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by inglor_cz 1725 days ago
"Self driving cars are a nice luxury, especially in city driving, not something that radically improves our world."

With truly autonomous vehicles, you can have a radically different logistics for goods, delivery services etc. You can also have specialized "sleeper cars" that get you to your destination overnight, fresh and ready.

Self driving cars can also park themselves somewhere out of sight and stop clogging inner cities.
2 comments
entee 1725 days ago
I'd agree if it works as advertised. Level 5 or very close to it is the key. No system has shown that, much less Tesla's. In the meantime, doing a live experiment with 3,000+ pound machines moving at 30+ mph seems like a bad idea.
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judge2020 1725 days ago
There seems to be a misunderstanding on what they're referring to. You with "self driving cars are a nice luxury" refers to the current iteration, while the main GP is talking about biotech and self driving cars in terms of the potential they hold, perhaps 15-30 years in the future.

We can't go straight from level 2 to level 4 without some real effort, and it's not exactly helpful when new level 2 systems can't even handle curves[0] or will continue to drive for you when you take your seatbelt off[1].

0: https://youtu.be/GCRNYP5Qg34?t=321

1: https://twitter.com/MinimalDuck/status/1388557772921344005?s...

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hexatin 1725 days ago
> You can also have specialized "sleeper cars" that get you to your destination overnight, fresh and ready.

Trains have had this capability for decades, and that is a very mature technology, with the upside of also carrying far more people at a time than a car-based system would.

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inglor_cz 1724 days ago
I have taken them several times. Prague-Warsaw, Prague-Frankfurt, Vienna-Venezia, Prague-Tatras, Prague-Krakow.

First of all, trains shake a lot. I could at best take hourly naps, it was better than nothing, but far from optimal. The loud proclamations of station speakers whenever you stop somewhere do not help your sleep either.

Second, night trains are a paradise for opportunistic thieves. Yes, it is a solvable problem, but I haven't seen it solved.

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