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| Zero999:
--- Quote from: MK14 on March 15, 2020, 12:06:39 am ---Good point. But something like the railways, can get relatively slow/long time scales. Unlike general public cars, which might be changed every 3 years. The trains may only change in a big way, every 20 to 50 years (I don't know, what the time period is, exactly). Because they spend millions, buying the new train stock. Then keep using it for 10, 20, 30, 40 or more years. until it is replaced. I imagine, self driving cars, may start out in one small part of America. Maybe with the driver having to sit in the drivers seat and watch the precedings. If that works out. It could get rolled out in other parts of America, and other countries could start following suit. If not the US, then another country(s). As you said, Tesla, have already been rolling out autonomous self driving cars, sorry, I mean Tesla autopilot. As regards making the roads safer. Although computers won't drink and drive, take drugs or speed just for the fun of it. I still think that they will still have accidents. Just that those accidents will be different. E.g. The Tesla autopilots, have had various accidents. Because of misinterpreting things, etc. Another example is 'self driving'/autopilot jet airplanes. Which has been going on for a long time now. Where some percentage, maybe 99% of the time. the autopilot, effectively flies the plane. Because as you will know. We still have plenty of aircraft crashing, despite these systems. E.g. Boeing 737max, whose autopilot mode (although there is more to it, as it was not really the autopilots fault, the MCAS system and its sensors), was not exactly safe to leave it like that, unoccupied. --- End quote --- Automation was ready to take over from human train drivers over 30 years ago, so it should have already been done by now. I doubt it would need replacement of the entire locomotive and rolling stock. It should be possible to retrofit all the required sensors and control hardware to the existing trains. The problem is self driving cars it would have to be a universal roll-out, rather than a gradual upgrade. A computer will always be more cautious than a human and when people realise a driverless car will always give way to them, they'll take advantage of it. Yes, they will have different accidents to human drivers. I don't think people would take it very well if they were told their loved one wouldn't have been killed, had a real human being driving, irrespective of how many more lives being saved by automation, avoiding human error. At the movement, the law states the person behind the wheel is ultimately responsible and I can't see that changing soon. Driving a car as a couple of orders of magnitude more difficult than a train. It would be fairly simple to automate the entire rail network and there would be a huge return on the investment. As far aeroplanes are concerned: human pilots are still necessary. I honestly don't know whether it's possible to eliminate human pilots. It wouldn't surprise me if it is, but I think the planes would all have to surrender a lot of control to the nearest air traffic controller for it to work. --- Quote from: CatalinaWOW on March 15, 2020, 12:37:27 am ---But recently legal issues are pushing more automation in trains. Accidents which have at their source the operator paying attention to the cell phone or under the influence of drugs have resulted in trials where the question is asked "Are automated systems available?". "Well, yes." Followed by: "Could they have prevented this accident? and Why weren't they installed or in use?". Liability is resulting from the lack of automation. --- End quote --- I completely agree with your points about railroad automation, which should in theory eliminate all accidents except for those which are completely unavoidable, such as someone jumping in front of a train. The same can't be said about cars though, because they're much more complicated to automate, especially when there are human controlled vehicles, pedestrians and cyclists around. --- Quote from: unknownparticle on March 15, 2020, 12:11:26 am ---Walking more and driving less is all very laudable but for many it just impractical. I live in the countryside and it's 1.5 miles to the nearest A road, and the road to reach that point has no footpath. It's then a further 7 miles to the nearest supermarket. So, assuming I would be willing to risk my life on a regular basis to go food shopping (the only physical shopping I ever do now), and further assuming I could maintain a brisk walking pace, it would take me about 2 hours each way, actually more, because on the return journey I would be carrying about 10 to 15 KG of shopping! I just don't have the time! And don't even mention buses, there are 3 per day in my area, 1 morning, 1 mid day, 1 evening!! And very often they are cancelled with no notice. This is the problem with all this drive less mantra, it's fine if you live in a city, but a non starter for those that live in areas with poor infrastructure. One thing that could be done to alleviate traffic congestion would be to change school starting times so they don't conflict with work hours. Then there is the question why?! Climate change, the climate