You should really read the report. It's comparing Tesla TACC to Tesla TACC+Autosteer. Aka the safety increase when going from Level1 to Level2. It doesn't have anything to do with being safer than human drivers.
I think it is reasonable to assume that Tesla TACC is not less safe than Tesla non-TACC, therefore the conclusion is also relevant to comparisons between Tesla level 0 (entirely human-driven, no assist) vs. Tesla level 2.
Because traffic-aware cruise control has existed for years from other car manufactures, and I have seen no data showing that this feature decreases safety.
Perhaps you should be looking for data that shows that traffic-aware cruise control increases or matches safety of human drivers then? Seems strange to just assume one side of the argument if there's no proof either way.
I can rephrase my original comment according to your terms: there is no evidence that TACC reduces safety. That's equivalent to what I said. Do you have evidence to the contrary?
Moreover, if experience showed that TACC reduces safety, NHTSA and its counterparts in other countries would have noticed and put the brakes on it. If you don't think this is a reasonable assumption, so be it.
Editted to respond to edit. (perhaps my original comment was a bit brash as well)
The problem here is that you're mis specifying the null hypothesis. We have had human drivers for 100 years. New automated systems start to come into the fray. We're trying to figure out if they are safer than humans. The null in this case is that they are not. That's what we assume until proven otherwise.
> We're trying to figure out if they are safer than humans.
No, we're not. We're trying to figure out if TACC has any impact either way. Accordingly, the null hypothesis is that they are no more and no less safe than human drivers alone. You need data to show the direction of the change. You just picked a direction (i.e., towards worse) that was more intuitive to you.
Fair enough. I'd still say that invalidates your original comment.
>I think it is reasonable to assume that Tesla TACC is not less safe than Tesla non-TACC, therefore the conclusion is also relevant to comparisons between Tesla level 0 (entirely human-driven, no assist) vs. Tesla level 2.
Is it really reasonable to assume it's not less safe in this case? Neither of us can say either way, seems like it would be impossible to assume either way.
> Is it really reasonable to assume it's not less safe in this case?
Yes, because this assumption is consistent with the null hypothesis. The negation of this statement is that it is strictly less safe, which is not consistent with the null hypothesis, and for which there is no evidence.
Okay so let me follow. We're fine assuming it's not less safe. So then we must be fine assuming it's not more safe.
These two lead us to your null which is that it is as safe.
When a new unproven technology comes out does it seem correct to automatically assume that it is as safe as the current standard? Would you not expect some proof?
> When a new unproven technology comes out does it seem correct to automatically assume that it is as safe as the current standard? Would you not expect some proof?
In the absence of any data or given priors whatsoever, we should give the three possibilities (less safe, as safe, more safe) equal weight. This means that there is a 33% chance it's less safe, which is too large to ignore. That's why we want more proof when we deploy new tech, introduce a new drug, etc.
But note that specifically in the context of TACC as it stands today, we are not in that situation. There has been plenty of data accumulated already, which constitutes the proof you are looking for (i.e., the data we do have doesn't show a decrease in safety.) That's why today it is reasonable to assume that TACC is not less safe than no TACC.
Level 1 is Driver Assistance. Level 0 is No Automation. It's literally a graphic in the report... Someone kindly posted the pdf link if you'd like to read it.
Do you actually believe that cruise control is less safe, to any non negligible degree than human driving?
You are bringing it up, but I don't think you are doing this for any reason other than to be contrarian.
Also, ALL cars have cruise control right now. So the 40 percent STILL applies to all these cars.
The correct way to frase the study is that "99 percent of cars are level 1 autonomous cars. For this 99 percent, going from level 1 to level 2 would make them 40 % safer"
> You are bringing it up, but I don't think you are doing this for any reason other than to be contrarian.
You shouldn't assume intentions. A ton of people here are misreading this study (or should I say not reading it).
> Also, ALL cars have cruise control right now. So the 40 percent STILL applies to all these cars. The correct way to frase the study is that "99 percent of cars are level 1 autonomous cars. For this 99 percent, going from level 1 to level 2 would make them 40 % safer"
The comparison here is only on Tesla so accordingly it's only on TACC vs TACC+Autosteer. TACC is fundamentally different than the type of cruise control that is in basically all cars.
Or saying "just because this drug cocktail appears to reduce incidents of heart failure relative to the weaker drug for patients with a specific condition doesn't mean we should scream at regulators to abandon all further attempts at regulation and start selling all potent heart-related drugs under development over the counter"
