WTF Department - Uber Bureau

[Hawkmoon]

http://www.newser.com/story/257082/arizona-suspends-uber-self-driving-program.html

This article claims that Uber had DISABLED the collision avoidance capability on the vehicle that struck and killed the woman in Arizona. Why would they do that? It makes zero sense to me. Maybe on a test track, in daylight. On public roads, at night? Does not compute.

[MikeB]

Like most any news these days, it's not particularly accurate or badly explained/written by the author.

As I understand it, and this comes from piecing together several different reports on this and most of those were so badly written that I'm only pretty sure, not positive that I'm understanding. The collision avoidance system that is in the car from the factory was disabled. It had to be. There is also collision avoidance in the sensor and software packages that Uber is developing and testing separate from what come from the factory; that was not disabled. You can't really run both; or at least most likely running both would/could cause conflicts.

Now of course Ubers collision avoidance obviously didn't work in this case. I don't see how a human driver could have avoided this accident from the video I've seen. To me it appears the majority if not all the fault is from the person who was walking their bike across a place that wasn't designed for that and didn't appear to be paying attention - she should have seen the car and not crossed.

[dogmush]

Aptiv, which supplied the standard collision-avoidance technology for the Volvo SUV involved, says Uber had disabled the technology in the vehicle, possibly as part of testing for its own program.

Like Mike explained Uber disabled the standard Volvo autonomous braking so their system could drive the car.  The Uber system was (presumably) still active.

Now of course Ubers collision avoidance obviously didn't work in this case. I don't see how a human driver could have avoided this accident from the video I've seen. To me it appears the majority if not all the fault is from the person who was walking their bike across a place that wasn't designed for that and didn't appear to be paying attention - she should have seen the car and not crossed.

I'd be very interested to learn whether the system didn't work, or it worked as designed but encountered a collision outside it's design parameters.

Any collision avoidance system, even the organic ones we normally use is limited by the range of the sensors, the reaction time of the deciding system and the physics of stopping the vehicle.  Did this Uber just plow over the woman, or did it attempt to stop and couldn't in the time given to it by the detection range?

Which also begs the thought experiment.  Bicycles are supposed to have reflectors and exercise gear often incorporates reflective stuff so your eyes can see it farther away.  Will we soon start seeing LIDAR reflectors incorporated into pedestrians and bicycles.

[MikeB]

Like Mike explained Uber disabled the standard Volvo autonomous braking so their system could drive the car.  The Uber system was (presumably) still active.

I'd be very interested to learn weather the system didn't work, or it worked as designed but encountered a collision outside it's design parameters.

Any collision avoidance system, even the organic ones we normally use is limited by the range of the sensors, the reaction time of the deciding system and the physics of stopping the vehicle.  Did this Uber just plow over the woman, or did it attempt to stop and couldn't in the time given to it by the detection range?

Which also begs the thought experiment.  Bicycles are supposed to have reflectors and exercise gear often incorporates reflective stuff so your eyes can see it farther away.  Will we soon start seeing LIDAR reflectors incorporated into pedestrians and bicycles.

Good point. I was being overly broad in saying Uber’s system didn’t work. The car hit a pedestrian so something went “wrong”. We don’t know yet why it hit the person walking the bike. It may not be as simple as the Uber system not working as designed. I doubt these systems can ever be designed to be 100%. Humans can’t do 100% either. I personally still think the majority of the fault lies with the person who walked in front of the car. They most likely would have been hit by a human too.

[Hawkmoon]

Thanks for the explanation. Evidently I misunderstood the article.

As to whether or not a physical driver could/would have seen the pedestrian, I think that the "driver" should have seen her. The video is a bit deceptive. Video cameras are less adaptive than the human eye. The camera's exposure was adjusted to record the area lit by the main headlight beam correctly -- anything outside of the main beam basically isn't picked up on the video at all. The human eye is more sensitive, and the human brain does a better job of interpreting what we might term "nuanced" images. When you drive at night, your view of the cutoff from the main headlight beam to pitch dark isn't as sharp a cutoff as in the video. Certainly the pedestrian should have been using a crosswalk, and certainly she should have seen a car approaching and waited until it had passed, but maybe she misjudged the car's speed and thought she had time. We'll never know.

That said, I think a human driver probably would have seen her. Whether a human would have seen her in time to react and stop short of hitting her is questionable, but I think a human driver would at least have been on the brakes at the moment of impact.

