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by aaomidi 318 days ago
That’s why we have a jury.

Autopilot quite literally means automatic pilot. Not “okay well maybe sometimes it’s automatic”.

This is why a jury is made up of the average person. The technical details of the language simply does not matter.
2 comments
ratelimitsteve 318 days ago
Couldn't agree more. This thing where words have a common definition and then a secret custom definition that only applies in courts is garbage. Everyone knows what "full self driving" means, either deliver that, come up with a new phrase or get your pants sued off for deceptive marketing.
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ajross 316 days ago
> Everyone knows what "full self driving" means

Sadly most people don't know that this case involved a comparatively ancient Tesla that did not have FSD. Seems like better attention to the "meaning of words" (like, the ones in the article you seem not to have read) might have helped things and not hurt them?

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ratelimitsteve 315 days ago
The crash took place in 2019, which is the year that FSD went into beta in the model s. Older vehicles were capable of being retrofitted with FSD.

https://www.autopilotreview.com/tesla-now-offering-fsd-hardw...

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ajross 315 days ago
The car didn't have it. They weren't advertising it at the time of the crash. You couldn't buy it yet. And the upgrades wouldn't ship for months. I think I stand by what I said. Your attempt to make this about FSD seems to be basically a lie, no?
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lotsofpulp 318 days ago
Autopilot is used when referring to a plane (until Tesla started using it as a name for their cruise control that can steer and keep distance).

In the context of a plane, autopilot always meant automatic piloting at altitude, and everyone knew it was the human pilots that were taking off and landing the plane.

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MBCook 318 days ago
Did they?

I think you may be overestimating how much average people know about autopilot systems.

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lotsofpulp 318 days ago
Pilot is a relatively high status career. They are always shown taking off and landing in tv shows and movies. I would be surprised if people thought they just sit back and relax the entire time.
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aaomidi 317 days ago
Be prepared to be surprised
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