Self Driving Cars: How well do they work in areas with haphazard driving rules?

[sokoloff]

you just go with the flow and don't hit anything

As an engineer, would you ever program a machine to "just go with the flow", if that meant contravening the local rules and regulations that apply?

How would you justify that decision, in court if necessary?

I would not program "my" self-driving car to studiously adhere to the speed limits on controlled-access expressways as one concrete example. No good comes from that.

[vodka]

And he's entirely innocent of blame for not stopping his vehicle when unable to see where he was going.

He's not completely innocent, but he shouldn't take majority of responsibility.
Current Chinese laws says if a motor vehicle hits a non-motor vehicle or a pedestrian, the motor vehicle takes at least 70% of the responsibility, and the only exception is intentional suicide. That's just bullshit.

The shit and the fuck proportional responsability , how many  injustices is responsable that legal term? 
Here, we have the problem with the pedestrians that don't see and don't warn to car when they have the intention to cross the pass zebra without semaphores, and worse are the grandma with their grandsons,
they take off the baby wagon to middle road after they see if there are any car to approach them  .  The guilty always is for driver car, and very rarely for pedestrians.
 
In  the next place , we have  the kamikaze bikers that they have the bad habit to go for roads from the time of Primo de Rivera (very tigh lanes, without roadside and low visibility), when for any circumstance like sun blinding or a curve with low-visbility ram the bikers.  The guilty always is for driver car

[cdev]

Andy and coppice, the answer to your question seems to me to be that each self driving car will have a regulatory database of "the rules" that apply in its country, and it has to obey them. Whatever flexibility is in the law now will have to be removed for the corporations. Also, there will be a period, say five years, where self driving features will only be enabled in larger roads that have the technology to manage the traffic flow automatically. Of course initially, like now, some areas will be mostly old fashioned non-self driving cars so they will have to be given some time to buy new cars. Some areas - "off the beaten track" may remain non self driving indefinitely.

I think the main use case of self driving cars will be on highways and high speed streets which the non self driving cars, motorcycles, bikes and pedestrians will be banished from completely.

Just like in the 60s many towns eschewed sidewalks and avoided engaging in regional mass transit systems (a decision many now regret) because they didn't want to be seen as "pedestrian", many communities will likely only be reachable via self driving car only highways.

Quote from: AndyC_772 on Today at 02:06:39>Quote from: coppice on Today at 00:53:10>>>I'd really like to see some coverage of how things like the Uber and Google self driving cars react to completely unstructured situations like accidents, and slightly more structured things which are off the script, like lane closures for road repairs.
>I'm curious about how they react in situations where obeying the rules of the road is not the norm.

>Programming a machine with "when X, do Y" is fair enough. For example, provided it's in a country where people do generally stop at red lights, a machine programmed to stop at red lights won't have a problem.

>But what if it's driving through somewhere where expectations are different. What if, for example, stopping at a red light is likely to get you rear-ended by someone who's not expecting it?

There won't be any need for red lights in a completely self driving ecosystem because the cars will all be networked with one another and the highway control systems all the time.

>What if it will get you car-jacked?

>What if the way to minimise the chances of an accident isn't to do what you're supposed to do, but to do what other local drivers expect you to do?

>What rules-of-the-road do you program in?

We'll see. I think there is a lot more to this self driving car thing than just the technical and legal issues.

Its also part of a general re-stratification of society by income and class. A way to covertly put boundaries back into place which were temporarily eliminated or reduced for the industrial age..

[rdl]

Instead of self driving cars, I think they should have started with something easier like self piloted airliners.

[KE5FX]

Instead of self driving cars, I think they should have started with something easier like self piloted airliners.

Or even trains.  Why humans still need to be involved in train operations, I'll never know.

[cdev]

Lots of places have automated passenger trains. They are popular at airports.

[rstofer]

I think it is going to be about sensors.

