Featured Elon Musk’s big lie about Tesla is finally exposed

LOL
I hope you didn't waste too much time trolling the entire internet to find another article that bashes tesla. What a strange thing to get energized over.
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Note that Tesla's Quarterly Safety Reports has not been updated in 11 months. Essentially ever since other reporters started questioning its data interpretation and integrity. Instead of being transparent and releasing the raw data, Tesla just quit updating anything at all.

There are more links in a couple other threads.

 

LOL, if nhtsa really 'finally caught up with it', they should fine tesla like they did toyota over the runaway throttle debacle

 

I hate to say it, but, once again you are confusing him with the facts: something that just angers them these days: they all believe in the perpetual “witch hunt”.

 

Never going to fine Red, White, and Blue - Tesla.
That treatment is only reserved for foreign car companies, putting American car companies out of business.... The two largest was against VW and Toyota. They caught VW with their hands in the cookie jar. The Toyota throttle debacle wasn't really cut and dry. Many other car manufacturers used the same throttle cable cable design, yet they focused on the floor mats causing the throttle issue. No other car manufacturers used floor mats in their cars???

 

"The only thing Tesla can do by software is constantly bombard drivers with warnings to remind them of the truth they have obscured for so long: you are actually in control here, pay attention, the system will not keep you safe"

Sigh, each driver has a profile (custom settings like seat, mirrors and steering wheel adjustment and phone key, etc). On each profile, Autopilot is deactivated by default. To activate it, you must acknowledge that you have to always pay attention to the road and take control at a moment's notice. Nothing "obscure" here.

 

Pretty sure Toyota's fine was over breaking a law about passing reports on safety issues in other countries on to US regulators.

 

If Musk believes machines can drive better, then maybe it isn’t a lie. There are some cases when George Castanza’s funny excuse for lying, “if you believe it’s true, it isn’t a lie,” may be true. A lot of people want to think machines are better than humans just because they may be able to be quicker and more accurate. They don’t respect the complexity of a mind reading the eye and ear sensors. It gets to Musk’s personality I would say. I don’t think any one person at GM has his kind of control. I wonder if an employee would speak up and disagree about auto pilot, what he would do. So that’s just my opinion.

 

Looking at Musk’s bio, he grew up getting whatever he wanted. It could be a personality disorder, whatever he says or wants can never be wrong and he must have what he wants. Even if the data says otherwise, the ego says he is right. Maybe it’s as simple as that.

 

I'm not one to trust all these electronic warnings and aids. They annoy me.

I prefer to concentrate entirely on my driving when I'm behind the wheel.

 

Drivers are not supposed to 'trust' them in the first place. They are supposed to be just 'looking over the shoulder' alerts or actions to fill in many (not all) of the Nut-Behind-The-Wheel's errors or attention gaps, which all humans exhibit to (wildly) varying degrees.

These interventions still ought to be fairly sparse. They are not yet ready for <1 fatality per 100,000,000 miles of all-roads, all-conditions, all-weather, all-abnormal-circumstances performance in stand-alone mode while drivers take naps.

 

Thanks!

RollingStone Logo

COMMENTARY
Elon Musk’s Big Lie About Tesla Is Finally Exposed
More than 2 million of the cars are being recalled — because Tesla’s “self-driving” systems have always been anything but

DECEMBER 17, 2023​

Terrified thanks to your source, I checked with the EPA for my 2019 Tesla Model 3 Standard Range Plus:

• Overall - 5 stars (the max)
• Front - 5 stars
• Side - 5 stars
• Rollover - 5 stars

The second month owning my 3,800 lb with driver, tools, and dogs, Tesla Model 3, I suffered five 'micro-sleep' events driving home on State highway 24, headed East toward Decatur AL. My late wife, a narcoleptic, recognized the first two and we made it safely to Decatur with AutoPilot assist where I got a cuppa coffee and walk around. The car stayed in its lane and dynamic cruse control meant we had an infinitesimal small risk of running into any vehicle in the lane. AutoPilot paid for itself that day.

I could not find in the Rolling Stone article a link to the NHTSA announcement:
https://static.nhtsa.gov/odi/rcl/2023/RCLRPT-23V838-8276.PDF

So looking for the cited Noah Goodall paper, I found "Article PDF can be printed USD 58.00." Having been burned before by a dodgy SAE paper, I'll try 'contacting the author' to see if I can get a copy. But where did the Rolling Stone editorial get "11%"? Source: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/19439962.2023.2178566?scroll=top&needAccess=true

