[spuz]

I guess the only option they have is "pull over" which in this case just caused the car to continue circling looking for a safe place to pull over. If they had an actual kill switch, we'd probably be watching another video of some guy on a call to waymo support while stuck in the middle of a highway.

[likeabatterycar]

> If they had an actual kill switch

I'm unfamiliar - we have these in train cars, did the architects behind driverless techshit not think it was necessary?

[spuz]

To be clear, I'm talking specifically about the first line of support at Waymo here. I am not precluding that they have higher levels of control behind layers of authorisation.

[Waterluvian]

Train cars? As in the vehicle on a track where an immediate stop is almost never more dangerous?

[troad]

Yes, in much of the world there are mandatory passenger-facing emergency break levers in every carriage of passenger trains. The US is the outlier here.

And yes, passengers should absolutely be able to bring their vehicle to an immediate stop. It's an "emergency break"! Of course you need an emergency break in an autonomous car! What exact alternative are you proposing for when you're in an AI-operated car hurtling under the chassis of a white truck that it failed to detect in snow conditions?

It seems like an incredibly obvious and basic legislative requirement for self-driving cars to have some kind of immediate manual break for emergencies. I'm kind of shocked that that apparently isn't the case now?

[likeabatterycar]

I didn't say pull the hand brake at 60mph.

There should be an emergency "pull over and stop gracefully" button.

[amclennon]

They do. I'm guessing there was a bug in finding a place to safely pull over?

[Terr_]

Sounds likely, in which case there needs to be a much more "break glass in case of emergency" control which gradually lowers the maximum speed cap of the vehicle.

So even if the vision/pathfinding believes there is nowhere to park and nowhere else to turn, it will still coast to a stop in a way that is not inherently less-safe than a more-normal car running out of gas and stalling on the road.

[throwawee]

If they can remotely kill the engine of any Waymo car in motion, so can hackers.

[likeabatterycar]

If they can't secure it, then the entire project should be scrapped.

But GM already has this capability with OnStar. Stolen vehicles can be slowed down then stopped and and disabled remotely.