In "BLUE", my 2017 Chevy Bolt (which is blue), the car isn't driverless but it probably is only a step away.  I have cameras fore and aft and when backing up, the display shows the anticipated track based on the steering angle.  It also has the ability to sense cars in my blind spots and there is an orange symbol on the outside mirrors if there is something within 11 feet of my rear quarter panel.  It also has a warning light/buzzer if I am about to rear-end the car ahead and will apply the brakes for me.  This Forward Automatic Braking works between 5 and 50 MPH.  It also has a Front Pedestrian Braking System that works over the same speed range but doesn't work well at night.  Oh, and it also has a form of lane detection and will correct the car if I tend to drift into another lane.  Fact is, I may actually have to go to the training class just to find out how many things it does.

I think I'm only along to press on the 'loud pedal'.  Just "punch it and fry 'em" and let the computers worry about the details!

The 2017 Bolt is the "Motor Trend Car Of The Year"
http://www.motortrend.com/news/chevrolet-bolt-ev-2017-car-of-the-year/

It isn't as sporty as my 2014 Chevy Spark EV but GM realized they needed to tame the acceleration.  With 400 ft-lbs of torque, the EV could be a handful as it shifted drive from side to side as tires lost traction.  It was a fun car to drive!

The Bolt is a lot of fun and, for our needs, the range is more than adequate.

Now here is something weird for the conspiracy types.  There is a satellite view of the car and surroundings.  Under some conditions, the image is so 'real time' that it can change the image as you put your arm out the window.  Now that's "real time".  No matter where I am, there is a satellite watching my car.  How cool is that?

So, there I am sitting in line at TacoBell and I can see my car from the top down in front of the server window and also a couple of cars behind me.

Self driving is going to come and it will be a huge application of distributed computing with vehicles talking to each other.

[sokoloff]

Now here is something weird for the conspiracy types.  There is a satellite view of the car and surroundings.  Under some conditions, the image is so 'real time' that it can change the image as you put your arm out the window.  Now that's "real time".  No matter where I am, there is a satellite watching my car.  How cool is that?

 

That view is synthesized from cameras on the car.

Don't believe me? Try it in a garage. It will still work.

[station240]

Just basic stuff like accidents, temporary road work speed limits etc are no doubt going to cause issues for driverless cars.
The permutations of possible issues is effectively infinite.

Nope, there are various solutions to these problems already.

Some 'autopilot'* systems read speed limit signs, others drive slower if other vehicles are also doing so. So far a lot of neat tech, but no car has all if it. Tesla have accidence avoidance software, auto braking (stop if something/someone on the roadway), auto steer (stay in lane, but detects if another vehicle changes into your lane and swerves/brakes to prevent accident).

Lack of or poor road rules is going to be unsafe anyway, computer can react faster than any human, isn't so affected by night or fog, and will err on the side of caution unlike people.

* some in name only, it's often not full self driving and is more driver assist.

Also new story specific to auto pilot in China, doesn't seem to be a problem.
http://knowledge.ckgsb.edu.cn/2016/11/21/technology/self-driving-cars-china/

[james_s]

I think truly autonomous cars are at least 20 years behind where most people think they are. I predict the first round of them released into the wild will be rushed out by arrogant tech companies and there will be a spectacular failure. One or more of a number of scenarios will happen, a well publicized incident of a hardware or software fault will cause a car to accelerate through a mass of pedestrians killing a bunch of people, an anomaly in the road markings will cause a number of serious accidents, a weather event such as a major snowstorm will cause a bunch of the cars to either go apeshit and crash or completely shut down and gridlock a major city. Then there is the almost guaranteed scenario where a bunch of hackers and pranksters come out of the woodwork with GPS and LiDAR jammers and other tech toys, spraypaint to make phony road markings and signs and wreak havoc, anyone who doesn't think that will happen is either smoking something or has their head in the sand.

Anyway the end result of any of these is that a bunch of people will be killed or seriously inconvenienced and the whole thing will be shut down for a significant period of time. I just don't see the concept living up to the promises any time soon. Sure Google has driven their cars millions of miles or whatever but it is millions of miles around the same heavily documented routes around the cities where they are based. The day of being able to get into a car, punch in a destination anywhere in the country and have the car reliably deliver you there are a LONG way off. Personally I'm ok with that, if I don't get to drive it myself then I have zero interest in owning, maintaining and insuring a car. I could take a lot of bus trips or cab rides for the cost of owning a car. The only real reason I have a car is because I like to drive and I like tinkering with cars.

