Redefining “Safety” for Self-Driving Cars

All I have ever seen are vehicles tested in urban settings. Or on well defined by lane markings interstate type highways.

I travel 3,000 miles twice a year and I am often on some 2 lane highways with barely a centre line or no shoulders or shoulder markings. On any roads going through villages or towns speed bumps are installed and some of them are not marked because of paint having worn off or missing warning signs.
In the winter I live on a dirt road and there are many of those around. I would be curious as to how those self driving cars would perform in these situations?

Additionally drivers here ignore double lines and will pass expecting oncoming traffic to move to the right so that they can illegally pass.

More and more I think self driving vehicles are way off and currently and in the near future are just an expensive science experiment.

I don't think I will see fully autonomous self driving cars on the roads in my lifetime (other than experimental versions in controlled environments). I am just too old and won't be alive when it happens.

That said, driving automation is already underway and will continue to evolve in small increments with added sensors, safety mechanisms, and controls that will assist the human driver and take control of more and more driving functions. Automated parking systems, blind spot detection, lane departure warnings, automatic braking are just a few examples that already exist.

I'd love to see stats on how many lives were saved and disasters avoided from near misses that the computer properly judged in a split second and avoided an accident. Unfortunately, there's too much focus on the isolated rare incidents where something went wrong.

just think cellphone distractions, putting on make up, spilling hot coffee on you lap, day dreaming, drunk driving, your dog going potty in the front seat lol all these distractions removed would save how many lives ? will there be failed computer accidents yes but I suspect far less then with human drivers !

There is a pretty good size fleet of Teslas, and they phone home a lot. Tesla master control knows how many miles each car drives under autopilot (yes, I know, that is not full autonomy) and how many not.

Both Tesla and at least one insurance company have concluded from the data that the actual experience shows lower accident rates with the autopilot turned on. The insurance company is putting its money where its mouth is by adjusting rates.

Making such comparisons properly is actually a whole lot harder than it looks, and related to work I used to do professionally. I won't promise that either Tesla or the insurance company is doing it just right. But it is early days so far, and I think the early indications are quite good.

Wonder if the accident rate is simply down to when the self drive bit is active? Nice wide roads where the computer etc can easily cope. Human takes over when it's complicated so more accident risk? I love driving and can't ever see me handing over to a machine!

I would also bet that YOU know and maybe still drive a manual.

You can put me into or on almost any vehicle and I can drive it. Learning to drive on an automatic is not driving, it's just guiding the vehicle.

If you want a real driving challenge, turn the calendar back 100 years. See this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gTL5z32pqtU. A Model-T was my dad's first car. This video gives me a lot of respect for those who learned how to drive back then. My grandpa refused to drive the Model T and made my dad drive him everywhere until the Model A came out. Then my grandpa agreed to learn how to drive.

Yep, always had a stick shift except when I lived in the US

Thanks for that. The amazing thing is that millions of first-time drivers started with the model T--most of them not fast-learning teenagers.

A somewhat similar video for the model A: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kr53h0hv8hI, makes clear how very much closer to more recent cars was the A than the T.

Even partial autonomy would be an improvement.

Had a 2 spped B&M hydro transmission coupled to a 848 horse, blueprinted 454...

We had air conditioning and electric windows ..

It wasn't quite stock

Not self driving but I really like the adaptive cruise that is on my new car...

As mentioned earlier, things like adaptive cruise control, lane drift correction and assisted braking are becoming standard features in newer vehicles. These improvements represent incremental steps towards, what I call, "supported driving". We are still in control but these things have improved driving safety.

Maybe they will install a "red light assist" that will interact with traffic signals and determine whether you will make the upcoming light

Right now we have transport vehicles that practically can drive themselves. I'm talking about airplanes. It can fly and land of its own, and probably it can be make to take off by itself. But just take a look on all ground support involved to make this possible. And even now there are no self-flying planes that carry passengers.

To make cars drive fully autonomously you have to build ALL infrastructure on ALL roads that will be allowed for self-driving vehicles. Once somebody will be able to finance building and maintenance of this guidance system then it will be possible to make it work.

Right now there are fully automated, self-driving delivery systems in factories. They are based on properly prepared "roads" that can precisely guide vehicle. Once you got working guidance system, you can make cars drive themselves with precision surpassing any human.