[XMPPwocky]

Of course it's evidence of something!

Suppose, as a massive oversimplification, Uber's self-driving cars crash with some constant probability P for every mile driven (i.e. a Bernoulli process).

We now have learned at least one thing with absolute confidence: P > 0.

The first mile driven before the accident, of course, also showed P < 1.

But beyond absolute certainty, we also have a better idea of the actual value of P. (Intuitively, the longer we go without a crash, the lower we suspect P to be, and for every crash, we increase our estimate of P).

If there was only one crash in 3 million miles driven, this is evidence for values of P near 1/(3 million), and evidence against values of P far from it.

Is it strong evidence? Nope! But it's evidence!

[roenxi]

You obviously want to be technical. Technically you are correct. However, the evidence that this car is a worse driver than a human is currently so weak we're both wasting time talking about it. We need more of the stuff for it to be worth considering.

Your pedantry has managed to upset me and I would encourage you to be a little more understanding of people using language in the way it is used outside of the world of mathematics. Walking into a practical discussion of safety with an existence proof of all things is disrespectful of the fact that lives and enormous quantities of human attention are at stake.

Obviously, technically everything is evidence of something. I know that. Using the language in that sense is not going to help.