We should be focused on finding alternative fuels, even if it drives itself it's still going to need fuel.

[AndyC_772]

you just go with the flow and don't hit anything

As an engineer, would you ever program a machine to "just go with the flow", if that meant contravening the local rules and regulations that apply?

How would you justify that decision, in court if necessary?

I would not program "my" self-driving car to studiously adhere to the speed limits on controlled-access expressways as one concrete example. No good comes from that.

OK, good example.

At some point, one of your self-driving cars is going to be involved in an accident on one of those roads. An injured party will claim that the vehicle was speeding - which it was! - and that this is was a contributory factor to the damage which resulted from the crash.

Do you suggest in court, that it was safer to program the car to do this? Statistically speaking, it may well indeed have been, but that defence rarely if ever goes down well in front of a magistrate when the driver is human, and especially so when personal injury has occurred.

I'd hate to be the engineer hauled up in front of a judge and jury, and asked to explain why I've deliberately programmed the machine to contravene regulations. I suspect pragmatism would be in short supply.

[sokoloff]

Do you suggest in court, that it was safer to program the car to do this? Statistically speaking, it may well indeed have been, but that defence rarely if ever goes down well in front of a magistrate when the driver is human, and especially so when personal injury has occurred.

I do suggest that in court, backed with statistics and data on the speeds of the cars around me, including the plaintiff's car.

I'd hate to be the engineer hauled up in front of a judge and jury, and asked to explain why I've deliberately programmed the machine to contravene regulations. I suspect pragmatism would be in short supply.

I'd hate to be in that situation as well, but I'd rather engineer according to pragmatism and science with an awareness of the relevant statutes, rather that walk around constantly afraid of a legal shadow hitting my work.

[FlyingHacker]

I'd say it is more likely that governments will have a higher speed limit for self-driving cars. Thus, they will be able to go the 5-10mph over the limit that most drivers do daily. The argument will be that the reaction time of the computer will make up for the higher speed limit. Lobby money from tech companies will ensure passage.

[Brumby]

That's a problem for any driver situation.

It's not the driver capabilities that are in control of the outcome - it is simply physics.  A function of inertia, distance and friction.

This is one example where dash cams are invaluable for demonstrating the innocence of the driver in such situations.

[cdev]

Who is going to pay for these new highways? They will be privatized of course, and once you privatize anything you can't un-privatize it, so no-matter whether it works, or doesnt, or whether the economy prospers, or tanks, which is not unlikely, they will have to stick with it.

Courts also tend to support contracts so if the contract gives the new owners of our roads the right to set the tolls, and any disputes have to go to ISDS arbitration, thats it.

Also, because of non-compete agreements, and the quite unambiguous prohibition in the WTO GATS on governments competing with MNCs, they will become the only choice people have.

Just as we don't let horses and carriages on highways now, the old human driven cars likely eventually wont be allowed, as they wouldn't be able to drive in the controlled manner required to avoid accidents. Allowing that kind of autonomous driving, particularly for delivery vehicles and commuting is two of the main goals of autonomous vehicles.

The big growth and investments made over the next ten or twenty years is in developing countries, not in developed countries. Thats what all the fuss in trade agreements is about, the MNCs want to be protected from every possibility before they sink billions into factories in countries with low wages but the strong possibility of social unrest.

So they put the jobs in developed countries, which are seen as in decline, in terms of profitability, on the table as bargaining chips.

In exchange for jobs here they hope to be able to get "national treatment" and "most Favored Nation" status there so they can invest vast amounts of money building factories to employ the millions of unemployed workers in those countries so they don't start wars with us or sell cheap life saving drugs.

they want to bring them into their big Ponzi scheme as investors.

