I-Like-To-Bike

Really? DId the little birdy who informed you that driverless AVs will be communicating and cooperating with each other in the foreseeable future, also tell you when the testing for that networking feature began and who is doing it and where?

Do you believe all the Techno Pipe Dream and PR fluff that you read will happen in the next 4 years, four decades? Why not just stick with a can't be disproved "it could happen maybe, sometime in the future?

RubeRad

Yes, the little birdy who whispered it into my ear also said that this work is currently underway. Here is an academic survey published in 2017 that cites 97 previous studies. (I realize of course that the words 'academic' and 'study' will trigger you to bray 'HA so it hasn't happened yet and will thus never happen!')

4 years no. 4 decades I think extremely likely.

Here's another prediction: 4<N<40 years from now, level 5 driverless vehicles will be available to over 100 million Americans, within spatial geofences that include all major U.S. cities (pop >1 million) and all interstate freeways; and within time geofences that enforce no AVs in certain inclement weather conditions. Trucking especially will be especially diverless, with over 90% of interstate trucking driven autonomously. Outside of the spatial geofences (rural roads), AV performance will be spottier, but safe (safer than current human driving).

And I-Like-To-Bike will say 'My driverless taxi wouldn't take me off-roading in a blizzard! That's not Level 5!'

RubeRad

Also, I remember that fleet-AV testing was happening in San Diego probably 5-10 years ago. I-15 near NAS Miramar (home of Top Gun) has center HOV lanes that can be opened in either direction for rush hour, and closed off from both ends in the middle of the day. They used to test convoys of AVs in those lanes but nowadays they seem to be just always open to traffic.

Seattle Forrest

@RubeRad clarified the toxicology report, and then you strawmanned him with "she had what was coming to her." He didn't make any moral judgement about whether she deserved to die or not. Nobody else did, either. That's all you, Slick.

Seattle Forrest

Last night on the radio they were talking about the invention of the bicycle, how it would startle horses, how people would push cyclists into traffic to express their anger. This was before cars were invented so traffic meant pedestrians, equestrians, and other cyclists. For a while, bikes were made illegal in many US cities. People feared this new technology would get people killed and ruin everything.

History doesn't repeat itself, but it rhymes.

RubeRad

That's cute

Reminds me of this lovely XKCD: https://xkcd.com/1227/

clemsongirl 

wondering if this is i l t b

I-Like-To-Bike

I am sure if you listen to some more people talking on the radio, or read some more Internet blogs you might hear some irrational jokers mentioning the invention of smartphones or man's travel to the moon as evidence that whatever"technology" they are promoting or dreaming about is sure to happen because after all - smartphones! - moon travel! - bicycles!

You might even hear or read where some of these jokers fabricate straw man arguments about "fear" being the reason why skeptics don't march in lockstep with them and other fan boys, dreamers and promoters of every technological scheme that gets hyped by other fan boys, dreamers and promoters.

I-Like-To-Bike

Note that an ad hominem argument does not get any more rational or less offensive by adding a smiley.

genec

Gee recent innovations include better cheaper LIDAR, and Quacomm (the heart of most smarphones) announcing their focus on AV communication.
https://www.cnbc.com/amp/2020/01/06/...ving-cars.html

You're gonna have to do a better job of keeping up with technology if you expect any of your counter arguments to have validity.

I-Like-To-Bike

And you should learn that every tech firm's press release and sales pitche for their components are not announcements (let alone evidence) of the incorporation of their gee-whiz tech being bought, installed, tested and successfully deployed in a single driverless vehicle on the road, let alone a successful test of a network of driverless AV's safely sharing public highways with other vehicles.

Or that the touted hardware will lead vehicle makers (to be named later) to arrive one day sooner to the promised land of successfully manufacturing, fielding and selling driverless AVs to anybody.

RubeRad

It is a little funnier though. And the grumpier you are, that also makes the rest of us appreciate the humor more.

Notso_fastLane

This is a true statement.

79pmooney

"Driverless cars today... where will they be in 5 years..." Do they have AI? How smart are they? Do they have (or can they acquire) self awareness? With enough AI, those cars might just decide to retire, drive themselves to someplace dry and out of the sun (no rust or UV damage) after they have been left with a full tank of gas. Every couple of months, they up and drive themselves around the block to keep all running properly. Should last a lot longer than living life as a slave to some owner.