is always changing, nothing we can do about it. Notice it is now called climate change, not man made climate change, funny that! Humanity is not affecting the climate in any significant way, it's all a scam. In 50 years when the whole scamming nonsense is eventually exposed there will be alot of very angry people! --- End quote --- You're only in that situation because most people own a car. It's highly likely there was a small shop within a mile of where you live many years ago, when few people had a cars. And what I was proposing was for new housing estates to be virtually carless, so it wouldn't apply to you. I also accept that this will probably never happen, as it would be very unpopular. As far as schools are concerned, it depends on where you live. In my area the state schools aren't much of a problem. It's the private schools which contribute to congestion, because they tend to have an extra week off every school term and the traffic is good when they're closed. I'd just make children walk and cycle to school more, like in the good old days. |
| unknownparticle:
It is possible to eliminate pilots now, and has been for at least 20 years. General practice is for pilots to take off, then the autopilot is activated after about 20 seconds, the plane then flies on autopilot until it is well into the glide path to landing. However, the autopilot could do the whole thing without problem. The biggest problem in civilian aviation today is pilot boredom and consequent fatigue, because they have nothing to do in flight, this causes human error. So, it's a psychlogical problem, would passengers feel safe if they knew the aircraft was being flown entirely by computer with no flight crew onboard? Even knowing that this would probably be safer than being flown by a human pilot, because, most aviation accidents are caused by pilot error. Quite a dilemma. |
| Zero999:
--- Quote from: unknownparticle on March 15, 2020, 10:33:01 pm ---It is possible to eliminate pilots now, and has been for at least 20 years. General practice is for pilots to take off, then the autopilot is activated after about 20 seconds, the plane then flies on autopilot until it is well into the glide path to landing. However, the autopilot could do the whole thing without problem. The biggest problem in civilian aviation today is pilot boredom and consequent fatigue, because they have nothing to do in flight, this causes human error. So, it's a psychlogical problem, would passengers feel safe if they new the aircraft was being flown entirely by computer with no flight crew onboard? Even knowing that this would probably be safer than being flown by a human pilot, because, most aviation accidents are caused by pilot error. Quite a dilemma. --- End quote --- I suppose pilotess planes would be easier than driverless cars because there aren't lots of human controlled vehicles in the air. I'd definitely feel safer with no humans in the loop. |
| Cubdriver:
--- Quote from: Zero999 on March 15, 2020, 10:51:06 pm --- --- Quote from: unknownparticle on March 15, 2020, 10:33:01 pm ---It is possible to eliminate pilots now, and has been for at least 20 years. General practice is for pilots to take off, then the autopilot is activated after about 20 seconds, the plane then flies on autopilot until it is well into the glide path to landing. However, the autopilot could do the whole thing without problem. The biggest problem in civilian aviation today is pilot boredom and consequent fatigue, because they have nothing to do in flight, this causes human error. So, it's a psychlogical problem, would passengers feel safe if they new the aircraft was being flown entirely by computer with no flight crew onboard? Even knowing that this would probably be safer than being flown by a human pilot, because, most aviation accidents are caused by pilot error. Quite a dilemma. --- End quote --- I suppose pilotess planes would be easier than driverless cars because there aren't lots of human controlled vehicles in the air. I'd definitely feel safer with no humans in the loop. --- End quote --- ...right up until there's a near catastrophic mechanical or system failure... UAL flight 232: Qantas flight 72: Qantas flight 32: US Air flight 1549: ...and others. I think I'd prefer to keep the meat popsicles up at the pointy end to deal with failures like these. They might not ALWAYS succeed, but they'll do better than a computer that's not programmed for such things, or that, in cases like QF72, actually CAUSED them. There's a whole lot more that can go wrong in a plane than a car, and cars don't normally fall out of the sky. My vote is to keep the humans IN the loop. -Pat |
| CatalinaWOW:
There is no question that humans can sometimes deal with cases that the computers can't currently handle. But we are nearing the point (or perhaps already past) where the failures that humans introduce to the system outnumber and out weigh the cases where the computer would fail. Even if you only count cases where it is indisputably pilot error instead of just a case of throwing the pilot under the bus. It really shouldn't be a situation where personal feelings or preference is the deciding factor. Just the facts, maam. Just the facts. |
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