[kozikow]

> Automate that which is easier to automate: the long distance highway driving

Long distance highway driving except that one highway exit on 101 that kills you. I'm just saying that when human lives are at stake, bottoms up approach may not be as feasible as with web software.

[noodle]

> except that one highway exit on 101 that kills you

The conversations on the topic that I've heard involve building special, dedicated exits, sort of like truck weigh stations. And having them live not particularly close to urban centers.

So it a bit more of a holistic approach than bottom up, and something that will take a while to implement since you're not able to roll it out everywhere at once.

Not to say that there still won't be issues. I'm sure there will be. And I'm sure there's a long way to go still. But its also not a black and white issue.

[slfnflctd]

At this point I'm starting to think engineers for self-driving vehicles need to find a way to explicitly map out every possible scenario on a given stretch of road... and from that - in real time - derive a custom template for each individual vehicle, tailored to the range of possible interactions between the vehicle in its current state (i.e. tire pressure is significant) and the current scenario playing out on that road.

Much of the process of getting close to this point can be done with the latest A.I. tools, but I have this nagging feeling we're going to need humans to fine tune a whole lot of 'last mile' stuff.

[nradov]

Unless you ban all human drivers from that road, and find a way to keep out pedestrians and animals, there will always be an infinite number of possible scenarios. Mapping everything out in advance can't possibly produce the level of safety that the general public would demand.

[myrryr]

But with driving human lives are at stake now.

It just has to be better than the average driver.

[ultraluminous]

That's one more of those "irrational exuberance" regarding the future of autonomous driving. It would never even come close to being legal if it's only better than the average driver. It will need to be better than the 95th percentile of human drivers at the very least. 48% of the human population are not going to accept a more dangerous, potentially deadlier, car ride because it's "safer on average".

[slavak]

In which case any driver of above-average ability would be insane to put their lives in the hands of one.

How many people do _you_ know that consider themselves below-average drivers?

[michaelt]

I'm just spitballin' here, but perhaps they could make something that was better than the average driver, and wouldn't swerve or accelerate into stationary objects like highway barriers? That sounds like something a lot of people would want.

[Piskvorrr]

Looks easy, right? Too bad it's been looking easy for 50+ years now, with no solution in sight.