Ask HN: Is there a part within you rooting against self-driving tech? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Is there a part within you rooting against self-driving tech?

I couldn't help but notice it within me, and it grew over the years.

As humans the physical world is OUR world, OUR element, OUR domain of expertise.

We have earned that right over millions of years of painful trial and error, where error meant death and inability to reproduce and pass genes.

The right and the privilege to put our bodies on the line on the pursuit of riding out and dominating the natural elements around us.

Driving (and riding) is a special feeling, you give it an input and a 6000lbs vehicle immediately responds and reacts to your input in exactly the way you want . We have earned the right to feel such feelings.

If self-driving tech becomes viable we'll become as useless and redundant as fighter jets pilots in the era of drones, and that is unacceptable.

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No, I'm not rooting against it.

What I am rooting against is that it seems to come hand-in-hand with cars being connected to the cloud or the manufacturer's servers. That's 100% unacceptable to me and if that's a requirement for self-driving tech, then I reject self-driving tech.

I agree with this and add that it's especially repugnant when manufacturers collect data for purposes unrelated to the feature they're developing.

Story of all tech

- Most drivers are awful, at least here in the US. Even a Tesla is probably better than a below average driver. A Waymo is way better, and I can live with more of those on the road.

- Cars will be legally drivable for the forseeable future. In the far future, I'm sure car enthusiasts will drive them for fun, so no skin off our backs.

> this 6000lbs vehicle

- Now that ^ is what I have issue with. Modern cars are too heavy, too loaded with tech and luxury junk that detracts from the driving experience. I don't want to manually drive a 6000lb electric brick with powered folding cupholders.

> > Most drivers are awful, at least here in the US

But so were you and I as kids who had just gotten their license or even before when stealing dad's truck behind his back.

Actually the most fun happens when you are awful at something, it means that the learning curve is still in the steep phase.

> Actually the most fun happens when you are awful at something, it means that the learning curve is still in the steep phase.

Yeah, but that fun period is also when you are most likely to kill or maim someone, especially when the car is 6000lb.

This is going off on a tangent, but that issue would be much less severe if the U.S. took drivers licenses as seriously as, say, Germany.

My man over here romanticizing traffic fatalities

I think this is a bizarre take. We have no “right” to anything. We’re just sentient sacks of meat and flesh.

If self-driving takes over, fine we can spend our time doing something else.

It’s like saying, if mass produced food takes over and we no longer have to hunt we’re useless and redundant. It just means something we used to do we no longer have to, so instead I can spend more time ranting on HN or something.

> > so instead I can spend more time ranting on HN or something

Bizzarre, I spend time on here so that I earn myself enough intellectual, cultural and frankly financial cushion that I don't have to set foot here anymore and spend my time driving and riding all sorts of vehicles in all sorts of wild places blessed by Natural beauty.

Nothing against you guys but some experiences are superior to others and I think that in general every person should face societal domestication as a stepping stone towards going into the wild with enough means (vehicles, equipment etc.) to conquer it.

I honestly believe that the ability to drive a car or ride a motorcycle is the only thing keeping people from snapping and violently rebel against the societal domestication in place today.

> > if mass produced food takes over and we no longer have to hunt we’re useless and redundant

This is exactly what is happening, the marginal utility of a human has never been lower than it is today, thanks to automation, mechanization etc. It's undeniable.

> in general every person should face societal domestication as a stepping stone towards going into the wild with enough means (vehicles, equipment etc.) to conquer it.

That's what we as a society have been doing for a long time, and it's a huge part of why we're losing our wild spaces.

I'm very much an outdoors person, but I object to the notion of "conquering" it or bringing vehicles, equipment, etc. into it. Doing that destroys the value of the outdoors.

> driving and riding all sorts of vehicles in all sorts of wild places blessed by Natural beauty.

Others likely view this as making those places no longer wild nor Natural.

> going into the wild with enough means (vehicles, equipment etc.) to conquer it.

> the marginal utility of a human has never been lower than it is today, thanks to automation, mechanization etc.

I'm not sure I see how these two statements don't directly contradict each other? I read this as 1) try to amass all the things you can to conquer nature but 2) a reliance on things makes humans less useful?

> > Others likely view this as making those places no longer wild nor Natural.

