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heavyset_go | karma 25689 | avg karma 3.63 · 2020-02-12 07:25:08+00:00

> Current self-driving might be safer than the avarage driver,

So far there isn't any evidence for this assumption.

eloisant | karma 5215 | avg karma 3.54 · 2020-02-12 08:12:03

If you compare the number of accident per km, I'm pretty sure the numbers for self-driving are much lower than human drivers.

When a self-driving car is involved in an accident, it's in the news all over the world.

Human drivers kill or get killed every day, in every country.

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dontreact | karma 1589 | avg karma 2.34 · 2020-02-12 08:53:14

Humans have 1 fatality per 100 million miles, self driving is nowhere close to this.

Piskvorrr | karma 5073 | avg karma 1.42 · 2020-02-12 11:39:24

The statistics for SDVs have an issue which might invalidate them: "fatality per miles driven" doesn't take disengagements into account: how do you even do that, meaningfully? "Fatality avoided because human driver stepped in - another triumph for autonomous driving"? That doesn't make much sense...

emiliobumachar | karma 3540 | avg karma 2.37 · 2020-02-12 12:27:23

It makes sense in that, even in the real world, the real humans can be counted on to pay attention and intervene to some extent. That's an important counterpoint to the vivid thought experiment of "how could you possibly expect someone to pay attention after hundreds of hours of flawless machine operation?"

Unless you're talking about getting rid of the steering wheel and deploying the current system as Level 5. In that case, yes, interventions should count against it.

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ng7j5d9 | karma 176 | avg karma 2.93 · 2020-02-12 17:50:20

I think the statistics to compare self-driving miles vs human driven miles are quite tough to judge.

Tesla was criticized quite a bit at one point for comparing deaths per Autopilot mile to deaths per all motor vehicle miles. This was a bad comparison because motor vehicles included motorcycles, as well as older, poorly-maintained cars, etc.

Then Tesla released a comparison between Autopilot miles in Teslas and human-driven miles in Teslas where Autopilot was eligible to be engaged. This felt like a much more fair comparison, but Teslas are lenient about where Autopilot can be engaged - just because the car will allow it doesn't mean many people would choose to do so in that location, so there might be some bias towards "easier" locations where Autopilot is actually engaged. There's also the potential issue of Autopilot disengaging, and then being in an accident shortly afterwards.

This is morbid, but I also wonder about the number of suicides by car that are included in the overall auto fatality statistics. If someone has decided to end their life, a car might be the most convenient way (and it might appear accidental after the fact). That would drive up the deaths-per-mile stat for human drivers, but makes it tougher for me to decide which is safer - Autopilot driving or me driving?

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