Re:A Tragic Loss
by Someone on Friday July 01, 2016 @05:45AM
(#12014825)
I don't think you can statistically make that claim on this N=1 data point given that "This is the first known fatality in just over 130 million miles where Autopilot was activated. Among all vehicles in the US, there is a fatality every 94 million miles. Worldwide, there is a fatality approximately every 60 million miles."
They should not have mentioned that global number. I doubt Teslas drive much on the really dangerous roads in third-world countries that make that number so high, certainly not on autopilot (Aside, those numbers make it look like US roads are safe. They are relative to third-world countries, but not relative to Western Europe)
More importantly, autopilot bails out when it thinks it cannot do a reliable job. I think those times correlate strongly with times when it gets dangerous.
There also is the effect of car quality. It is harder to get killed in a Tesla or Volvo than in a 1970's Volkswagen Beetle.
It probably is impossible to make a fair comparison, but I think the better comparison would be with modern and fairly expensive cars driving on US highways.
They should not have mentioned that global number. I doubt Teslas drive much on the really dangerous roads in third-world countries that make that number so high, certainly not on autopilot (Aside, those numbers make it look like US roads are safe. They are relative to third-world countries, but not relative to Western Europe)
More importantly, autopilot bails out when it thinks it cannot do a reliable job. I think those times correlate strongly with times when it gets dangerous.
There also is the effect of car quality. It is harder to get killed in a Tesla or Volvo than in a 1970's Volkswagen Beetle.
It probably is impossible to make a fair comparison, but I think the better comparison would be with modern and fairly expensive cars driving on US highways.