless woman walking across the street with a bicycle which had bags hanging from it (an unfortunately not too uncommon a sight)..

Initial indications seem to indicate that not only could the accident not have been avoided but the control driver was busy playing with, what seems to be, their smartphone. When, if ever, was a disengagement attempted?

(here are, for example, the log of disengagements in CA last year: https://www.dmv.ca.gov/portal/dmv/detail/vr/autonomous/disengagement_report_2017 )

Sensors should have picked her up so the question is now: did the car try to stop or slow or did it just "plow through" her? The control data (sensor data, CAN bus data etc.) should be able to help fully reconstruct things.
Right now I have only seen-- as everyone else-- the dashcam footage: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/mar/22/video-released-of-uber-self-driving-crash-that-killed-woman-in-arizona

Is a video from the crash, would appear uber want to incriminate the guy asap.

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/mar/22/video-released-of-uber-self-driving-crash-that-killed-woman-in-arizona

The guy? The 'driver' you mean?

Looking at the video I'd say it must be more of a technical error than a human. How could the car not see the victim?

I'm wondering why, given you can see naff all with dipped headlights, the car's OS or the 'operator' neither switched to full beam or slowed the vehicle down.

Yeah I get it the car doesn't need the light to 'see' but the operator does.

I think that's just the low light of the webcam they use for evidence collecting, not the actual human/car view of the road. @Velocio posted on twitter an image of that road showing it was well lit.

The guy? The 'driver' you mean?

She's not a guy.

The comparison image is this:

The top image from a higher end dash cam... still not an awesome camera, but one which lets in more light and has a better sensor.

The bottom image is from the Uber car... and is unlikely to be an input to the self-driving car, it's merely a cheap dashcam with a very crappy camera.

The road itself is a well-lit urban road, and conditions were good.

So the car should've managed it fine? Sure the 'driver' is partly at fault, but the car should've avoided the crash, no?

This asks some interesting moral questions. As it's a computer, it's much harder to accept it as the human factor isn't at play.

Super hard question, but do you think the 'driver' or the car is responsible here?

Uber is responsible. The vehicles is not fit for purpose. The safety driver is not fit for purpose.

Tech site comment sections are going hard on victim blaming, saying she should have had wheel reflectors and reflective clothing and that 'she was jaywalking' as if that excuses anything. Shouldn't the car detect her whether she was lit up like a Christmas tree or not? This is supposed to be able to stop for a deer bounding into the road, right? And it can't recognise a woman purposefully walking a bike over. I even saw a comment saying 'this looks like a suicide if anything'. Yeah that makes sense, typical suicidal behaviour of walking slowly into a road with a bike so its ghost can join you in the afterlife and give you something to ride around on.

Yeah been arguing about it on twitter. Fucking cretins.

As I pointed out - she'd crossed an entire lane already, not just jumped off a curb. The car was speeding and the 'safety tosser' was totally oblivious.

Shouldn't the radar or lidar pick out a pedestrian in front of the car?

Yes it absolutely should...if it was turned on and working.

Yes. Uber probably felt they didn't need that tech though, they had their safety driver...