[chaboud]

Possibly, but Waymos have recently been much more aggressive about blowing through situations where human drivers can (and generally do) slow down. As a motorcyclist, I've had some close calls with Waymos driving on the wrong side of the road recently, and I had a Waymo cut in front of my car at a one-way stop (t intersection) recently when it had been tangled up with a Rivian trying to turn into the narrow street it was coming out of. I had to ABS brake to avoid an accident.

Most human drivers (not all) know to nose out carefully rather than to gun it in that situation.

So, while I'm very supportive of where Waymo is trying to go for transport, we should be constructively critical and not just assume that humans would have been in the same situation if driving defensively.

[jobs_throwaway]

Certainly, I'm not against constructive criticism of Waymo. I just think it's important to consider the counterfactual. You're right too that an especially prudent human driver may have avoided the scenario altogether, and Waymo should strive to be that defensive.

[themafia]

> I'm not against constructive criticism of Waymo.

I feel like you have to say this out loud because many people in these discussions don't share this view. Billion dollar corporate experiments conducted in public are sacrosanct for some reason.

> I just think it's important to consider the counterfactual

More than 50% of roadway fatalities involve drugs or alcohol. If you want to spend your efforts improving safety _anywhere_ it's right here. Self driving cars do not stand a chance of improving outcomes as much as sensible policy does. Europe leads the US here by a wide margin.

[veltas]

Absolutely, I can tell you right now that many human drivers are probably safer than the Waymo, because they would have slowed down even more and/or stayed further from the parked cars outside a school; they might have even seen the kid earlier in e.g. a reflection than the Waymo could see.

[mlyle]

It seems it was driving pretty slow (17MPH) and they do tend to put in a pretty big gap to the right side when they can.

There are kinds of human sensing that are better when humans are maximally attentive (seeing through windows/reflections). But there's also the seeing-in-all-directions, radar, superhuman reaction time, etc, on the side of the Waymo.