[hamdi.tn]

Simple answer, they will not. autonomous car need some road infrastructure to operate correctly.
The humain factor is and will always be the main cause of traffic accident, and the random variable to solve in an automated sensor based system like autonomous cars.
So i think in order for this to perform as it should, all cars need to be autonomous and road are equipped for that. Now that can be true for a couple of country in 20 years maybe, but in no way this will be used in any part of the third world country.
So till then Drivers are responsable for their cars autonomous or not, i really hoped they stick to the Assisted driving definition or restrictive driving to oblige the driver to follow some rules,  instead of "autonomous", this will only cause more chaos to the roads and more debate about whose responsable.

in an other side, i don't really understand the movement of the automobile industry towards this autonomous driving thing, in my simple thinking it's just a way to make a 3000$ car cost 10000$ with shitload of sensors and on board computers, it's insane.

[cdev]

No cars being made today are one step away from driverless cars because a driverless car is beyond the most automated airliners, imagine the equivalent of a Boeing 777, except for roads, it has complete fly by wire as the default everything and the human controls that exist for off road driving on conventional roads are similar to a video game, where you see the world around you digitally and navigate through it via joystick and GPS. They wont be like cars of today that are still largely electromechanical, even electric cars and hybrids. Its a transformation we have already seen in a great many areas where computers become the default way of solving problems. This will require a complete re-engineering of the problem of getting from point a to point b to make it a digital process.

Of course at the same time, huge numbers of people - billions, will be freed of the burden of having to travel every day to work. So the number of people with a need to travel will drop by several orders of magnitude.  The main reason so many people bought cars in the 20th century was to commute to work, so they could man the machines and staff the offices of industry.

[cdev]

They sell cars for $3000 in Tunisia? Interesting.


Last time I looked (more than a decade ago) the cheapest new cars in the US cost around $15,000. I think that the cheapest self driving cars here in the US will probably cost at least $50,000 more likely twice that. And they likely will have to be replaced much more frequently than the ones we have today. Thats the goal. Driving will become like flying, a rich persons game. Many countries are like that now, with huge taxes and permits, etc. which are required if you want to own a car inside of a major city. Just the cost of a parking space in SF or Manhattan is more than the cost of buying a home in many other places.

[hamdi.tn]

They sell cars for $3000 in Tunisia? Interesting.


Last time I looked (more than a decade ago) the cheapest new cars in the US cost around $15,000. I think that the cheapest self driving cars here in the US will probably cost at least $50,000 more likely twice that. And they likely will have to be replaced much more frequently than the ones we have today. Thats the goal. Driving will become like flying, a rich persons game. Many countries are like that now, with huge taxes and permits, etc. which are required if you want to own a car inside of a major city. Just the cost of a parking space in SF or Manhattan is more than the cost of buying a home in many other places.

haha, if it's 20 years old yes  no they don't in fact price here are double cause we pay 100% customs fees on cars. it's just an exemple. The point is this will put extra cost on cars and make it harder for middle class people to own, just by adding this kind of unclear (yet) features. For now it's just some industrial talking about it, it will be mainstream once they got there. and as you said, once some car are autonomous and some are not, normal cars will be banned from some roads. i totally see that coming.

[TK]

They sell cars for $3000 in Tunisia? Interesting.


Last time I looked (more than a decade ago) the cheapest new cars in the US cost around $15,000. I think that the cheapest self driving cars here in the US will probably cost at least $50,000 more likely twice that. And they likely will have to be replaced much more frequently than the ones we have today. Thats the goal. Driving will become like flying, a rich persons game. Many countries are like that now, with huge taxes and permits, etc. which are required if you want to own a car inside of a major city. Just the cost of a parking space in SF or Manhattan is more than the cost of buying a home in many other places.

I think Tesla 3 will be priced around $30,000 with full self-driving capabilities

[coppice]

Andy and coppice, the answer to your question seems to me to be that each self driving car will have a regulatory database of "the rules" that apply in its country, and it has to obey them. Whatever flexibility is in the law now will have to be removed for the corporations. Also, there will be a period, say five years, where self driving features will only be enabled in larger roads that have the technology to manage the traffic flow automatically. Of course initially, like now, some areas will be mostly old fashioned non-self driving cars so they will have to be given some time to buy new cars. Some areas - "off the beaten track" may remain non self driving indefinitely.

