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US probes Tesla's Full Self-Driving software after fatal crash

(www.reuters.com)
410 points jjulius | 20 comments | 18 Oct 24 16:01 UTC | HN request time: 0.403s | source | bottom
1. jqpabc123 ◴[18 Oct 24 12:19 UTC] No.41878712[source]▶
By now, most people have probably heard that Tesla's attempt at "Full Self Driving" is really anything but --- after a decade of promises. The vehicle owners manual spells this out.

As I understand it, the contentious issue is the fact that unlike most others, their attempt works mostly from visual feedback.

In low visibility situations, their FSD has limited feedback and is essentially driving blind.

It appears that Musk may be seeking a political solution to this technical problem.

replies(2): >>41879568 #>>41880058 #
2. whamlastxmas ◴[18 Oct 24 14:02 UTC] No.41879568[source]▶
It’s really weird how much you comment about FSD being fake. My Tesla drives me 10+ miles daily and the only time I touch any controls is pulling in and out of my garage. Literally daily. I maybe disengage once every couple days just to be on the safe side in uncertain situations, it I’m sure it’d likely do fine there too.

FSD works. It drives itself fine 99.99% of the time. It is better than most human drivers. I don’t know how you keep claiming it doesn’t or doesn’t exist.

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3. jqpabc123 ◴[18 Oct 24 14:07 UTC] No.41879611[source]▶
So you agree with Musk, the main problem with FSD is political?

Tesla says on its website its "Full Self-Driving" software in on-road vehicles requires active driver supervision and does not make vehicles autonomous.

https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/nhtsa-...

4. sottol ◴[18 Oct 24 14:08 UTC] No.41879614[source]▶
The claim was about _full_ driving being anything but, ie not _fully_ self-driving, not being completely fake. Disengaging every 10-110 miles is just not "full", it's partial.

And then the gp went into details in which specific situations fsd is especially problematic.

5. peutetre ◴[18 Oct 24 14:40 UTC] No.41879880[source]▶
The problem is Tesla and Musk have been lying about full self-driving for years. They have made specific claims of full autonomy with specific timelines and it's been a lie every time: https://motherfrunker.ca/fsd/

In 2016 a video purporting to show full self-driving with the driver there purely "for legal reasons" was staged and faked: https://www.reuters.com/technology/tesla-video-promoting-sel...

In 2016 Tesla said that "as of today, all Tesla vehicles produced in our factory – including Model 3 – will have the hardware needed for full self-driving capability at a safety level substantially greater than that of a human driver." That was a lie: https://electrek.co/2024/08/24/tesla-deletes-its-blog-post-s...

Musk claimed there would be 1 million Tesla robotaxis on the road in 2020. That was a lie: https://www.thedrive.com/news/38129/elon-musk-promised-1-mil...

Tesla claimed Hardware 3 would be capable of full self-driving. When asked about Hardware 3 at Tesla's recent robotaxi event, Musk didn't want to "get nuanced". That's starting to look like fraud: https://electrek.co/2024/10/15/tesla-needs-to-come-clean-abo...

Had Tesla simply called it "driver assistance" that wouldn't be a lie. But they didn't do that. They doubled, tripled, quadrupled down on the claim that it is "full self-driving" making the car "an appreciating asset" that it would be "financially insane" not to buy:

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/04/23/elon-musk-any-other-car-than...

https://edition.cnn.com/2024/03/03/cars/musk-tesla-cars-valu...

It's not even bullshit artistry. It's just bullshit.

Lying is part of the company culture at Tesla. Musk keeps lying because the lies keep working.

replies(1): >>41881832 #
6. enslavedrobot ◴[18 Oct 24 15:01 UTC] No.41880058[source]▶
Here's a video of FSD driving the same route as a waymo 42% faster with zero interventions. 23 min vs 33. This is my everyday. Enjoy.

https://youtu.be/Kswp1DwUAAI?si=rX4L5FhMrPXpGx4V

replies(2): >>41880348 #>>41880841 #
7. ck2 ◴[18 Oct 24 15:31 UTC] No.41880348[source]▶
There are also endless videos of teslas driving into pedestrians, plowing full speed into emergency vehicles parked with flashing lights, veering wildly from strange markings on the road, etc. etc.

"works for me" is a very strange response for someone on Hacker News if you have any coding background - you should realize you are a beta tester unwittingly if not a full blown alpha tester in some cases

All it will take is a non-standard event happening on your daily drive. Most certainly not wishing it on you, quite the opposite, trying to get you to accept that a perfect drive 99 times out of 100 is not enough.

replies(1): >>41880614 #
8. enslavedrobot ◴[18 Oct 24 15:57 UTC] No.41880614{3}[source]▶
Those are Autopilot videos this discussion is about FSD. FSD has driven ~2 billion miles at this point and had potentially 2 fatal accidents.

The US average is 1.33 deaths/100 million miles. Tesla on FSD is easily 10x safer.

Every day it gets safer.

replies(2): >>41881791 #>>41890087 #
9. jqpabc123 ◴[18 Oct 24 16:18 UTC] No.41880841[source]▶
Can it drive the same route without a human behind the wheel?

