Random Thought Thread v2

[Brupal]

People can object to self-driving vehicles for many reasons, but once they are prevalent accidents, damage, injuries and deaths due to impaired driving will drop tremendously. Around 15,000 drunk driving deaths occur in North America each year. How is this still condoned? As soon as it is proven to be much safer than human drivers, insurance companies will practically require all vehicles to use self driving software. And the companies that developed it can license the technology to other car manufacturers. And one day the cost to ride in a self driving robotaxi could be so low (maybe 50 cents per km?) that the decision to hop in one versus driving your own vehicle (especially if the possibility that alcohol might be consumed during that outing) clearly favours the robotaxi.

[Fuzz]

K.

You know you don't have to repeat everything Musk tells you, right? You, uh, understand he just makes a lot of #### up. I can tell you haven't used your own thinking machine, and are just repeating tripe at the part where you say all cars will be self driving, but then you would get drunk and take a "robotaxi" instead of your own self driving car. Or maybe you'd just prefer to vomit in someone else's car.

Also, no company would be dumb enoguh to license Tesla's garbage. That's just stock pumping nonsense.

[Brupal]

I knew Fuzz would be the first poster to comment. How can you object to the logic of fixing the problem of drunk driving? The premise I proposed is when self driving is safer than human driving then it will become prevalent. Insurance companies will jack up the cost to allow people the privilege to operate their vehicles in a more risky manner than self driving vehicles. At no point did I even mention Tesla or Elon Musk (but credit to you for assuming Tesla might be the company that leads the charge so to speak). Next thing you know Fuzz will be the spokesperson for drunk drivers and how self driving software impinges on their FreeDumbs.

The reason you would take a robotaxi over your own vehicle is because the cost of ownership is so low and the prevalence is so high that calling up a robotaxi that can be in front of your house in five minutes is so convenient. You don’t have to pay for parking or worry about damage or an impaired driving charge. It’s a very real possibility for the future, regardless of your opinion of Tesla or Elon Musk.

[Fuzz]

"At no point did I mention Tesla or Elon Musk except when i used the term most associated with Tesla's self driving car efforts."


I don't oppose self driving and advanced safety features. Some companies are working in the proper manner towards that. I can't wait until I can trust my car to drive for me. What I do oppose is a company that has been claiming for a decade their cars can drive themselves, and permitted anyone dumb enoguh to pay $10k to be beta testers on public roads, with zero instruction on how to beta test, the safety issues involved, and after many repeated failures to follow even the most basic of instructions, not having their ability to risk the lives of other users revoked permanently.


As you said, insurance will be a key indicator. And if you haven't noticed, no insurance company, including Tesla's own, has agreed to take any responsibility for Tesla's "self driving" and until they do, it's all just a Elon Kool-Aid BS. How many more years of being lied to do you need to go before you catch on that he's lying to you?

[CroFlames]

Originally Posted by fotze2

Just saw the jets or whatever for I assume labour day classic. I know nothing but that is quite possibly the coolest sound that has ever existed.

Is there an event where you can watch and listen to that all day? Air show? I would love to hear that roar all day long if possible. Do I have to go to Aleppo or Normandy.

Go to Vegas then drive to the north edge of the city near the race track (tons of parking). F35s and F22s and all manner of whoop-ass taking off from Nellis AFB regularly.

[Brupal]

So you have an axe to grind against Elon Musk and Tesla. We get it. And currently there is no insurance coverage for unsupervised full self driving because at the moment that is currently not available, check. But once self driving is demonstrably better than human driving (does it need to be twice as good? Three times as good? Ten times as good? Because eventually it will be) would you concede that drunk driving will decline? And that outcome alone should be applauded as situations like the one being discussed can be avoided.

Maybe one of your preferred companies that is developing autonomous driving in the proper manner can claim this development first. We can all hope.

[bizaro86]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

"At no point did I mention Tesla or Elon Musk except when i used the term most associated with Tesla's self driving car efforts."


I don't oppose self driving and advanced safety features. Some companies are working in the proper manner towards that. I can't wait until I can trust my car to drive for me. What I do oppose is a company that has been claiming for a decade their cars can drive themselves, and permitted anyone dumb enoguh to pay $10k to be beta testers on public roads, with zero instruction on how to beta test, the safety issues involved, and after many repeated failures to follow even the most basic of instructions, not having their ability to risk the lives of other users revoked permanently.


