Musk is Tesla's worst enemy here - first in naming the thing "AutoPilot" and then in doubling down with his absurd claims about "Full Self Driving" within a year. What the general public thinks "Full Self Driving" means is Uber - I get in a car, I set a destination, and it goes there as if a human driver was at the wheel - I can browse the web, take a nap, whatever. We are a decade from that, if not more. But as long as Tesla insists on calling it "AutoPilot (now with Full Self Driving!)" they will keep getting sued when an unfinished technology encounters a problem.

I can’t help but think of Bart Simpson sitting in the back of the car while driving down the highway - “cruise control my dude!” Right before the road turns off and he goes into a cornfield

Cruise control has been called AutoPilot in the past, and this is closer to Autopilot on planes anyway.

I think autopilot is an apt name. It’s not like planes on autopilot do everything and just fly themselves. It’s more like setting the cruise control. I still need to be paying attention when my car is on autopilot, real pilots don’t set their autopilot and then just leave the cockpit.

Reminder that the start of the marketing video for Autopilot says "The person in the driver's seat is only there for legal reasons. He is not doing anything. The car drives itself." [0]

[0] https://www.tesla.com/autopilot

Common people, laymen, don’t completely understand it the same way you might, full of nuance.

So Tesla's autopilot has no history or world model?

If you approach a truck from the rear, you have a rear aspect on it before having a side aspect on it.

If you have overtaken by a truck, you have a front aspect on it before having a side aspect on it.

If an overpass is falsely identified as the broadside of a truck, even a very small percentage of the time, then sudden breaking in the middle of the road would be very dangerous. Also, from a PR standpoint, I think there would be many articles about how AP caused a fatal accident rather than merely failing to prevent it...

From a PR standpoint, how is it advantageous to Tesla for laypersons to be told that Autopilot, which is ostensibly safe enough for hands-off highway driving, can't recognize what is to every human driver an unambiguously dangerous situation?

In terms of overpasses being falsely identified as the broadside of a truck, this explanation feels more and more confusing to me as Tesla doubles down on vision-only self-driving (as opposed to LIDAR-assisted). Why would a camera and computer-vision algorithm ever falsely identify an overpass, which in normal weather is viewable and trackable from at least a mile away, as a broadside of a truck suddenly running through an intersection?

I think we have to consider the idea that Tesla is run by a futuristic utopian maniac who doesn’t take “no” for an answer. I mean... possibly.

My aunt's vision isn't so great any more, and quite often she'll brake for what she thinks is an animal or car, but is just a shadow. Other times, if the sun is low in the sky, she will not notice other vehicles that really are there.

I just make sure that when I'm a passenger in her car I have my hand resting on the emergency brake, so I'm ready to stop the car if I need to. It's much safer that way.

I don't think your aunt should be driving.

The guidance system will show the truck approaching from the rear. It will show it drive along side you, and pass, and it will show it driving in front of you.

GreenTheOnly posts lots of videos of internal captures from his Tesla AutoPilot (I believe he “jailbreaked” his Tesla to capture them. Here’s an example of what the software is tracking [1].

He was able to capture one case where there happened to be a trailer backing up / parking in front of him a couple months back [2]

[1] - https://youtu.be/7ztK5AhShqU

[2] - https://twitter.com/greentheonly/status/1118330606146998272?...