Artificial intelligence. As my dad used to say, "Be careful what you ask for; you might just get it."

Ben

genec

Could be worse... I understand that there are wireless charging stations being developed and deployed... that run on solar energy... so eventually those electric AI cars will just hang out near a solar station like barflys at the local pub.

You'll never get the damn things to show up to work... all you'll hear is "Well, it was cloudy yesterday, I'm just not 'feelin' it today'..."

Seattle Forrest

You use a lot of words to not say anything.

RubeRad

I am totally on board with the notion that technological fanbois are blind to unintended (and in hindsight, obviously inevitable) negative consequences of new technologies. You would be interested in some stuff I've been reading lately:

article: Jacques Ellul: The Technological Order
book: Jacques Ellul: The Technological Society

(Take note of the page numbers in the scanned article, some pages are repeated and out of order)

Ellul was kind of like a pre-Neil Postman, except French, and a few decades earlier.

I-Like-To-Bike

I am not grumpy (your words) but rather amused when reading silly responses/assumptions from members of the "the rest of us" clique about how advanced cruise control and lane warning features make a vehicle autonomously driven. Also amusing is the faith that press release spin from promoters of techno bits for sale are indications of the progress towards driver free AV sure to come about sooner rather than later. Also amusing is the inability or unwillingness to notice when the major players like Waymo and Uber have stopped issuing rosy spin press releases about the results of their testing or make any more predictions about when they will be ready to produce a commercial product. Most humorous is the fan-boy-like belief, fabricated from wishful thinking, that driver free AVs are just a few press releases and perhaps a chip or two away from being ready for production and practical prime time driver free, accident free operation.

It seems at least some of "the rest of us" would rather "appreciate" the alleged cleverness of snarky insulting comments and ad hominem arguments rather than make any logical or relevant argument supporting their own prediction or rebuttal of predictions/observations that dreams about driverless AV are not likely to be realized just because "we" wish it to be so.

RubeRad

BUT, to say that technological fanbois fail to foresee negative side-effects of new technology is different than to say that technological fanbois think that technology can be implemented when it actually is impossible.

RubeRad

FIFY. And great, then we are all amused by each other.

I'll stipulate 'our' snark, and you can raise

I-Like-To-Bike

TLDR; can you provide a summary and its relevance to the thread subject if any?

If only those fearful regulators and dim-witted Luddites would let the techno promoters, venture capitalists and stock pumping speculators do their thing and unleash their allegedly driver free vehicles on the public highways and streets of the U.S. without any oversight or regulation, just like AZ., what could go wrong, eh?

We could at least be enjoying the benefits of clicking on our phones for a driver free taxi to go short distances in good weather, at least as long as we lived near Chandler AZ and promised not to tell anybody else but Google about the experience and value of such a benefit.

I-Like-To-Bike

Who said what is impossible?

RubeRad

You've been saying that all along

If your only point is it's not gonna happen within 5 (now 4) years, I conceded that weeks ago. The rest of us have moved on to general discussion of developing AV technology and you're still stuck on the post title. In FOO.

I-Like-To-Bike

Alright, advanced cruise control and lane warning features make a vehicle more autonomously driven in the same sense that auto tuning radios and power windows, or any other enhanced convenience or comfort feature, make a vehicle more autonomously driven.

Presumably that is the goal Waymo, Uber, Tesla et al. are aiming for with billions of dollars spent on prototype testing - making taxis less taxing and more comfortable for their drivers, because none of those features are close to making a vehicle a driver free vehicle.

I-Like-To-Bike

That was the question, I answered it to the howls of protest and consternation from "the rest of us" who apparently shape shifted driverless vehicles into a distantly related vehicle - "autonomous vehicles" with which a driver can feel more comfortable, if not safer, taking his eyes off the road for a while.

You may have conceded that, "the rest of us" have conceded nothing but the high ground and resort instead to Fooish snark.

What do you and "the rest of us" seriously expect to change with autonomous features in cars sold in the U.S. in the next 4 years, a few more bell and whistles? Who but techno fan bois and Tesla owners gives a dang? Is that the end result Google, Tesla, Uber, Ford et al. expect from billions of dollars of dollars spent on prototype AV testing - to add a few new zoot-suit comfort and convenience features to conventional vehicles and perhaps connect them to the Internet and call them "Smart" ala Elon Musk rhetoric? Mighty humorous indeed.