Tesla’s Push to Build a Self-Driving Car Sparks Dissent Among Its Engineers
Since we&#x27;re finally getting some refutations to Self-Driving Hype, let me drop some quotes here:<p><i>“I tell adult audiences not to expect it in their lifetimes. And I say the same thing to students”<p>&quot;Merely dealing with lighting conditions, weather conditions, and traffic conditions is immensely complicated. The software requirements are extremely daunting. Nobody even has the ability to verify and validate the software. I estimate that the challenge of fully automated cars is 10 orders of magnitude more complicated than [fully automated] commercial aviation.&quot;</i><p>- Steve Shladover, transportation researcher at the University of California, Berkeley<p><a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.automobilemag.com&#x2F;news&#x2F;the-hurdles-facing-autonomous-vehicles&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.automobilemag.com&#x2F;news&#x2F;the-hurdles-facing-autonom...</a><p><i>&quot;With autonomous cars, you see these videos from Google and Uber showing a car driving around, but people have not taken it past 80 percent. It&#x27;s one of those problems where it&#x27;s easy to get to the first 80 percent, but it&#x27;s incredibly difficult to solve the last 20 percent. If you have a good GPS, nicely marked roads like in California, and nice weather without snow or rain, it&#x27;s actually not that hard. But guess what? To solve the real problem, for you or me to buy a car that can drive autonomously from point A to point B—it&#x27;s not even close. There are fundamental problems that need to be solved.&quot;</i><p>- Herman Herman, director of the Carnegie-Mellon University Robotics Institute<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;motherboard.vice.com&#x2F;en_us&#x2F;article&#x2F;d7y49y&#x2F;robotics-lab-uber-gutted-says-driving-cars-are-not-even-close-carnegie-mellon-nrec" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;motherboard.vice.com&#x2F;en_us&#x2F;article&#x2F;d7y49y&#x2F;robotics-l...</a><p><i>&quot;While I enthusiastically support the research, development, and testing of self-driving cars, as human limitations and the propensity for distraction are real threats on the road, I am decidedly less optimistic about what I perceive to be a rush to field systems that are absolutely not ready for widespread deployment, and certainly not ready for humans to be completely taken out of the driver’s seat.&quot;</i><p>- Mary Cummings, director of the Humans and Autonomy Laboratory at Duke<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.commerce.senate.gov&#x2F;public&#x2F;_cache&#x2F;files&#x2F;c85cb4ef-8d7f-40fb-968c-c476c5220a3c&#x2F;8BC0CC7E137483CEFD0C928ECB14E74E.cummings-senate-testimony-2016.pdf" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.commerce.senate.gov&#x2F;public&#x2F;_cache&#x2F;files&#x2F;c85cb4ef...</a> [pdf]<p>All quotes pulled from this article (which is really quite good and you should read it in full):<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.nakedcapitalism.com&#x2F;2016&#x2F;10&#x2F;self-driving-cars-how-badly-is-the-technology-hyped.html" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.nakedcapitalism.com&#x2F;2016&#x2F;10&#x2F;self-driving-cars-ho...</a>