This completely misses the point. In real world driving we are forced to break the rules when we encounter the aftermath of an accident or really convoluted roadwork setups. We frequently puzzle over what to do for a while, but we have to take some rule breaking action, or we would be stuck until the obstacles are cleared. Getting a car to take safe action as it encounters such an incident is reasonably straightforward. Getting it safely out of such situations, so it can continue to make progress, it a whole different thing.

[Cerebus]

OK, good example.

At some point, one of your self-driving cars is going to be involved in an accident on one of those roads. An injured party will claim that the vehicle was speeding - which it was! - and that this is was a contributory factor to the damage which resulted from the crash.

Do you suggest in court, that it was safer to program the car to do this? Statistically speaking, it may well indeed have been, but that defence rarely if ever goes down well in front of a magistrate when the driver is human, and especially so when personal injury has occurred.

I'd hate to be the engineer hauled up in front of a judge and jury, and asked to explain why I've deliberately programmed the machine to contravene regulations. I suspect pragmatism would be in short supply.

Having a bit of experience with jurisprudence in the UK, I expect that here the standard a self driving car would be held to (in the absence of any specific statutory law) would be that of "a reasonably skilled human driver". That is, the car's autonomous systems would be regarded as behaving correctly as far as the law was concerned if they undertook the same actions, under the same conditions as "a reasonably skilled driver".

As far as deliberately breaking the rules goes there's the defence of 'necessity'. If it was necessary to exceed the speed limit to avoid an accident (say accelerating when you were already travelling at the limit) then you have a defence to a charge of speeding, and so on. Necessity is a very broadly applicable, and rarely used, defence. Again, an autonomous system would almost certainly be judged on the basis of whether it did what a reasonable person would do under the same circumstances.

At the most simplistic, a self driving system would be given the rules "obey the law" and "don't hit things, especially people" with a higher priority given to "don't hit things" if there was a conflict between the two. If hauled before the beak to explain this I'd expect one's argument to be something like: "I did program the car to obey the law, but I also programmed it to avoid killing people and gave the latter priority as I understood that the underlying intent of the law relating to driving was ultimately to avoid killing people.".

[FlyingHacker]

So what if a self driving car drives perfectly on a highway, and some jaywalker attempts to cross the red light? No algorithms can predict someone standing and waiting for signal, and suddenly decides to jaywalk, and when computer vision system detects it, it's gonna be too late.

I encountered this once, and I was so lucky that that day was rainy and I drove exceptionally slow so I didn't hit the bastards almost rushing to me, seems to be on high. I swear to god I sweated for quite a while.

I would hope it would do what I do when I drive near pedestrians, namely slow down. If the pedestrian is close to or moving towards the curb I slow down more. It could do a much more accurate job of calculating the fastest that it could safely go and still stop if the pedestrian lept out.

[Brumby]

I have a question, with follow-ups....

What about the situation where there are police officers on duty directing traffic?

Situations such as accidents, failed traffic lights and the like?

What if there is a large intersection that has 2 or more police officers controlling it?

[Brumby]

So what if a self driving car drives perfectly on a highway, and some jaywalker attempts to cross the red light? No algorithms can predict someone standing and waiting for signal, and suddenly decides to jaywalk, and when computer vision system detects it, it's gonna be too late.

I encountered this once, and I was so lucky that that day was rainy and I drove exceptionally slow so I didn't hit the bastards almost rushing to me, seems to be on high. I swear to god I sweated for quite a while.

I would hope it would do what I do when I drive near pedestrians, namely slow down. If the pedestrian is close to or moving towards the curb I slow down more. It could do a much more accurate job of calculating the fastest that it could safely go and still stop if the pedestrian lept out.

I can see it now ..... pedestrians playing "Baulk the autonomous car" by making the motions to step/jump out in front of such a vehicle only to laugh themselves silly when the car brakes and the passengers get shaken like a martini.