Any collision avoidance system, even the organic ones we normally use is limited by the range of the sensors, the reaction time of the deciding system and the physics of stopping the vehicle.  Did this Uber just plow over the woman, or did it attempt to stop and couldn't in the time given to it by the detection range?

I'm fairly certain that multiple reports indicated the Uber system made no attempt to stop prior to the impact.

[HankB]

From what I read, Uber decided to make everyone else on the road an unwitting, involuntary test subject for an unproven system which, in the event of failure or malfunction, would subject those unwitting, involuntary test subjects to potentially fatal consequences - and with a dead woman resulting, it's more than potentially fatal consequences, it's actually fatal consequences.

Even if the owners of Uber avoid criminal prosecution for negligent homicide (or whatever the equivalent charge is there), the company and all its assets should, in its entirety, become the property of the next of kin of the person they killed.

[cordex]

From what I read, Uber decided to make everyone else on the road an unwitting, involuntary test subject for an unproven system which, in the event of failure or malfunction, would subject those unwitting, involuntary test subjects to potentially fatal consequences - and with a dead woman resulting, it's more than potentially fatal consequences, it's actually fatal consequences.

To be fair, Arizona's governor made the decision to allow those tests on Arizona roads.

[HankB]

To be fair, Arizona's governor made the decision to allow those tests on Arizona roads.

Is he protected from the consequences of his actions via sovereign immunity, or whatever the legal term is in Arizona?

[Firethorn]

I'm fairly certain that multiple reports indicated the Uber system made no attempt to stop prior to the impact.

I watched the video and by paying attention to the lane stripes, I saw no attempt at braking before they paused the video just before the impact would be seen.

I do not claim to know where the failure happened in the car's collision avoidance system, I just know one happened.  Like with a plane crash, experts need to analyze the records, figure out what happened, and issue a public report so all the other developers can either validate that the problem doesn't exist in their systems(uber's engineers were idiots), or fix the problem in their own systems, and it can be added to the battery of validation tests so it doesn't happen again.

Even if the owners of Uber avoid criminal prosecution for negligent homicide (or whatever the equivalent charge is there), the company and all its assets should, in its entirety, become the property of the next of kin of the person they killed.

Given that she was homeless, there is probably no real next of kin.  I know I wouldn't leave anybody I consider 'kin' homeless.

That said, take a step back.  Do you support, say, handing all of UPS or Fedex's assets over to somebody killed in an accident involving one of their trucks?  Because think about it, they're handing control over to unproven human drivers that could kill somebody at any time.

If anything Uber did apply due diligence by having a professional, paid, human driver that was supposed to be able to take over at any time.  Hell, with as unreliable as Uber self driving cars are supposed to be, requiring intervention every dozen miles or so, the driver should be much better at paying attention than, say, a Waymo/Google driver, which is in a car that needs an intervention only about twice a year.

To be fair, Arizona's governor made the decision to allow those tests on Arizona roads.

Under the premise that they were at least developed enough to probably not kill anybody, with the potential to save lives with their development and deployment.

[KD5NRH]

Bicycles are supposed to have reflectors

CPSC requirement only.  It only applies to new bicycles at the time of retail sale.  States vary, but all require a white light on the front and a red light or reflector on the rear, when being ridden at night.  Very few require wheel or pedal reflectors, and wheel reflector mounting clips are quite possibly the crappiest UV-brittling junk plastic ever made.  I can only very rarely remove a 2+ year old wheel reflector without breaking the twist or squeeze clip, and I've broken plenty just trying to change a tight tire.

and exercise gear often incorporates reflective stuff so your eyes can see it farther away.

Yeah; a logo on the chest or (in Dri-Star's case) at the hem, that can be covered by a nickel.  That's why I buy 10-20 meters of iron-on reflective from eBay every year.

Will we soon start seeing LIDAR reflectors incorporated into pedestrians and bicycles.

Think about that one; a typical LiDAR reflector is commonly known as "any object visible in NIR."  If they want to improve detection, passive FIR and even visible spectrum LiDAR is available.  If it depends on special more-reflective-than-normal stuff, then hoodlums are going to have a field day placing not-overly-reflective stuff like old engine blocks in traffic lanes to watch the AVs plow into it at speed.

[KD5NRH]

I watched the video and by paying attention to the lane stripes, I saw no attempt at braking before they paused the video just before the impact would be seen.

Right; and even depending on visual cues as seen by the craptastic dashcam, (and ignoring that she passed in front of a reflective sign a second or so before her shoes became visible) the ~18 frames she was visible before impact are an eternity to a properly functioning computer.

