Are Self-Driving Cars Safe?

Tesla's Autopilot system is the most advanced available right now, but it has limitations, and some of those limitations might be us.

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[flyboy]

I'm a private pilot and even though I fly airplanes with autopilots, I'm still the Pilot-In-Command. That means that if the plane crashes, it's my fault unless there is a mechanical reason the plane crashed that was out of my control. And, if the autopilot does something stupid, It's my responsibility as the Pilot-In-Command to take control back from the autopilot and resume control. This is per federal aviation laws. Yet, some people still think that their autonomous cars should be held responsible or the company that makes them should be held responsible when the self driving cars crash. IMHO, this is just stupid. Having said that, this is still a tragedy and is likely the fault of the drive that cut off the car. But, that decision will have to be left up to the investigators.

[chriswanderer]

It's not perfectly safe, since other drivers are reckless. Maybe it will be 100% safe if all cars are autopilot.

[Boyninja]

133 million driving miles without a deadly accident; 2 deaths. Also, don't forget that these are reasonably infant systems (In the grand scheme of both automobiles and automation) and safety always improves with time. No matter what you may think of the concept, it's certainly safer than total human control.

[jonesnj]

*Self driving cars don't need to be perfect, they just need to be better than we are*

[Seag-Gaming]

Thousands of manual car deaths - meh. One death form automatic car - OH MY GOD THIS AUTOMATIC CAR HALLABALU NEEDS TO STOP NOW!

[yaroslavsky]

I KNEW IT! Florida's insanely bright sun kills again!

[swsephy]

Maybe they shouldn't have called it Autopilot. Also don't watch Harry Potter when you're supposed to be driving a car.

[kendelion]

if the truck was on autopilot, it wont make a left turn until it's safe.

[konanxyz]

first self driving car death, still mostly wasnt the cars fault 😂😂

[bolerie]

To everybody saying that the autopilot just needs to be better than humans: You're totally right. But think of it like planes: statistically a lot safer than driving, but we think it's a lot more scary because it is outside our control. Humans are innately scared of lack of control. Same reason why we're scared about mass muderes, very unlikely to happen to us but outside of our own control.

[Octamed]

And now all Tesla's know how to avoid that situation. It sounds morbid, but it won't take many fatal accidents before they can handle every situation.
If a human does something fatal, only THAT human knows (for about half a second) and no other human knows about it, so it keeps on happening.

[contajus]

They don't have to be perfect, just better than humans.

[dwood]

The final statement in this video is absurdly unlikely. Within a couple of decades, humans will simply not be required at the rate the technology is improving. They might still be told to keep their hands on the wheel for liability reasons, however that's not the same thing as it actually being required for adequate safety. Self-driving cars don't have to be perfectly safe to be usable -- they only have to be safer than humans, which isn't hard. Many people claim they already are.

[Vakito]

But why is there hair around my self driving car?

[FirstRisingSouI]

Self-driving cars are the future. I'm very uncomfortable that we have such a low standard for handing out licenses to control these things that are continually proven to be giant metal death machines. I think they should be relegated to computers, or more practically for the moment, professionals who have expert training.

[CoffeeBurps]

With only the context that the video gave, it sounds like if it was a normal car that was being driven, the driver that died would not be found at fault. It sounds like the driver of the tractor made a reckless turn which would have endangered another driver even in a human-driven car. It seems unfair to blame this on the technology when, based on the context this video gave, just glancing away for a moment would have ended in a collision.

Like a time when I wanted to merge over a lane on the highway so I glance to my left to make sure I'm clear and when I glance back, traffic in front of me had stopped. I looked away for less than a second to be aware of my surroundings and I ended up with a totalled car and the guy in front of me had a severely damaged car. I'm grateful to the guy for being surprisingly cool about the whole situation and things could have ended much worse.

But my point is road conditions can change in an instant and there are a huge amount of variables. It sounds like a similar thing would have happened had the car been manually driven .

[Belicose]

They're safe gosh darn it. About as safe as any other car. Just use your head and don't confuse a fully autonomous system with a fancy car with sensors and programming that can't account for variables like cars suddenly pulling out. Think of it more as cruise control on steroids and a very intense workout regimen.

[silverharloe]

"a sample size of 1" - shouldn't all the safely driven km also be part of the "sample size"?

[nodros]

The driver needs to be aware while the car drives itself! I don't get why people don't understand this.

[cybar]

I'll save you five minutes and nineteen seconds: Yes, they are. Humans though...