New MIT study confirms Tesla’s autopilot is indeed unsafe

New MIT study confirms Tesla’s autopilot is indeed unsafe

A new study from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology reveals that drivers who use Tesla’s advanced driver assist system become inattentive, confirming how unsafe it can be.

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Amonth ago, towards the end of August 2021, the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration (NHTSA) launched an investigation into Tesla’s Autopilot system after it was found responsible for 11 accidents, resulting in 17 injuries and one death. Now a new study, conducted by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), has confirmed how unsafe Elon Musk’s infamous autopilot feature actually is.

Titled A model for naturalistic glance behavior around Tesla Autopilot disengagements, the study backs up the idea that the electric vehicle company’s “Full-Self Driving” (FSD) system is in fact—surprise, surprise—not as safe as it claims. After following Tesla Model S and X owners during their daily routine for periods of a year or more throughout the greater Boston area, MIT researchers found that, more often than not, they become inattentive when using partially automated driving systems. Note here that I went from calling the autopilot a Full-Driving system—which is the term Tesla uses to describe it and therefore entails it is fully autonomous—to then qualifying it of an automated driving system, also known as an advanced driver assist system (ADAS), which is what it truly is.

“Visual behavior patterns change before and after [Autopilot] disengagement,” the study reads. “Before disengagement, drivers looked less on road and focused more on non-driving related areas compared to after the transition to manual driving. The higher proportion of off-road glances before disengagement to manual driving were not compensated by longer glances ahead.” To be completely fair, it does make sense that drivers would feel less inclined to be attentive when they think their car’s autopilot is fully in control. Only thing is, it isn’t.

Meanwhile, by the end of this week, Tesla will roll out the newest version of its autopilot beta software, the version 10.0.1 in this case, on public roads—completely ignoring the current federal investigation when it comes to the safety of its system. Billionaire tings, go figure.

Musk has also clarified that not everyone who has paid for the FSD software will be able to access the beta version, which promises more automated driving functions. First things first, Tesla will use telemetry data to capture personal driving metrics over a 7-day period in order to ensure drivers are still remaining attentive enough. “The data might also be used to implement a new safety rating page that tracks the owner’s vehicle, which is linked to their insurance,” added TechCrunch.

In other words, Musk is aware of the risk the current autopilot system represents, and he’s working hard on improving it, or at least making sure he’s not going to be the one to blame if more Tesla-related accidents happen. How do you say your autopilot is not an autopilot without clearly saying it—and therefore risking to hurt your brand? You release a newer version of it that can easily blame drivers for their carelessness, duh.

“The researchers found this type of behavior may be the result of misunderstanding what the [autopilot] feature can do and what its limitations are, which is reinforced when it performs well. Drivers whose tasks are automated for them may naturally become bored after attempting to sustain visual and physical alertness, which researchers say only creates further inattentiveness,” continued TechCrunch.

My opinion on Musk and Tesla aside, the point of the MIT study is not to shame Tesla, but rather to advocate for driver attention management systems that can give drivers feedback in real-time or adapt automation functionality to suit a driver’s level of attention. Currently, Tesla’s autopilot system doesn’t monitor driver attention via eye or head-tracking—two things that researchers deem necessary.

The technology in question—which is a model for glance behaviour—already exists, with automobile manufacturers like Mercedes-Benz and Ford allegedly already working on implementing it. Will Tesla follow suit or will Musk’s ‘only child’ energy rub off on the company?

 

[Billy Beer]

No shit, sherlock. Asking an AI to deal with the randomness of other drivers was never going to work.

 

[Maurice Caine]

No shit, sherlock. Asking an AI to deal with the randomness of other drivers was never going to work.

Reminds me of this comic I saw one day.

 

[Exigent Circumcisions]

Trusting some software in your car with your life and the life of everyone around you should be grounds for immediate confiscation of your drivers license.

 

[Exceptionally Exceptional]

The fact that Elon idiotically called this shit "full self driving" or "autopilot" instead of "driver assist" should seriously get his dumb ass in trouble. I mean, the only reason most of these tards thought their cars were fully capable of driving themselves was because of that dipshit constantly spewing that they were when they weren't.

Of course, if his drooling fanboys weren't such uncritical brainlets they would probably have known they should have exercised due diligence and looked into it themselves instead of believing what their wholesome 100 big chungus cult leader said as gospel.

 

[Bill The Fucker]

No shit. Google outfits entire cars with enough storage to handle the amount of data they take in from their real world driving, and even then they've only trialed Waymo in a tiny handful of cities. Meanwhile Tesla is sending crumbs over a cell signal and saying full autonomy is right around the corner. Biggest scam from the company, imo.

 

[Zero Day Defense]

The only way you're going to get self-driving cars to work well enough is if you can ensure that literally every car on the road is self-driving, then have them connect to the same network so that the server can coordinate the cars.

 

[totallyrandomusername]

Yep, this study tells us something new. We couldn't have figured this out based on Tesla's continually ramming into non-moving objects at 70+ MPH...

The only way you're going to get self-driving cars to work well enough is if you can ensure that literally every car on the road is self-driving, then have them connect to the same network so that the server can coordinate the cars.

Bingo. A central coordinated supercomputer system that can see the entire system of roads and vehicles, and make decisions faster than is required for correction at a given maximum speed.

Doing it on a per-car basis is the retarded way to handle it. The people developing this crap know this, they just don't want to wait until they can get to the point where this kind of massive traffic handling system is possible.

Also, drive attention management systems are garbage. I guarantee as soon as people find them annoying they will start searching on their phones "How do I disable this shit in my car that keeps annoying the fuck out of me" on Google.

 

[Vlinny-kun]

The only way you're going to get self-driving cars to work well enough is if you can ensure that literally every car on the road is self-driving, then have them connect to the same network so that the server can coordinate the cars.

I wouldn't be surprised if that was already on the shlomo 2030 agenda. "Ban human driven vehicles. End reckless driving." Along with some bullshit stats that """prove""" that we'd all be better off if we had no agency over our own vehicles. Coming soon to a Californian city near you.

 

[737 MAX Stan Account]

I wouldn't be surprised if that was already on the shlomo 2030 agenda. "Ban human driven vehicles. End reckless driving." Along with some bullshit stats that """prove""" that we'd all be better off if we had no agency over our own vehicles. Coming soon to a Californian city near you.

Considering the chip shortage is unlikely to be solved anytime soon, their plans might be on indefinite hold.

 

[Mepsi Pax]

Considering infrastructure and the overall system is degenerating, there's no way self-driving is happening. Supercomputers? Fully networked roads and vehicles? Yeah right. We're a few natural disasters or a economic crash away from some dark times, and here are the usual utopian dreamers with their nonsense again. Same with the idea that an electric car mass adoption is gonna happen any day now. With what grid? With what subsidies? With what batteries and computers?

I spoke to an industry consultant over half a decade ago and asked him about self-driving (being concerned about it's potential effects on my job). This was a guy who makes like $50k to come out to a big enterprise for a week and tell them what they're doing wrong. Anyways he told me to forget it, that I'd be dead before it would even be relevant, and IMO his prediction seems to be holding up pretty well.