I love this argument because it is so obviously wrong: how could any self aware person seriously argue that hearing, touch, and the inner ear aren't involved in their driving?
As an adult I can actually afford a reliable car, so I will concede that smell is less relevant than it used to be, at least for me personally :)
Not to mention possibly the most complex structure in the known universe, the human brain: 86 billion neurons, 100 trillion connections.
2. since this is in context of Tesla: tesla cars do have microphones and FSD does use it for responding to sirens etc.
Beating human sensors wasn't hard for over a decade now. The problem is that sensors are worthless. Self-driving lives and dies by AI - all the sensors need to be is "good enough".
Well, in TFA the far more successful manufacturer of self driving cars is saying you're wrong. I think they're in much better position to know than you :)
If it makes you happy, you can read "only vision" as "no lidar or radar." Cars already have microphones and IMUs.