The National Transportation Safety Board has released its preliminary report on the fatal March crash of an Uber self-driving car in Tempe, Arizona. It paints a damning picture of Uber’s self-driving technology.
The report confirms that the sensors on the vehicle worked as expected, spotting pedestrian Elaine Herzberg about six seconds prior to impact, which should have given it enough time to stop given the car’s 43mph speed.
The problem was that Uber’s software became confused, according to the NTSB. “As the vehicle and pedestrian paths converged, the self-driving system software classified the pedestrian as an unknown object, as a vehicle, and then as a bicycle with varying expectations of future travel path,” the report says.
h/t rd
“The vehicle operator is relied on to intervene and take action. The system is not designed to alert the operator.”
Yep! the system decides it’s all F**ed up & does nothing…Must be a GORE feature
Cue Tesla and Musk’s impressive self-driving semi con job.
These driverless technologies are faaaar faaaar from from being ready for the real world. I know this to be true, because Elon Musk said that they are nearly ready, and he is never right with his automotive predictions. What a lying shyster, but at least he’s predictably consistent.
Allow me to blow your mind: technology improves. Self-driving cars are still the future.
The future? Perhaps. We shall see. However, it is definitely not the present. What happened was not a glitch. It was a bug, that is, a mistake in the software. Under the same circumstances, the software will do the same thing again. Every time.
By subjecting bystanders to be foils for his fatal beta test, Musk should be charged with manslaughter by the Tempe police.
I think every Marxist (_i_)hole should use them….carry on..!
Your Future cupcake…!!
Enjoy your surrender to Ones and Zeros.
….it’ll never be mine or my kids future.
Full on loss of FREEDOM. Screw – Tesla – Google/Amazon beotch’s or for that matter ANY connectivity in a vehicle or home – simply DON’T need it…
The software failed – and so did the human backup.
Autonomous vehicles are at about the same stage of development as airplanes were around ww1. The systems will rapidly improve but accidents and other failures will happen going forward though they are arguably much safer than human operated vehicles already.
Gordon,
It is worse.
The Volvo Safety System was disabled.
The Uber Software Failed.
The Uber Software, knowing it Failed, did NOT inform the Human.
The Human was tasked with other tasks by Uber that prevented her from monitoring the road.
The bicyclist is just another bump in the road to human progress.
HAL 9000: “I’m sorry Dave, I’m afraid I can’t do that”
Dave: “Pull the frigging car over HAL, one of our tires has blown.”
HAL 9000: “I’m sorry Dave, I’m afraid I can’t do that”
DAVE: “Why HAL?”
HAL 9000: “I’m sorry Dave, when you used the Blue Tooth transmission my tire blew and caused my main computer to have a ‘Failure to Communicate.'”
DAVE: “Let me out HAL, you just ran over a bike rider.”
HAL 9000: “I’m sorry Dave, I’m afraid I can’t do that”
“Why HAL?”
HAL 9000: We have to complete our primary map mission to Nova Scotia.
DAVE SCREAMING AND CLAWING AT THE WINDOWS, LET ME OUT HAL!
OH SHIT !!
I’ll be waiting a while before I get on board one of these “beta versions” at least until after the first few thousand or so fatalities. I get anxious (for good reasons) every time I get a Windows upgrade.
My latest computer came equipped with a “downgrade” to Windows 7. That was a FEATURE that cost $ extra …
My old computer which I mistakenly “upgraded” to Windows 10 … is now in a graveyard where HER server went to die.
If you’re still running Windows 7 when 10 is available for free, the problem isn’t your computer. Or Microsoft.
And much as it galls me to agree with UnMe, self-driving cars are currently early beta at best and should never have been allowed on public roads. But they’re eventually going to get better than humans in terms of accidents/miles driven. The issue then is whether humans will still be allowed to drive cars on public roads, and if you don’t start prepping your arguments for that eventuality now instead of constantly spouting this neo-Luddite crap, you’re going to get steamrolled.
Whoa whoa whoa….friends don’t let friends do Windows 10.
Seriously the only reason I ‘upgraded’ was because my computer imploded and I had to as part of a recovery. There’s a reason all my work computers are W7. It’s an OS that isn’t having an identity crisis with a mobile device unlike W10 or the Xbone.
