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Comment by Waterluvian | Hacker News Reader

I have a Subaru Forester base model with lane keeping and adaptive cruise control.

I need to be touching the wheel and applying some force to it or it begins yelling at me and eventually brings me slowly to a stop.

I’ve had it for a year now and I cannot perceive of a way, without physically altering the system (like hanging a weight from the wheel maybe?) that would allow me to stop being an active participant.

I think the opposite is true: Tesla’s move fast and kill people approach is the mistake. Incremental mastering of autonomous capabilities is the way to go.

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I own a Model Y and am a pretty heavy Autopilot user. You have to regularly give input on the steering wheel and if you fail a few times it won't let you re-engage until you park and start again.

Personally Autopilot has actually made driving safer for me... I think there's likely abuse of the system though that Tesla could work harder to prevent.

I personally think the issue boils down to their use of the term "Autopilot" for a product that is not Autpilot (and never will be with the sensor array they're using IMO.)

They are sending multiple signals that this car can drive itself (going so far as charging people money explicitly for the "self-driving" feature) when it cannot in the slightest do much more than stay straight on an empty highway.

They should be forced to change the name of the self-driving features, I personally think "Backseat Driver" would be more appropriate.

Autopilot is precisely the correct term - An autopilot is a system used to control the path of an aircraft, marine craft or spacecraft without requiring constant manual control by a human operator. Autopilots do not replace human operators.

> the issue boils down to their use of the term "Autopilot" for a product that is not Autpilot

It is literally an autopilot. Just like an autopilot on an airplane, it keeps you stable and in a certain flight corridor. There's virtually no difference except for Tesla's Autopilot's need to deal with curved trajectories.

> There's virtually no difference except for Tesla's Autopilot's need to deal with curved trajectories.

Well, and it actively avoids collisions with other vehicles (most of the time). Airplane (and boat) autopilots don't do that.

"But you're using the word autopilot wrong!"

Well, they still need to avoid the collisions more reliably, apparently. Once they do it perfectly reliably I will add it into the list of the things it does differently from an airplane autopilot. ;)

Tesla had a similar system, and

> physically altering the system (like hanging a weight from the wheel maybe?)

was exactly what people were doing. But it's also possible to be physically present, applying force, but being "zoned out", even without malicious intent.

>But it's also possible to be physically present, applying force, but being "zoned out", even without malicious intent.

I've occasionally noticed myself zoning out behind the wheel of my non-self-driving car as well.

It's actually very common. [0]

[0] https://www.actuarialpost.co.uk/article/quarter-of-fatal-cra...

It also previously required only 15 minutes between steering wheel contacts.

> I need to be touching the wheel and applying some force to it or it begins yelling at me and eventually brings me slowly to a stop.

> I’ve had it for a year now and I cannot perceive of a way, without physically altering the system (like hanging a weight from the wheel maybe?) that would allow me to stop being an active participant.

That's exactly what people were doing with the Tesla. Hanging a weight to ensure the safety system doesn't kick in. [0][1]

[0] https://edition.cnn.com/2021/04/28/cars/tesla-texas-crash-au...

[1] https://twitter.com/ItsKimJava/status/1388240600491859968/ph...

If people are consciously modifying their car to defeat obvious safety systems, I have a really hard time seeing how the auto manufacturer should be responsible.

I guess the probe will reveal what share of fatal accidents are caused by this.

Well, it doesn't help when the CEO of the company publically states that the system is good enough to drive on its own and those safety systems are only there because of regulatory requirements.

GM's Supercruise (which is the actual king of the hill for L2 systems) uses cameras to track the driver's eye position to ensure they are paying attention. It's significantly harder to defeat, is geofenced to prevent use in incompatible situations like surface streets, and has a much more graceful disengagement process. Most of the time autopilot is smooth, but sometimes it just hands control back to the driver without warning.

Teslas can famously be tricked by wedging an orange between the rim and spoke of the steering wheel to produce enough torque on the wheel to satisfy the detection. There are enough videos of it on youtibe that tesla could easily be found negligent for not doing enough to prevent drivers from defeating a safety system given that alternate technology that more directly tracks attention is available and tricking tesla's detection method became common knowledge.

You're literally describing how the Tesla system works. It requires you to keep your hand on the wheel and apply a slight pressure every so often. The cabin camera watches the driver and if they're looking down or at their phone, it does that much more often.

People causing these problems almost certainly are putting something over the cabin camera and a defeat device on the steering wheel.

That's exactly what my Tesla does. I need a constant torque on the steering wheel or it yells at me and slowly comes to a stop.

Personally I’ve found this to be sufficient in my Forester. Even holding the wheel but not being “there” isn’t enough. The car is really picky about it.

Shove a can of soda in the wheel and it will stop beeping.

yes, but what if you also have to sing the jingle?

Damn, this 'drink verification can' is going to get us all killed.

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