Comment by rdiddly

>By fixing education, road design, and other factors, those 40k killed can be reduced by seven times before you even need to bother with automation.

1. [citation needed]

2. Just because it's theoretically possible, doesn't mean it's an option that actually exists. I'm sure you can dream up of some plan for a futuristic utopia where everybody lives in a 15 minute city, no private cars are needed, and the whole transportation system is net zero, but that doesn't mean it's a realistic option that'll actually get implemented in the US, nor does it mean that we we should reject hybrid or EVs on the basis that they're worse than the utopian solution, even though they're better than the status quo of conventional ICE cars.

Exactly, I tell people every order of magnitude more we spend on infrastructure reduces the self driving complexity as much likewise.

The education bit can’t be fixed by the government though in the short term, as the outcomes correlate too strongly with stable home life conditions (which are in free fall over the past 50 years).

Hey, I hear you. And I'm sad. Because I'd like to say that the right way is to:

build infrastructure that promotes safe driving, and

train drivers to show respect for other people on the road

However, those are both non-starters in the US. So your answer, which comes down to "at least self-driving is better than those damn people" might be the one that actually works.

As you said, people often continue to drive at full speed through unlit intersections let alone roads. Doesn't that then imply that a Waymo stopping on such a road is not "failing safe"? It's just asking for someone to hit it -- even if they'd be at fault, it's still not safe.

I want nothing to do with Waymo or any of the others, but they're all being forced on me. I think self-driving cars are one of the biggest and stupidest misallocations of resources and talent we've seen yet. And they're being developed using public resources that we all own (yet I never had a chance to vote on it) for the benefit of a private company that only those with enough disposable income can buy into. I don't happen to own any of their stock, so I'm not seeing any benefit. Why would I care how well they're doing? And they helped themselves to my roads as a testing ground; why would I afford them the slightest slack when they mess up? Meanwhile the people who can least afford to buy in, are actually living on the streets where these are being tested and are shouldering a disproportionate share of the risks. So it only takes mere inconvenience, or their mere existence, to bother and annoy me, not human harm. It's a machine designed to steal from the commons. And actually in tort law, theft IS harm. But physical harm to humans has also happened and will happen. Cars driven by humans: same, except also having a lengthy history that includes documented physical harm to humans. They too are machines for stealing from the public to advantage the owners. The things being stolen are clean air, climate, land/space, and safety/life. So my argument is fully consistent. There are exceptions in it for trucks, trains and buses, and even for some cars, in cases where the benefit offsets the harm, and the public has meaningfully approved it.

Why lie? If you have a valid point, make it. Don't pull made up stats out of your ass.

The US isn't close to being the highest per traffic fatality rate in the western hemisphere.

I count 14 countries higher.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-r...

The difference is those human-driven cars all have a driver who can be held accountable.

If I kill someone with my car, I’m probably going to jail. If a Waymo or otherwise kills someone, who’s going to jail?

Progress does not require perfection; it requires net improvement.

> The spontaneous explosions become so common and normalized that just about everyone knows someone who got caught up in one, a dead friend of a friend, at least

That’s an extraordinary claim.

American roads are uniquely dangerous for passengers in cars and for pedestrians compared to other developed countries..

>My concern is that one company can have a malfunction which shuts down traffic in a city.

That's hardly new. What do you think happens to traffic when a semi flips over on a busy interstate, or electricity goes out, turning all traffic lights into 4 way stops and severely limiting throughput?

I think the blog is strongly hinting us to focus on the real problem -- the electrical utility and I have to agree.

The only other option I can think of is to build some kind of high density low power solar powered IoT network that is independent of current infrastructure but then where is the spectrum for that?

Ask any EMT or paramedic - an astonishingly large proportion of human drivers panic in the presence of an ambulance and just slam their brakes on.

I've browsed reddit long enough to know that human drivers don't just stop in the middle of traffic for no reason, they will stop in the middle of a railroad intersection, block a highway exit, reverse from a highway exit, drive into a highway exit in the wrong direction, drive into another vehicle, reverse into another vehicle, and spew fume at pedestrians and bikers, all the time.

Or at least frequently enough to supply multiple subreddits dedicated to these people.

A lot of human drivers blasted through intersections with lights that were out.

There were indeed accidents, and so yes, human cars were in fact stopped in the middle of traffic.

I was actually wondering more about the people whose streets they are. Didn't mean to indicate that I or anyone cares what HN thinks.