As you said, insurance will be a key indicator. And if you haven't noticed, no insurance company, including Tesla's own, has agreed to take any responsibility for Tesla's "self driving" and until they do, it's all just a Elon Kool-Aid BS. How many more years of being lied to do you need to go before you catch on that he's lying to you?

Self driving cars are awesome. I use waymo 100% of the time when I'm in San Francisco, and it's great. I think their plan of "put all the sensors to make it work and then iterate to save costs" is way better than Tesla's "put cameras and iterate to get it to work". Wayno works now. And with mass production/tech advances the cost of that sensor package will keep dropping and they'll probably find some are redundant.

I'd love to own a self driving car. I could watch sports on my phone and read cp instead of driving.

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by Brupal

So you have an axe to grind against Elon Musk and Tesla. We get it. And currently there is no insurance coverage for unsupervised full self driving because at the moment that is currently not available, check. But once self driving is demonstrably better than human driving (does it need to be twice as good? Three times as good? Ten times as good? Because eventually it will be) would you concede that drunk driving will decline? And that outcome alone should be applauded as situations like the one being discussed can be avoided.

Maybe one of your preferred companies that is developing autonomous driving in the proper manner can claim this development first. We can all hope.

You are tilting at windmills. I already said I'd love to have self driving vehicles. What do you want me to "concede"? That water is wet? Of course if drunk drivers have an option or requirement for the car to drive them home, drunk driving will go down.

[Brupal]

Interesting that you mentioned costs, Bizaro86. Yes, Waymo currently offers driverless ride sharing, I’m actually envious that you have had the chance to experience it, sadly I have not. We can debate whether using cameras and neural net software is better than cameras and lidar and radar in a different post but when it comes to cost Waymo is at a disadvantage. While it’s true lidar sensors are not overly expensive what happens when you have a conflict between what your lidar sensor says and your camera says? Quick, lives are on the line. You can’t wait, you have to go with one or the other. Which is it going to be? Click - you go with the camera because it sees what is in front of you. That is why Tesla chose to go with camera only driving, because too many inputs can lead to distortion and you have to go with one. But setting the technology aside, currently it costs Tesla approximately $30,000 to make a Model Y which comes equipped with FSD software which Tesla can turn on for free and put that vehicle out into the fleet and start earning robotaxi fares. Whereas Waymo, who doesn’t manufacture its own vehicles, has to buy a Jaguar iPace for about $90,000 (and sadly for Waymo Jaguar no longer makes the iPace), and then Waymo has to buy 13 cameras, 4 lidar sensors and 6 radar sensors, and then it has to retrofit them to the Jaguars (that it didn’t build) before it can add that vehicle to the fleet. Such a platform is not easily scalable. Waymo has approximately 2000 vehicles currently capable of operating as robotaxis. Every model Y that rolls off the assembly line (about one million per year) is ready to go as a robotaxi. Tesla will be able to roll out robotaxis into many cities quickly - much faster than Waymo, and capture market share before the competition can. And given the significant cost advantage, Tesla could charge far less than whatever Waymo chooses to charge, and still do so profitably. I hope Waymo and other companies are able to provide autonomous ride sharing and self driving vehicles, but currently likely only Tesla has the ability to do so profitably and that means they will likely succeed while others may not. We shall see. But along the way our roads will be safer for all of us as fewer impaired and just generally bad drivers are out there.

[PepsiFree]

Elon must have the tastiest boots

[bizaro86]

