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Comment by data-ottawa | Hacker News Reader

As mentioned in the previous thread, I'm not pleased with this colour.

For red-green colourblind people (both types), this colour is at the neutral point where both available cones are saturated and the brain can't differentiate it from white light.

In their study paper they used a much more blue turquoise, decided it was confusing, and then moved it to a more green version (thus saturating the non-blue cone for dichromats) but did not reassess the new green-turquoise colour.

The net effect is that for something like 8% of men this light looks exactly the same as the white reversing lights and is placed exactly where reversing lights are.

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In Australia, cars have red rear lights on at all times, so it’s easy to distinguish a reversing car or a headlight.

Also, aren’t all cars now required to have front on driving lights in most jurisdictions, separate to headlights?

Do you mean that the daytime running lights for all new cars include both front (white) and rear (red) lights?

If so, that's a good precedent for other jurisdictions. A longstanding gripe of mine has been that, in Canada at least, new cars are only required to have front lights illuminated in daytime, afaik. The practical effect is that it is a regular occurrence to have dangerous situations where cars with no rear lights illuminated are driving in dim / rainy conditions.

Are you referring to when the headlights are on?

Distinguished from Daytime Running Lights.

Because otherwise this is just wrong.

what would be a better alternative color?

to me the placement seems substantially different from the reversing light (which is usually more toward the middle of the back)

of course these pictures probably don't tell much about how it will actually look like in traffic, but some kind of pattern seems to be the way to go (that's recognizable from 2-3 cars afar in a traffic jam, for example if folks are curious WTF that particular car is doing, why is it stopped or going slow)

The alternative is a light in a predictable position or with a standard shape. I really hate that EVs are trying to be all modern about light systems redesigns. Specially in the US, car manufacturers are being very creative with their new designs in ways that are not even legal in Europe. I hope international standards for human-friendly lights can be agreed upon soon.

OP's complaint was about the color.

The point of the light is primarily for specific people like law enforcement to be able to identify that the vehicle has self-driving mode engaged so that they don't pull the operator over erroneously. Is it actually an issue if Joe Colorblind can't tell that the person he's passing has automated driving enabled?

It's an issue if Joe is a color blind cop...

Cops can’t be colorblind?

I don’t know if they have to do a test or something.

Beat cops shouldn’t be ? It impairs their ability to do their job.

They should identify the color of a car or a person’s apparel fairly accurately .

How would a color blind cop catch say killer escaping in a teal car if they cannot identify that color ?

Most Physical disabilities sadly would be disqualifying in some jobs line first responders or police, such jobs that at times require them to assist the physically challenged

Yes.

Imagine you’re in a parking lot and the car is in self driving. Is it in Reverse? I have no clue.

I’ve always had an excellent vision both near and far, except for one flaw that I can’t distinguish some shades between green and blue. All the turquoise colors give me a strange feeling of not knowing if it’s green and blue. When I was younger I used to ask if it was green or blue and would only be satisfied once someone told me which one it is. Over the years, I’ve learned to recognize the feeling and attach turquoise to it, but it’s still slightly annoying for my brain. I know it’s selfish of me, but I hope that driving won’t require the ability to distinguish turquoise well… I never thought that this minor impairment could one day be a problem.

I don't think this should be an issue... At least in the US, only law enforcement is authorized to use blue lights and they don't use them in this way. If you see lights that might be blue solidly lit around all edges of the car, it's self driving. If you see a flashing light that might be blue, it's police. If you see a solid light that might be blue, and is only on one side, or only in the middle, it's most likely police, but might be self driving with a lot of broken lights.

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