When I say conquering it I don't mean pouring concrete or going there with RVs. I mean a small helicopter, a deltawing, a dirt bike, an ATV, a MTB etc. Stuff that is easily movable and nimble and that doesn't necessary require a road and would leave no trace of its passage.

> > a reliance on things makes humans less useful?

Absolutely, once upon a time every place was wild and dominated by Nature, hence those who wanted to measure themselves against Her only had to come out of their cave and it would be game on. Nowadays you need vehicles to reach wild areas because everywhere is populated by humans who have domesticated everything including themselves.

"This is exactly what is happening, the marginal utility of a human has never been lower than it is today, thanks to automation, mechanization etc. It's undeniable."

Every generation draws this modern day pseudo-intellectual transcendalist arbitrary line in the sand.

> I think this is a bizarre take. We have no “right” to anything. We’re just sentient sacks of meat and flesh.

Nihilism is the real killer here

Or incredibly freeing?

Nihilism tends to turn people into observers of life, rather than participants. It can lead to a lot of regret down the road

I'm against war, because of the waste of human life and potential. I'm against self driving cars because of the needless deaths they cause. Nobody has proven they are anywhere near as safe as an alert and attentive driver in the places where they need to be, where other humans are outside of cars.

Do they know to look for little footsteps under the cars along side the road? Do they notice something moving, then predict when it's about to come out from behind an obstacle and possibly into the path of the car? Of course not.

They just follow the training set, which doesn't represent the corner cases anywhere near enough to make them well learned.

It's possible that all this will get sorted, but we're not there yet. Once it actually is better at driving than most of us, I'll happily share the road with it.

I do feel that drivers need to be able to over-ride self-driving aspects when needed. I see that even in the crash avoidance features in my current car. It sometimes yells at me when a trash can is on the edge of a curve, etc.

But that doesn't mean I root against the tech. It just needs to be balanced with actual driving. Because it also has hit the brakes faster than I could when someone pulled in front of me and prevented me from t-boning them. It has saved me twice. And twice makes it worth it to me, in particular as I age as I know my reflexes will dwindle..

It sounds like you have a sense of entitlement about driving, and I don't feel that way. I'm sure there are others who share it, but my guess it is a minority and the many of us just see cars as transportation tools.

I’m curious from a technical perspective, but don’t care much about it in practice, especially in the current state that is not safe enough to be a chauffeur, and too boring to keep the driver engaged.

Trains and subway are “self-driving” EVs. Build more of these! You can read a book and not run over anybody.

For the problem of “idiot drivers” I think driving assists can be good enough. For safety, cars don’t need to drive 100% of the time, they only need to reliably brake and avoid collisions, which is a subset of the self-driving problem.

There’s also a lot that can be improved with low-tech traffic engineering. If the US could ban turn on red, and start liking roundabouts, it would significantly reduce risk of serious crashes.

"We have earned that right over millions of years of painful trial and error..."

I mean, we just developed the technology so we could more efficiently get around - it wasn't some right granted to us by nature. Self-driving cars will mean more people will be able to get around more easily who currently can't but it will also mean safer trips. If you're intent on having the experience of driving, I'm sure it will be available to you in some fashion but for most people daily driving is just a slog.

What I'm personally rooting against is the monopolization of the technology in the hands of just one or two large players.

> As humans the physical world is OUR world, OUR element, OUR domain of expertise

Yea, and our tools are extensions of our bodies.

> Driving (and riding) is a special feeling

100% agree. I love driving, esp at night for long distances. It's almost religious. Even through not driving and age makes my ankles weak.

IMHO self driving cars I think need to get to the point where they're better than people to cut down on deaths. So, free municipal rides for drunks? Yes. But we can do that with taxis too.

Not as such. The tech is incredibly cool, but I'm rooting against cars whether they're self-driving or not. Cities are for people.

Even not so far from where I live on London there are single track roads with high sides and occasional, often informal, passing spots. Even in the town I rarely get anywhere without finding somewhere to let a car pass the other way, or they let me through. Not rooting against it, just sceptical.

i am rooting against it in that it is something we don’t need

lots of ideas that we don’t need get VC funding simply because of nepotism or because a very small group of people with money want to realize their dream of also being a genius… be famous for 5 minutes

they will rather fund their stupid idea that nobody asked for rather than funding what you brought them that makes the world genuinely better.

I am not sure how self driving cars will make the world better. I am also concerned that it can be used in bad ways just like any other tool.

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