Given that she was homeless, there is probably no real next of kin.  I know I wouldn't leave anybody I consider 'kin' homeless.

Not necessarily; there are plenty of people who don't think like we do, but will suddenly be distraught that auntie Elaine got killed in a way that could mean a huge payoff.  Plus, for that matter, I've been homeless for as long as a couple months without anybody but the owner of the land I camped on knowing about it.  The weather was lovely, and it turned out an overgrown hayfield is better for my back than a worn out mattress...and a couple months camping is better for my mental health than listening to my mother nag daily if she found out.

That said, take a step back.  Do you support, say, handing all of UPS or Fedex's assets over to somebody killed in an accident involving one of their trucks?  Because think about it, they're handing control over to unproven human drivers that could kill somebody at any time.

Some members of the species UPS and FedEX use have been proven to be excellent drivers.  None of Uber's computers have yet shown the same...in fact, one just showed they're not ready to be off the test track.

If anything Uber did apply due diligence by having a professional, paid, human driver that was supposed to be able to take over at any time.  Hell, with as unreliable as Uber self driving cars are supposed to be, requiring intervention every dozen miles or so, the driver should be much better at paying attention than, say, a Waymo/Google driver, which is in a car that needs an intervention only about twice a year.

How long can you hover your foot over the brake pedal without touching it?  Even had the babysitter been watching, the time to get a foot from resting on the floor to pressing the brake firmly is a lot longer than the normal time to move from the gas to the brake.

[Jim147]

FLIR. I know it costs but if they want self driving it has to be part of the package.

[Firethorn]

Right; and even depending on visual cues as seen by the craptastic dashcam, (and ignoring that she passed in front of a reflective sign a second or so before her shoes became visible) the ~18 frames she was visible before impact are an eternity to a properly functioning computer.

Indeed, which is why the following paragraph I talk about the system failing.  It should have seen her well before being illuminated by the headlights.  Instead it acted as though it never saw her.

Some members of the species UPS and FedEX use have been proven to be excellent drivers.  None of Uber's computers have yet shown the same...in fact, one just showed they're not ready to be off the test track.

Some.  My point is that each new hire is of an unproven system.

How long can you hover your foot over the brake pedal without touching it?  Even had the babysitter been watching, the time to get a foot from resting on the floor to pressing the brake firmly is a lot longer than the normal time to move from the gas to the brake.

Depends on the exact spot on the floor.  I'd say.

The critical difference is that you stop accelerating when you remove your foot from the gas, while a cruise control like foot on the floor will maintain velocity until his foot hits the brake.  Also, many of us will start slowing if something suspicious is coming up, even if we do not yet brake.

[Brad Johnson]

Lots of questions about Uber, the tech, the driver, etc.. The one question I haven't seen asked is why someone walked directly into the path of a moving vehicle.

Brad

[DittoHead]

Uber decided to make everyone else on the road an unwitting, involuntary test subject for an unproven system which, in the event of failure or malfunction, would subject those unwitting, involuntary test subjects to potentially fatal consequences - and with a dead woman resulting, it's more than potentially fatal consequences, it's actually fatal consequences.

I'd rather take my chances sharing the road with an Uber computer driven car than 16 year olds with a learners permit and a cell phone.

[Firethorn]

Lots of questions about Uber, the tech, the driver, etc.. The one question I haven't seen asked is why someone walked directly into the path of a moving vehicle.

That's because human stupidity is to be assumed, not questioned.

People do that *expletive deleted*it all the time, to the point that about 5k people die from it every year, which is a substantial fraction of automobile accident deaths(~18%).

http://www.pedbikeinfo.org/data/factsheet_crash.cfm

[KD5NRH]

FLIR. I know it costs but if they want self driving it has to be part of the package.

Trouble is there's no reason LiDAR shouldn't have seen her; the unit they're known to have purchased has a 120m range using active NIR, and it's continuously doing 360 degree scans.  The manufacturer agrees, and doesn't seem particularly happy to have their product associated with this mess: https://www.forbes.com/sites/alanohnsman/2018/03/23/lidar-maker-velodyne-baffled-by-self-driving-ubers-failure-to-avoid-pedestrian/

For that matter, these cars supposedly have multiple radar units, and she was walking a metal bicycle while carrying grocery sacks of aluminum cans.  Apparently, there's important new stealth technology here that needs to be investigated closely; hanging old bicycles and WalMart bags full of empty beer cans all over warships could be the cheapest solution anyone has come up with so far.