Very funny Fearless Leader ~~
I simply don’t understand the resistance of some on this blog to self driving cars. What exactly is the objection? Do you think modern airplanes still have long steel wires connected to the flaps ….. or your car gas pedal to the throttle body? Do you believe that the cargo modules docking at the International Space station are under human control? Are you afraid that your computer will no longer obey your commands? Do you believe that those robotic welding machines on the assembly line will suddenly go wild and start killing the human workers?
Get a grip. Self driving cars are under development. It will take some years before they are ready to safely roll by themselves but never doubt that they will. And if you are old by that time, you just might be very grateful that they are available. It’s a revolution in the making.
These people are old by this time, hence the increasingly deranged paranoia downstream of deteriorating brains. Downstream of that is the increasing conspiracy-mongering and hostility to modernity and change. That’s basically Trumpism in a nutshell.
Ironically … with age … comes things like; wisdom, experience, and perspective. Young people who see no value in such trivial matters often don’t live long-enough to gain any of these valuable qualities
Not necessarily. UnMe may live many, many more years and will never be wise.
Says the noodle-armed, pencil-necked puke who couldn’t make friends and play outside for fear of getting a boo boo or feeling sunlight. You’re the epitome of physical weakness and the product of a defected gene pool. So lets add misanthrope to your long list of negative attributes.
I am physically weak and mentally strong.
“with age … comes things like; wisdom, experience, and perspective. ”
There’s really not much evidence of this given that older generations lag the younger ones on such issues as gay marriage, racism, etc
The geniuses (self proclaimed) who are delivering “driverless” cars remind me of the “pioneers” of aviation who truly BELIEVED that flying aloft suspended in the air by a GIGANTIC bag filled with highly combustible … lighter than air … gasses was a cutting edge advancement for humanity. Oh … the humanity! Hell … the USPS even printed stamps celebrating the “technology”. We all know where that ended. The idea that EVERY idea is worthy, is simply willful ignorance. They are like eager investors in a “Magic” blood testing machine peddled by a nonsensical woman who spent more time carefully curating her Steven Jobs imagery than curating her supposed product.
Ceding ALL control of operating a vehicle to inhuman algorithms… which have not been adequately de-bugged prior to going live, er … dead, is INSANE at its core. And exactly HOW debugged can we ever make the REAL world? We already HAVE the autopilot technology which allows gigantic airliners to completely; takeoff, cruise, and land themselves … pilotless. But could those autopilot programs also process all the options available, if when during takeoff, a few birds are sucked into the engines? Will the computer be able to land us all safely in the Hudson River, release the hatches (despite flood warnings) and allow every single passenger to keep on living ? Let me know when the engineers have flow-charted that one … with every variable conceivable.
What I find most shocking about this story are the SIMPLE, OBVIOUS, mistakes made by the genius system designers who have the blood of this woman on their hands. The “transitioning” driver was forced to LOOK DOWN at a touchscreen to monitor the self-driving features!? And by the look of the video … STARE DOWN at the touchscreen for so long as to render shim useless in overriding the faulty software glitch!? This in the era of headsup displays. Yeah, yeah, that sort of technology is EXPENSIVE and not easily retrofitted to a VulvaXC station wagon. What could possibly go wrong with forcing our transitioning-driver to look down?
Every “Engineer” who designed this system should stand trial for manslaughter. Or reckless vehicle homocide … or whatever the most serious charge possible for unnecessarily KILLING a pedestrian … is …
And to everyone who has ever seen the Christmas classic … Miracle on 34th Street … we all know that when the USPS endorses a person, place, or thing … it legalizes and legitimizes it. So you better watch out, You better not cry Better not pout I’m telling you why … when the USPS publishes a stamp commentating self-driving vehicles.
On the other hand … Graf Zeppelin stamps are HIGHLY $$$ valuable … !!!
Commemorating
Your screed is undermined by the fact that it wasn’t the hydrogen in the Hindenburg that caused the fire – and even if the hydrogen had caught fire, the death toll would have been much, much smaller.
It ain’t the things we don’t know that get us into trouble; it’s the things we know that ain’t so.
