Save Autonomous Vehicles companies from themselves — So they can Save Us
In 2011 NASA failed SpaceX software for being poorly tested and unsafe. It did not handle exceptions or what-if scenarios well. SpaceX was forced to augment its IT, app and gaming developers with aerospace engineers and engineering practices. NASA saved SpaceX from itself and we all benefited. That is what is needed from the government now with respect to the Autonomous Vehicle industry.
All of you folks who rail against government intervention help me understand exactly how detailed government regulations or a driver’s and “vision” test for autonomous vehicles would hamper the industry growth IF, like we have with the FAA, the regulations and testing criteria are comprehensive and accurate? Give me some exact examples. And while you are at it tell me when in the history of mankind any technology has risen to actual best practices or excellence without the government determining exactly what excellence or even good meant. Didn’t happen in air transportation, rail transportation or with vehicles. In other industries it didn’t work for medicines or medical equipment, nuclear plants, the oil and gas industry etc. And it certainly isn’t working for cybersecurity now. The argument that government will impede industry is a red herring. What is really involved is one group of humans must be regulated by another set of humans because one of them is motivated and obligated by law to maximize profits. The other is not. Industries virtually never implement actual best practice, without being forced to, if there is no return on investment. And if you look at how this pattern usually turns out detailed regulation not only can lead to actual best practices and high safety standards, it spurs competition. Why? Because it levels the playing field and resets the low bar to a much higher point. Companies now have no need to hype and cut corners. Their profit or ROI is now tied to a larger set of mandatory requirements. If they want to differentiate between themselves and others they need to innovate to reach the bar faster and cheaper. And in some cases, raise that bar a bit. The autonomous vehicle industry needs this intervention more than any in history. Why? Because the technology is harder than the others and it is being done by well-meaning intelligent folks who are in over their heads and either don’t know it or won’t acknowledge it. And they are using an unproven and not entirely understood new technology, AI, to overcome that gap. Worst of all virtually every AV maker is using humans in the public domain as Guinea pigs to create new and incredibly complex technology using another new and extremely complex technology to help them with that. The layered risk here is insane, especially since there is a far better way to go about this. Please see my first link below for more on that. (It is a myth that public shadow driving is a viable method to create AVs. That process can never come close to creating an AV. You cannot drive the one trillion miles or spend over $300B to do so. You also cannot run thousands of accident cases thousands of times each or have any more casualties especially a child or family. That is unavoidable on this reckless and fruitless path.)
Like the other industries I mentioned above the Autonomous Vehicle industry is on an extremely counterproductive and untenable path. One that others have been on before. Do we really need to repeat that history to do the right thing here? That loop starts off with folks screaming that the folks making these systems cannot be hampered by government interference. That leads to low bars, especially around safety. That leads to hype, false confidence, tragedies, press coverage and regulation. However, unless a massive tragedy occurs, it takes several iterations of those loops often with them needing to cause increasingly worse tragedies, since we are desensitized by them as we go, to get us to react. That is exactly what is happening here. We got used to driver Guinea pigs being killed so we needed a pedestrian to be killed to get us engaged. Now it will take a child or a family to die. Given the methods the futile and reckless methods currently being used those tragedies are not only an eventuality but will have to happen thousands of times over. (That will be the result of thousands of accident scenarios being run thousands of times each to train the AI.) Do we really have to repeat history here?
Back to the solution. Those pesky regulations and detailed tests. The relative rules and processes would not determine HOW something is done but what these systems and their relative subsystems must achieve. What sensors you use is not relevant. What they must be able to detect in all sorts of conditions and to do so with extremely high reliability, accuracy and redundancy is relevant. You don’t like LiDAR? Fine use cameras and 3-D radar etc. Just make sure you pass the tests. Beyond that we would engage all the relevant parties; engineers, insurers, academics etc to create a progressive set of tests, that would traverse legitimate geofencing and create the relevant tests needed to demonstrate verifiably higher levels of capability beyond that of a human driver. We would utilize aerospace, DoD and FAA level simulation as well as test tracks and limited public driving to do that. If the DoT got this and imposed this standard they would save most of the AV makers from going bankrupt, save lives by forcing folks to abandon most of their public shadow driving and handover/L3 nonsense and bring this technology to market far, far faster than it is coming now. (Which by the well is literally never given the status quo.) Since this industry, like virtually every other, cannot self-police, someone must save them from themselves. It is the right ethical, moral, professional and financial course for everyone involved.
Relevant articles
Impediments to Creating an Autonomous Vehicle
Autonomous Vehicle Maker Consolidation, Bankruptcies and Negligence Lawsuits are Coming
Waymo is leading the hype charge — That will get many more people killed than it saves
- https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/waymo-leading-hype-charge-get-many-more-people-killed-michael-dekort/
Autonomous Vehicle makers are using Children as Guinea pigs -
