That’s the problem with research; much of it turns out to be a dead-end, or exponentially more difficult as you approach the goal. FSD looked extremely likely there for a time, but I think the problem was actually AGI in disguise.
And that tricks you into thinking that the hard parts are done, and you just need to polish the thing, fill in the last few cases, and you're done!
Except, the work needed to go from 90% there to 91% there is astronomically higher than the work needed to go from 0% to 90%. And the work needed from 91% to 92% is even higher. Partly because the complexity of the corner cases increase exponentially, and partly because everyone involved doesn't actually know how the model works. It's been hilarious watching Tesla flail at this, because every new release that promises the moon always has these weird regressions in unrelated areas.
My favourite example of complexity is that drivers need to follow not only road signs and traffic lights, they also need to follow hand signals from certain people. Police officers, for example, can use hand signals to direct traffic, and it's illegal not to follow those. I can see a self-driving system recognizing hand signals and steering the car accordingly, but suddenly you get a much harder problem: How can the car know the difference between lawful hand signals, and some dude in a Halloween police uniform waving his hands?
You want to drive autonomously coast to coast? Cool, now the car needs to know how to correctly identify local police officers, highway patrol officers, state police officers, and county sheriffs, depending on the car's location.
Good luck little toaster!
And to detect when someone is doing a prank or just a homeless guy yelling and waving their fist at cars etc
Yeah, because if it understands hand gestures, it totally won't be used by criminals, directing it to a chop shop where they can disable it and cut it to pieces. What are you gonna do as the owner?