Not legally and not according to Tesla either --- because Tesla's FSD is not "Fully Self Driving" --- unlike Waymo.

10. diggernet ◴[18 Oct 24 17:50 UTC] No.41881791{4}[source]▶
How many miles does it have on the latest software? Because any miles driven on previous software are no longer relevant. Especially with that big change in v12.
replies(1): >>41883175 #
11. whamlastxmas ◴[18 Oct 24 17:55 UTC] No.41881832{3}[source]▶
Most of this is extreme hyperbole and it’s really hard to believe this is a genuine good faith attempt at conversation instead of weird astroturfing, bc these tired inaccurate talking points are what come up in literally every single even remotely associated to Elon. It’s like there’s a dossier of talking points everyone is sharing

The car drives itself. This is literally undeniable. You can test it today for free. Yeah it doesn’t have the last 0.01% done yet and yeah that’s probably a lot of work. But commenting like the GP is exhausting and just not reflective of reality

replies(2): >>41882109 #>>41883818 #
12. jqpabc123 ◴[18 Oct 24 18:27 UTC] No.41882109{4}[source]▶
... not reflective of reality

Kinda like repeated claims of "Full Self Driving" for over a decade.

13. enslavedrobot ◴[18 Oct 24 20:29 UTC] No.41883175{5}[source]▶
The miles driven are rising exponentially as the versions improve according to company filings. If the miles driven on previous versions are no longer relevant how can the NHTSA investigation of previous versions impact FSD regulation today?

Given that the performance has improved dramatically over the last 6 months, it is very reasonable to assume that the miles driven to fatality ratio also improving.

Using the value of 1.33 deaths per 100 million miles driven vs 2 deaths in 2 billion miles driven, FSD has saved approximately 24 lives so far.

14. peutetre ◴[18 Oct 24 21:49 UTC] No.41883818{4}[source]▶
> bc these tired inaccurate talking points are what come up in literally every single even remotely associated to Elon

You understand that the false claims, the inaccuracies, and the lies come from Elon, right? They're associated with him because he is the source of them.

They're only tired because he's been telling the same lie year after year.

15. hilux ◴[19 Oct 24 19:30 UTC] No.41890087{4}[source]▶
Considering HN is mostly technologists, the extent of Tesla-hate in here surprises me. My best guess is that it is sublimated Elon-hate. (Not a fan of my former neighbor myself, but let's separate the man from his creations.)

People seem to be comparing Tesla FSD to perfection, when the more fair and relevant comparison is to real-world American drivers. Who are, on average, pretty bad.

Sure, I wouldn't trust data coming from Tesla. But we have government data.

replies(1): >>41897149 #
16. lowbloodsugar ◴[20 Oct 24 17:50 UTC] No.41897149{5}[source]▶
That seems an odd take. This is a technologist website, and a good number of technologists believe in building robust systems that don’t fail in production. We don’t stand for demos, and we have to fight off consultants peddling crapware that demos well but dies in production. I own a Tesla, despite my dislike of Musk, because it is an insanely fun car. I will never enable FSD, did not even do so when it was free. I see even the best teams have production outages. Until Tesla legally accepts, and the laws allows them to, legal responsibility, and until it’s good enough that it doesn’t disengage, ever, then I’m never using it and nobody else should.
replies(1): >>41900413 #
17. dham ◴[20 Oct 24 22:04 UTC] No.41898860[source]▶
It's similar to when DHH said they were not bundling code in production and all the Javascript bros said "No you can't do that it won't work". DHH was like "yes but I'm doing it"

That's how it feels in FSD land right now. Everyone's saying FSD doesn't work and it'll never be here, but I'm literally using it every day lol.

18. hilux ◴[21 Oct 24 03:25 UTC] No.41900413{6}[source]▶
> ... systems that don’t fail in production.

I'll say it again: "compared to what?"

replies(1): >>41907225 #
19. lowbloodsugar ◴[21 Oct 24 18:58 UTC] No.41907225{7}[source]▶
A minimum bar, for societal harm, would be against an identical data set of US drivers. The data for human drivers covers vastly more situations than FSD does. FSD refuses to activate in those situations. So an apples-to-apples comparison doesn't exist. The FSD data is effectively cherry picked for ideal driving conditions. Tesla's claims that FSD is safer than the average driver are not supported by their data, and as others have said, either their statisticians are incompetent or liars. This is basic stuff.

However the minimum bar for me to activate it is "compared to me". I've never come close to driving under a truck or into a divider. I slow down driving into the sunset and use a baseball hat if necessary to make sure I can see.

replies(1): >>41907923 #
20. hilux ◴[21 Oct 24 20:00 UTC] No.41907923{8}[source]▶
> However the minimum bar for me to activate it is "compared to me".

I see where you're coming from. That's totally fair.

As a highly-informed (about health) consumer, I feel the same way about most nutrition advice.

But the parameters for government policy decision-making are different. AND I get your point about cherry-picked data. I'd like to have better data.