[erulabs]

While this is tragic, undeniably so, it’s worth knowing that a head on collision in Malibu two days ago killed a 50 year old man when a 20 year old crossed over the double yellow line. It was obvious seeing the car that the young person was racing and driving dangerously. It barely made the news. I only know it happened because I drove past the wreck.

Tragic about the cat - and Waymo must improve - but we cannot lose sight of the greater good.

[butvacuum]

No, We should be fighting tooth and nail against these companies. They're not here to save us from ourselves. They're using public streets to Alpha (beta if you want to be generous) test autonomous lethal weapons, and then profit off of it when it works.

I can't find anything saying waymo has a thermal camera. They aren't expensive- certainly not compared to the LIDAR- and provide extremely discriminated input on "am I about to kill something?" They're not perfect as foul weather and fog are likely to blind thermal- but they shouldn't be driving in suboptimal conditions until they have a track record of safety in optimal ones.

[AlotOfReading]

What criteria would you consider sufficient for deployment on public streets? My experience is that people opposed to AV technology usually aren't familiar with the level of validation that's been done and tend to have expectations that are either impossible or are already met.

Waymo has experimented with thermal imaging in the past. I've never seen experiments indicating it's a particularly valuable modality for AVs, and high resolution thermal cameras exceed the price of decent LIDAR these days. You can easily spend $10k+ on a FLIR sensor with a pixel count higher than 4 digits.

[tim333]

Waymo was started partly to save lives by Sebastian Thrun who lost a friend to a car accident when he was 18. They have about 1/3 the accident rate of human drivers. Calling this stuff evil is kind of sad.

[simianwords]

> They're using public streets to Alpha (beta if you want to be generous) test autonomous lethal weapons, and then profit off of it when it works.

Sounds good? It’s exactly working as it should.

[SR2Z]

Considering that they're already safer than human drivers, I don't think you could say that they're the ones using the streets to learn.

[moralestapia]

It doesn't work like that.

You imply all human driving is like that one example which is the worse one can come up with, which is not true.

You imply Waymos on the street will take the 20 year old irrational driver out of the road, which is also not true.

And "I did bad but others do worse" is a terrible premise to live by.

[simianwords]

But it has to be relative right?

If Waymo cars are statistically safer than normal cars then it is fine. What is your alternative?

Edit: you could have an issue with the statistical power itself

[altairprime]

In some countries, drivers are expected to prove their ability to operate heavy machinery safely, held that promise, and governments prioritize zero deaths in their spending and policy making.

In the U.S., billions of dollars that could be spent on proven ways of solving the problem are instead spend on speculative robotic car development.

Robotic cars are not the only solution. They may eventually be as effective as proven solutions that are offensive to U.S. car supremacists, but as of today, robotic cars have proven only to be better than untrained, inattentive U.S. drivers and the life-threatening domestic policies that enable them. Robotic cars aren’t trying to solve the problem; they’re trying to capture spending on the problem. If transportation policy magically changed overnight to force immediate, funded implementation of proven safety processes from other countries, the excuses given for Waymo and others to beta-test their “these fatalities are a necessary accident in service of zero deaths” robotic vehicles would no longer hold water.

[AlotOfReading]

Autonomous vehicles don't impede transit advocacy, and they genuinely can be massive accessibility improvements to disabled and disadvantaged populations. Unless you have a magic wand to make those changes, it seems like AVs are an improvement over the current situation?

[enaaem]

Robo-drivers won't fix reckless driving because reckless drivers want to drive recklessly.

[lelanthran]

> but we cannot lose sight of the greater good.

The greater good is not served by allowing profit-making machines to use public infrastructure to test lethal machines in.

[SR2Z]

But it is served by putting 18 year olds behind the wheels of cars and giving them free rein?

It is served when the state runs anti-DUI ads and puts up billboards reminding people to sleep when they they're tired?

It's served when car accidents are either the #1 or #2 killer of children?

I'm not sure I trust you to decide what's best for society.

[leobg]

So tell me where to find a not-profit-seeking human.

I’d say a government employee just seeks profit by doing as little as possible for the fixed paycheck they get. _Everyone_ has a profit motive. The question is how their profit aligned with that of others.