The relevant part is the last: "statistically safer than human drivers."
Every driving system that has existed or will exist will make errors due to extremely novel situations. Given the energies involved, such errors will lead to crashes, some of which will be horrible.
The standard for self driving systems is, at a high level, simple: statistically safer, by a fair margin, than human drivers.
Considering other utility unlocked by autonomous cars (e.g. less stress, life-hours freed up, helping the disabled) they could even be marginally less safe than human drivers and still provide a net benefit.
And not just that, but individually they have to be seen as safer. As in, I am not going to be happy with a computer driving me around that is merely safer than an average driver. Given that I'm middle aged, don't drink and drive, or drive while exhausted, etc, and I haven't ever caused an accident, I'm going to need a little more assurance.
I believe Elon Musk has talked about targeting '10x safer' than an average driver. My guess is that's a sufficient margin to cover the vast majority of better than average drivers.
No, perhaps I am to blame for incomplete quoting, but you're asking for evidence about the future, whether machine learning will be able to tackle this problem. So it's not just about current computers but also future computers. We can make predictions, but hard evidence would require a time machine or some first-principles proof that humans are the optimal arrangement of atoms for car control.
> however the results are just not there.
Well of course, but what information does that add to the discussion? That level 5 autonomy is an achievement that lies in the future is a premise of this thread and I think most people take this as fact. Bemoaning the absence of evidence for the results of a technology that's expected to only arrive in the future... doesn't make sense.
That's just your opinion, while my comment is a statement of reality as it stands.
> Evidence would be a deployed self-driving fleet.
This is also just your opinion. Evidence could also be a self-driving vehicle that doesn't drive under the beds of trucks, run people over or is statistically safer than human drivers.
> Now if you want theoretical considerations instead of evidence, then consider the lower reaction times of machines.
Consider the high error rate of machine learning when it comes to novel situations that driving exposes drivers to. Human beings can understand situations they are in and adapt based on that understanding, whereas this generation of ML does not.
Computers have the theoretical potential for a lot of things. The internet had the theoretical potential for mass informational enlightenment, democracy and resource allocation in the face of dwindling scarcity of resources.
Instead, the computers and the internet have become tools of mass manipulation, weapons for totalitarian regimes, and despite an abundance of food, people still go hungry.
I understand that a lot of people are sold on hype, and believe promises that were made, however the results are just not there.