Abstract

The safety of increasingly automated vehicles is of great concern to regulators, yet crash rates are generally reported by manufacturers using proprietary metrics with limited source data. Without consistent definitions of crashes and exposure, automated vehicle crash rates cannot be meaningfully compared with baseline datasets. The objective of this study was to establish methods to normalize automated vehicle crash rates using one manufacturer’s crash reports as a case study. The manufacturer’s quarterly crash rates for vehicles using SAE Level 1 and Level 2 automation were compared. Road type was controlled for using data from a naturalistic driving study with the same model vehicles, while driver age was controlled for using demographic ownership surveys. Although Level 2 vehicles were claimed to have a 43% lower crash rate than Level 1 vehicles, their improvement was only 10% after controlling for different rates of freeway driving. Direct comparison with general public driving was impossible due to unclear crash severity thresholds in the manufacturer’s reports, but analysis showed that controlling for driver age would increase reported crash rates by 11%. These results establish the need for detailed crash data, crash definitions, and exposure and demographic data in order to accurately assess automated vehicle safety.​

If I can get a copy of the paper for a reasonable price (i.e., sent e-mail to author,) I'll be able to understand where the "43%" and "11%" came from.

I understand Ed Niedermeyer considers Musk to be a fraud from his 2019 book.

Regardless:

SALE! SALE! SALE!
$7,500 off new Teslas until Jan 1, 2024​

Bob Wilson

 

I didn't know the EPA made any such ratings. Are you confusing EPA with NHTSA?

But all those are for other threads. This thread is specifically about AutoPilot. What is said agency's safety rating for driver assist system / AutoPilot?

I've had some 'micro-sleep' events in my driving life too. One in the 1980s, one in the 20-oughts, before AP existed. Each time, took the first safe turnoff after the first event, before any repeats. For the safety of other people on the road, AP users should too.

That should read just "reduced risk while micro-sleeping than without having AP."

"Not a risk" is BS until it is rated for true self-driving. We already have examples of fatalities from AP running into in-lane trucks, emergency vehicles, and a motorcycle while the drivers were similarly mentally disengaged.

 

I used the EPA safety ratings at http://WWW.FUELECONOMY.GOV for my 2019 Tesla Model 3 Standard Range Plus. The EPA probably copied them from an original source, NHTSA or even IIHS.

AutoPilot has always been a Level 2 system and the software has 'nag' features to make sure we're paying attention. But micro-sleeps are short enough they don't trigger an alarm ... any more or less than tuning a radio, glancing at a map, adjusting cabin temperature, or taking a sip of coffee.

At your suggestion, reworded the risk comment in an earlier post. Wouldn't want to offend sensibilities with a semantic fault. Back of envelope, it was about a 12 mile stretch and today, the odometer reads 120,000 miles ... 0.01% is pretty small.

Since April 2019, AutoPilot and Full Self Driving have gone through updates and revisions about every two months. I've seen steady improvements in both which suggests the probability of an AutoPilot/FSD accident from running into something is significantly lower than 0.01%. For example, there were at least two releases that the notes mentioned dealing with emergency vehicles with reduced speed and lane changes away from emergency vehicles.

Bob Wilson

ps.

SALE! SALE! SALE!
$7,500 off new Teslas until Jan 1, 2024​

 

I wonder if some driver distractions were eliminated, would they be forced to pay more attention to their driving?
The problem starts with government regulations. They want and encourage self driving, but they also allow phones, infotainment screens, video players, drugs and etc

 

Better than nothing, the pre-publication manuscript in the abstract has an early, obvious difference to the $58 version:

• "The manufacturer’s quarterly crash rates for vehicles using SAE Level 2 and Level 3 automation were compared."
• "The manufacturer’s quarterly crash rates for vehicles using SAE Level 1 and Level 2 automation were compared."

Having submitted formal papers to DECUS and later being one of the reviewers, I am well aware of what kind of changes show up. I'll read the pre-publication version with an editor's eye which may or may not be accurate to the $58 version.

The pre-publication manuscript is 18 pages and within the abstract, I found three things of note:

• red circle (problem) - the SAE levels.
• red circle (problem) - "different rates of freeway" is a statistical projection, not an accurate metric of automation in use.
• green box (agree) - "the need for detailed crash data, crash definitions, and exposure and demographic data in order to accurate assess automated vehicle safety."

It will take a little time to finish reviewing the other pages. But there is a whiff of smoke that makes me weary. But we have two authors and they give an impression:

• Ed Niedermeyer - wrote a book in 2019 hostile to Musk and Tesla EVs. He sells more books to the degree he sells his view about Musk.
• Noah Goodall - sincere interest in understanding accident rates but makes projections not based on empirical observations such as when AutoPilot is actually in use. AutoPilot is not geofenced which means trying to compare urban and highway rates by declaring AutoPilot is only used in highway driving is a rookie mistake.

Bob Wilson

 

I'll pass on those complicated touch screens that requires multiple screens to just adjust the temperature on the AC.

Changing from FM radio to CD is enough distraction to me.