Originally Posted by Brupal

Interesting that you mentioned costs, Bizaro86. Yes, Waymo currently offers driverless ride sharing, I’m actually envious that you have had the chance to experience it, sadly I have not. We can debate whether using cameras and neural net software is better than cameras and lidar and radar in a different post but when it comes to cost Waymo is at a disadvantage. While it’s true lidar sensors are not overly expensive what happens when you have a conflict between what your lidar sensor says and your camera says? Quick, lives are on the line. You can’t wait, you have to go with one or the other. Which is it going to be? Click - you go with the camera because it sees what is in front of you. That is why Tesla chose to go with camera only driving, because too many inputs can lead to distortion and you have to go with one. But setting the technology aside, currently it costs Tesla approximately $30,000 to make a Model Y which comes equipped with FSD software which Tesla can turn on for free and put that vehicle out into the fleet and start earning robotaxi fares. Whereas Waymo, who doesn’t manufacture its own vehicles, has to buy a Jaguar iPace for about $90,000 (and sadly for Waymo Jaguar no longer makes the iPace), and then Waymo has to buy 13 cameras, 4 lidar sensors and 6 radar sensors, and then it has to retrofit them to the Jaguars (that it didn’t build) before it can add that vehicle to the fleet. Such a platform is not easily scalable. Waymo has approximately 2000 vehicles currently capable of operating as robotaxis. Every model Y that rolls off the assembly line (about one million per year) is ready to go as a robotaxi. Tesla will be able to roll out robotaxis into many cities quickly - much faster than Waymo, and capture market share before the competition can. And given the significant cost advantage, Tesla could charge far less than whatever Waymo chooses to charge, and still do so profitably. I hope Waymo and other companies are able to provide autonomous ride sharing and self driving vehicles, but currently likely only Tesla has the ability to do so profitably and that means they will likely succeed while others may not. We shall see. But along the way our roads will be safer for all of us as fewer impaired and just generally bad drivers are out there.

I mean, Waymo has switched to Hyundai Kona EVs going forward (no prize for guessing if that's cheaper than the Jaguar). Building cars is absolutely a commodity business, and having the ability to do so isn't a competitive advantage. Byd is eating Tesla's lunch in China and has started taking over the Indian market as well on the physical car side.

In terms of sensors, the reason to have more than 1 type is for when one is wrong. Then you take the more accurate option (which is Lidar's 3d picture not a camera's 2d picture) or make the more conservative choice. Waymo obviously has this figured out - their cars are driving around San Francisco (which is a pretty difficult environment imo, I wouldn't really want to drive there) more successfully than humans.

I'm not saying Tesla's system is bad, but the problem is it has to be perfect. Last time I was in SF a friend drove me from my hotel near Union Square to the airport. He has a model Y with self driving, and he put the destination in and it drove the whole way. Except for once where it froze and needed driver input. True self driving can't be 99% good, it has to be 99.99999% good - and with camera's only I think the amount of human intervention required will always be too high

[topfiverecords]

Slow times at the dealership.

[Brupal]

Luckily it won’t be up to me (or you Bizaro) to decide if Tesla’s technology is safe enough. That’s what the government regulators and safety experts get paid the big bucks to do. And when Tesla is approved for ride hailing, then I will be the first to short Uber stock as the likes of Uber and Waymo will be unable to compete on cost. Speaking of costs, BYD might be the only other company making money while selling EVs. But we will have to see if it is due to their reliance on hybrid vehicles or their penchant for cooking the books. And BYD and Tesla hardly compete head to head. BYD vehicles are in the very low cost category mostly, whereas Tesla sells in the higher price point categories. There is room for both to exist.

I still look forward to the day that I can put my own vehicle out into the fleet of autonomous ride share vehicles during times when I’m not using it, so that it can earn me tens of thousands of dollars per year while I sit and post ##### on CP all day.

[Wormius]

If only there was some other options besides self-driving cars to get drunk people places.

[KelVarnsen]

Hyperloop?

[Brupal]

But once self driving robotaxis are the least expensive option then they will flourish.

[btimbit]

As long as there isn't a Tesla badge on it, I'm all for it

[Brupal]

When the cost of a trip to the airport is $75 in a smelly cab vs $60 for an Uber versus $50 and no tip for a Tesla, the badge isn’t going to be the deciding factor for most people. Same with Semi trucks and humanoid robots. What is the best quality available and what is the cost are the questions people are going to ask.

[KelVarnsen]

If it's best quality it sure as #### won't be Tesla

[topfiverecords]

Originally Posted by Brupal

When the cost of a trip to the airport is $75 in a smelly cab vs $60 for an Uber versus $50 and no tip for a Tesla, the badge isn’t going to be the deciding factor for most people. Same with Semi trucks and humanoid robots. What is the best quality available and what is the cost are the questions people are going to ask.

The badge that differentiates between the vehicle that gets me there without crashing into things and the one that does will for sure be a deciding factor.