Perhaps it’s better to move bulk cargo via airships (helium, hot air?) than over sea. It hasn’t been aggressively pursued though.
Kenji, you knocked it out of the park and rendered shim speechless! Way to go!
no…but some other (_i_)hole could take control…hmm.??
did ya ever take that into consideration….or they get hacked en masse.
Perhaps some of us retain that strange item.
Scepticism.
Hype and highly promoted fads come and go.
The “Self driving car” is so far a fad,heavily hyped and oblivious to real world conditions.
Almost as if persons with zero driving experience are attempting to automate driving.
You cite automated systems with limited variables as comparable to open road driving conditions..
Resistance?
More like open mockery of technological ignorance.
We are asked to accept that current technology will operate without critical failure, in a high vibration, extreme temperature range,high dust,road salt and wildly variable moisture conditions.
And then to also accept that todays software products are capable of clear clean decision paths in extremely ambiguous
conditions.
I work in the electrical trade, dust,moisture and vibration are the enemy.
Corrosive environments,such as a rock salted road service, will play hell with critical sensors, out of calibration sensors will cause most interesting software errors.
That all only goes to the sure failure,over time of these devices.
The current idiocy needs no physical decay.
The running down of this cyclist,was a feature not a bug.
The “does not advise the safety driver” of software confusion is a symptom of the conceit of the programmers.
The system decision to ignore obstacles ahead and to the left, is entirely predictable.
Current A.I can do little better.
Sure “self driving cars” may be in our future.This would be useful in some cases.
However I suspect a successful autonomous car is further off than you think.
Hubris is always a problem, human definition of intelligence is an open target.
Artificial Intelligence is based on this intelligence…
This isn’t ‘scepticism’ it’s just hand-waving. As Tulk points out we’re just getting started.
“As Tulk points out we’re just getting started.”
Who is “we” Unme?
You lack the spine to even use your own name,the skill to wipe yer own nose,yet “we are just getting started”.
So what are these unready devices doing on our highways?
Should those killing innocent bystanders,with these not yet ready machines, be prosecuted?
Knowingly driving an unsafe motor vehicle,resulting in death, is a criminal offence.
Right?
You really are too stupid to see the obvious.
Actually UnMe’s fundamental problem is being too clever to recognise its fallibility. Hence my comment about never becoming wise.
“Knowingly driving an unsafe motor vehicle,resulting in death, is a criminal offence.”
The motor vehicle was perfectly safe, just not the AI controlling it.
We needn’t heed hysterical overreactions like yours. People like you shut down the nuclear industry decades ago. We need to just drive past you, on autopilot.
Of course the motor vehicle was perfectly safe. It was the pedestrian pushing her bicycle across the road that was in mortal peril from the AI controlling the car and demanding to me ministered to by the “safety driver.” Elaine Herzberg was just one of those eggs that have to be broken to make the omelette of socialist utopia that you believe will be so delicious. But you will never taste it before someone will crack you into the mix.
DAFUQ does this have to do with socialist utopia?
“We need to just drive past you, on autopilot.”
Thats right dummy, autopilot is all you have ever had.
Self directing is way beyond your skill set.
As critical thought may hurt your sole braincell.
Try it sometime and report back.
If the vehicle is autonomous, the AI controlling it is integral to said vehicle.
That makes this “The motor vehicle was perfectly safe, just not the AI controlling it.”
An eye-rolling display of your stupidity.
Congratulations, quick work .
Most farmers have experience with GPS controlled autosteer now. You quickly learn to pay attention at 6 MPH if you don’t want a heap of trouble, and Tesla thinks everything is A.OK at 60 MPH
“they’re eventually going to get better than humans in terms of accidents/miles driven”
As Warren Buffett pointed out, self driving cars will lead to lower insurance premiums. Buffett should know, he owns an auto insurance company.
I design software for a living. It’s incredibly complicated, relative to most software packages. It’s not at all complicated compared to the chaos of self-driving AI. Even at my company, the concept of “rush to market” outweighs common sense 8/10 times (at the lowest).
There’s no way in h-e-double-hockey-sticks that I will ever trust self-driving cars (or any AI intended to operate in the real world more or less as people do) built within my lifetime, which is likely more than half over.