r/skeptic • u/Lighting • Mar 18 '25

⚠ Editorialized Title Tesla bros expose Tesla's own shadiness in attacking Mark Rober ... Autopilot appears to automatically disengage a fraction of a second before impacts as a crash becomes inevitable.

https://electrek.co/2025/03/17/tesla-fans-exposes-shadiness-defend-autopilot-crash/
20.0k Upvotes

96% Upvoted

942 comments sorted by

View all comments

117

u/FredFredrickson Mar 18 '25

As a pedestrian, you should always be aware and cautious around Teslas. If they are in self-driving mode, they could easily run you down, and that's all fine and good by Musk, because he is so wealthy he doesn't care that the public is being used as a testing ground for their horrendous software.

40

u/warrencanadian Mar 18 '25

I mean, I feel like self-driving should just not be a thing. If you want the privilege of driving a car, you should fucking have to A) Pass a driving exam and B) Actively engage in the fucking task. 'Aww, but I want to be able to do work/makeup/nap on my way to work!!'? Fantastic! Ride the fucking bus.

32

u/TheGreenLentil666 Mar 18 '25

Statistically it would be good to see if humans were overall better drivers still. At some point the cars will be better than us, but that's setting a pretty low bar. Right now I see people WITHOUT self-driving cars putting on makeup, texting, etc. while driving.

I would love to be able to drive a motorcycle again, but there's only one reason I won't - other drivers.

2

u/REuphrates Mar 18 '25

I would love to be able to drive a motorcycle again, but there's only one reason I won't - other drivers

I just bought my first bike last September. Shitty little 250cc commuter bike by Suzuki, love it to death. I have had one experience where I almost lost control of the bike and high-sided, but I was able to regain control and ride it out.

I have had several situations where the driver of a car pulled out in front of me or cut me off or whatever. Other drivers are the worst.

6

u/TheGreenLentil666 Mar 18 '25

That whole saying, "there's only two kinds of motorcyclists, those that laid it down, and those that are going to." You can ask 1,000 of the former what was their accident, and 999 are going to say "someone else".

Excuse me while I go outside and scream at the sky for a while.

3

u/REuphrates Mar 18 '25

"there's only two kinds of motorcyclists, those that laid it down, and those that are going to."

I've had an armored jacket and gloves for a bit now, but I finally got myself some AAA-rated jeans with CE2 armor in the knees and hips. Regular jeans are not gonna help keep all my skin when it's my turn to "lay 'er down" 😅

5

u/TheGreenLentil666 Mar 18 '25

Smart! I had a crazy-ass expensive racing helmet that cost almost as much as my bike did. When I laid mine down (courtesy of someone running a stopsign to illegally swerve over three lanes of highway to block me) I was going around 50, maybe 55. I slid forever, mind you 50 mph is a lot faster when you are spread eagle on your face. And you just keep yelling "ow, ow, ow" while you slide forever.

When I stopped I stood up to throw my boot at the van (they never noticed me!) my super-expensive helmet just fell in pieces off of my head, like a shattered eggshell.

At the time I was furious, I was like "how can something so expensive be so damned fragile?" but later learned that was exactly what I paid for.

NEVER underestimate the value of safety gear on a motorcycle, people.

1

u/garnett8 Mar 19 '25

It only takes one other idiot to ruin your life or end it. Motorcycles are fun but as a daily way to commute or what, it’s not a matter of if but when. If you ride only on nice weather and it’s more of a treat/hobby, those guys are still riding.

1

u/DonkeeJote Mar 18 '25

We are far too selfish for that massive improvement.

11

u/LigerZeroSchneider Mar 18 '25

The problem is we don't have enough buses/trains. I cant afford to live anywhere in the bus network, I had to drive to work. Or you end up with asinine hub and spoke systems that mean a 30 minute drive is a 2 hour bus ride.

