And we can thank Tesla for that, not even because of the issues of their system there will always be some, but because of the issues with their PR and marketing.<p>If you promote something as "autopilot" and "full self driving" and "safe" and yes sure the fine line says you need to stay alert and ready to act in under two seconds but the marketing really implies it's just a regulatory thing, and then you have said system kill people because it's not self driving at all it's drive assists, then people lose confidence.<p>Hell, even people who are fully aware of that are getting worried now, not because they don't understand what it is or isn't, but because they worry the person behind the wheel might be misunderstanding.
Someone I know drives an M series BMW and was considering a Tesla switch because his close friend in LA told him the autopilot is so good, he can now <i>routinely drive home drunk</i> (this was a guy in his mid 30s with a kid). As a result, my friend now also had confidence autopilot was reliable, no matter what I told him.<p>So, relative to the confidence most non-technical people seem to have had, this percentage is still not high enough.<p>Like most tech adoption curves, the hype here is still too high relative to reality. However, if you are someone who actually understands L1 - L4 scale, I think you should strongly correct people who don't.<p>Believing in the hype in crypto might lose you some money. Believing in the hype in self driving might lose you a life.
I tried to be open minded, but after my friend demoed his FSD "beta" to me I want these things banned. It drove worse than a drunk student driver and I legitimately feared for my life and made him stop after only a few minutes.<p>"Beta testing" such things on the general public is morally abhorrent. Let Musk by some land in a desert and build his own mock town to test his toys, but get it off the public roads.
As a full-time pedestrian without a car, while I'm modestly afraid of autonomous cars, I'm <i>really</i> afraid of distracted drivers on their phones.
I am eagerly looking forward to a day when all vehicles (or the vast majority) are autonomous. Not only would that allow drivers to get back all the time they would otherwise devote to operating their vehicles, but also it opens up a world of accessibility to blind people, the elderly, and others who (for whatever reason) can't drive themselves right now.<p>And there are network effects! If practically all cars are autonomous, they can talk to each other in sophisticated ways that are not feasible for manual operators, who largely rely on very rudimentary signaling (e.g. turn signals, flashing your brights, one-finger salute, etc.). This is fantastic for both safety and efficiency.<p>That said, what I think we should fear right now is not autonomous cars themselves, but misplaced expectations by drivers about how reliable the technology is right now. As long as everyone accurately understands their limitations, we can both limit our own risks and prevent the sort of backlash we're seeing now.
After seeing someone just blow through a stop sign in their normal non-autonomous car on my walk from the store this morning, I don't see how autonomous cars could be any worse.
I'm afraid of autonomous cars.<p>However, way less than I'm afraid of any random idiot human who may or may not have passed a driver's test on his 5th attempt in some random state, driving at whatever diminished capacity (tired, distracted, drunk, etc.) in the worst weather conditions, who is angry at the car in front of me for some reason, driving on the highway near me.
I'd like to thank Tesla for making this happen. They mislabeled their own self driving product and pushed it to market too early. Now everyone is afraid of something that <i>should</i> be safer than the status quo.
I'm more worried about the idiots driving 80mph and texting. Police don't seem to care or they are just so overwhelmed they have given up. I would welcome autonomous cars.
As they should be. I'm afraid of what Tesla's marketed as 'autonomous' and the precedent their ability to get away with it sets for the day we hand over a greater deal of trust to these systems.<p>Who needs regulation when you've got litigation? Surely that's the foundation of a reasonable government - let the bodies pile up and sort it all out in court.
This is really dumb. Media played up robots in the 80s and people were similarly scared of them.<p>There was even an SNL skit for Robot attack insurance.
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g4Gh_IcK8UM">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g4Gh_IcK8UM</a><p>It's only $4 a month. I bought it. Better be safe than sorry.
First I believe most members are rather old, probably above 50 years. So, no surprise there.<p>My, I cannot wait for Autonomous Cars, the kind I can take napes in, play games, etc as I am transported.<p>But that should like a train, I wish the US train system would be updated and expanded and cheap to where it would be useful :)
I'm curious what the split is on comfort with an autonomous car on city vs highway driving.<p>I know I'm personally uncomfortable with most stuff on the road right now in dense urban environments (Waymo, Cruise), yet a little more comfortable with highway autonomy (BlueCruise, Autopilot, Comma.ai).
I wonder if self-driving cars are going to be the second technology (after nuclear power) de-facto killed or at least stymied by demanding unrealistic/uneconomic safety standards.<p>Our media overhype fear and the civilizational consequences may be dire.<p>Edit: haha, a downvote in less than 30 seconds.
When the consumer is the unwitting beta-tester and the corporate policy is "ship fast and break things" well the consumer starts to grasp they are the thing that is going to break.
I'm afraid of all cars! The environmental impact, the personal economic impact, the amount of space they take up that could be parks or farms or whatever.