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

> It didn't merge left to make room for vehicles merging onto the highway. The vehicles then tried to cut in. The system should have avoided an unsafe situation like this in the first place.

This is what bugs me about ordinary autopilot. Autopilot doesn't switch lanes, but I like to slow down or speed up as needed to allow merging cars to enter my lane. Autopilot never does that, and I've had some close calls with irate mergers who expected me to work with them. And I don't think they're wrong.

Just means that when I'm cruising in the right lane with autopilot I have to take over if a car tries to merge.

Agreed. Automatic lane changes are the only feature of enhanced autopilot that I think I'd be interested in, solely for this reason.

While I certainly wouldn't object to how you handle merging cars (it's a nice, helpful thing to do!), I was always taught that if you want to merge into a lane, you are the sole person responsible for making that possible and making that safe. You need to get your speed and position right, and if you can't do that, you don't merge.

(That's for merging onto a highway from an entrance ramp, at least. If you're talking about a zipper merge due to a lane ending or a lane closure, sure, cooperation with other drivers is always the right thing to do.)

> Just means that when I'm cruising in the right lane with autopilot I have to take over if a car tries to merge.

Which brings it right back to the original criticism of Tesla's "self driving" program. What you're describing is assisted driving, not anything close to "full self driving".

>cooperation with other drivers is always the right thing to do

Correct, including when the other driver may not have the strictly interpreted legal right of way. You don't know if their vehicle is malfunctioning, or if the driver is malfunctioning, or if they are being overly aggressive or distracted on their phone.

But most of the time, on an onramp to a highway, people on the highway in the lane that is being merged into need to be taking into account the potential conflicts due to people merging in from the acceleration lane. Acceleration lanes can be too short, other cars may not have the capability to accelerate quickly, other drivers may not be as confident, etc.

So while technically, the onus is on people merging in, a more realistic rule is to take turns whenever congestion appears, even if you have right of way.

I was taught that in every situation you should act as though you are the sole person responsible for making the interaction safe.

If you're the one merging? It's on you. If you're the one being merged into? Also you.

If you assume that every other driver has a malfunctioning vehicle or is driving irresponsibly then your odds of a crash go way down because you assume that they're going to try to merge incorrectly.

More Americans should go drive on the Autobahn. Everyone thinks the magic is “omg no speed limits!” which is neat but the really amazing thing is that NO ONE sits in the left hand lane and EVERYONE will let you merge immediately upon signaling.

It’s like a children’s book explanation of the nice things you can have (no speed limits) if everyone could just stop being such obscenely selfish people (like sitting in the left lane or preventing merges because of some weird “I need my car to be in front of their car” fixation).

At least in the northeast/east coast US there are still lots of old parkways without modern onramps, where moving over to let people merge is super helpful. Frequently these have bad visibility and limited room to accelerate if any at all, so doing it your way is not really possible.

For example:

I use this onramp fairly frequently. It’s rural and rarely has much traffic, but when there is you can get stuck for a while trying to get on because it’s hard to see the coming cars, and there’s not much room to accelerate (unless people move over, which they often do). https://maps.app.goo.gl/ALt8UmJDzvn89uvM7?g_st=ic

Preemptively getting in the left lane before going under this bridge is a defensive safety maneuver I always make—being in the right lane nearly guarantees some amount of conflict with merging traffic.

https://maps.app.goo.gl/PumaSM9Bx8iyaH9n6?g_st=ic

Tesla FSD on German Autobahn = most dangerous thing ever. The car has never seen this rule and it's not ready for a 300km/h car behind you.

> You need to get your speed and position right, and if you can't do that, you don't merge.

I agree, but my observation has been that the majority of drivers are absolutely trash at doing that and I'd rather they not crash into me, even if would be their fault.

Honestly I think Tesla's self-driving technology is long on marketing and short on performance, but it really helps their case that a lot of the competition is human drivers who are completely terrible at the job.

Autopilot is just adaptive cruise control with lane keep. Literally every car has this now. I don't see people on Toyota, Honda, or Ford forums complaining that a table-stakes feature of a car doesn't adjust speed or change lanes as a car is merging in. Do you know how insane that sounds. I'm assuming you're in software since you're on Hacker news.

My Audi doesn't advertise its predictive cruise control as Full Self Driving. So expectations are more controlled...

They're not talking about FSD.

It sounds zero insane. Adaptive cruise control taking into account merging would be great. And it's valid to complain about automations that make your car worse at cooperating.

To be fair, Tesla FSD on German Autobahn = impossible because it's not released yet, precisely because it's not trained for German roads.

This entire thread is people complaining about automation and FSD. Then you want an advanced feature, that requires a large amount of AI to do, as a toss-in feature to basic adaptive cruise control. Do you realize how far ahead Tesla is to everyone else?

A large amount of AI to shift slightly forward or backward based on turn signals? No.