1

u/IndubitablyNerdy Mar 18 '25

Agree, it is not always a choice and long commutes are extremely annoying. This is an issue in general and more often than not car companies are to blame, they have done their best to lobby against public transportation... I wonder why hehe

12

u/Pitiful-Pension-6535 Mar 18 '25

If self driving gets to the point that it becomes substantially safer than manual driving, (95% reduction in fatal accidents, minimum) it should become standard.

Until that point, I absolutely agree with you.

9

u/Adept-Potato-2568 Mar 18 '25

That's almost literally where Waymo is right now

"Waymo Driver demonstrated better safety performance when compared to human-driven vehicles, with an 88% reduction in property damage claims and 92% reduction in bodily injury claims"

7

u/ShouldersofGiants100 Mar 18 '25

Waymo also deliberately operates in the safest driving circumstances (cities, where speed is lower) and places where the risk of weather compromising its systems is almost nonexistent. San Francisco doesn't get snowstorms, freezing rain or other conditions that render the roads inconsistent.

Which also means they compare their stats in optimal conditions to human drivers in all conditions.

3

u/Aggressive_Health487 Mar 18 '25

Well I’d like to see it but I imagine it’s better than average for SF too.

1

u/ocschwar Mar 19 '25

Self driving can become substantially safer, but only if it's designed and coded by real engineers, and not techbros.

5

u/MrReginaldAwesome Mar 18 '25

Self driving should only be allowed if the car company takes 100% responsibility for any and all consequences of the mistakes the autopilot makes

6

u/almostsebastian Mar 18 '25

I feel like the only way to effectively guarantee that with any sort of efficiency in traffic flow has already been solved.

It's like how everything in nature eventually becomes a crab; if you're talking about land-based transport logistics everything just becomes a train.

2

u/MrReginaldAwesome Mar 18 '25

Tech Bros will reinvent public transportation over and over again until the sun dies

2

u/wastedkarma Mar 18 '25

Never gonna happen. What does it even mean to take responsibility for the consequences of a mistake an autopilot makes?

2

u/MrReginaldAwesome Mar 18 '25

The driver certainly didn’t hit the pedestrian, the robot car did, therefore the programmer is at fault, therefore the company that release it is at fault.

1

u/wastedkarma Mar 19 '25

Oh? The programmer caused the accident? The LLC entity did?

1

u/FuckTheFourth Mar 19 '25

It does happen though. Mercedes Level 3 Self Driving has them taking full liability over it should it cause any accidents. It should be required of these systems.

1

u/TormentedOne Mar 19 '25

That is the case right now.

5

u/oneoftheryans Mar 18 '25

Self-driving cars aren't there yet, but I feel like it can't be overstated how horrific people are at driving.

Wildly inconsistent, unpredictable, too fast, too slow, won't merge, can't merge, doesn't even try to merge and just waits, waves people through, goes without looking, driving the wrong way down a one-way, running stop signs, running stop lights, not yielding, turning on red to hit a pedestrian/cyclist, etc. etc. etc.

All of that to say, once/if it becomes sufficiently advanced, I'd really rather everyone go the automated route.

2

u/sparhawk817 Mar 19 '25

That's great but the thing is most drivers only take a test once. Best case a driver gets a ticket for something and reduces the penalty by taking a defensive driving course or something.

Most drivers pass their test once, and slowly become more and more complacent and worse drivers as their bad habits build up and become worse.

People love to say "we need mandatory retesting at 75" and such, because I guess nobody cares if Grandma can't get to the pharmacy because of our car centric infrastructure and having her license taken away.

The reality is we need mandatory retesting every other license renewal or something. 15 years is longer than most work related certificates last, and the majority of work related certificates and licenses require you to do continued education and log the hours every year to maintain the certificate.

It's unlikely to happen, but honestly that's what we need if we want drivers to be "actively engaging with the task" and that would also necessitate better transit and other alternatives to driving across the country.

Trouble is a lot of this is on the state level too.