this post was submitted on 16 Mar 2025
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Mark Rober just set up one of the most interesting self-driving tests of 2025, and he did it by imitating Looney Tunes. The former NASA engineer and current YouTube mad scientist recreated the classic gag where Wile E. Coyote paints a tunnel onto a wall to fool the Road Runner.

Only this time, the test subject wasn’t a cartoon bird… it was a self-driving Tesla Model Y.

The result? A full-speed, 40 MPH impact straight into the wall. Watch the video and tell us what you think!

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[–] rational_lib@lemmy.world 2 points 15 minutes ago* (last edited 12 minutes ago)

The rain test was far more concerning because it's much more realistic of a scenario. Both a normal person and the lidar would've seen the kid and stopped, but the cameras and image processing just isn't good enough to make out a person in the rain. That's bad. The test portrays it as a person in the middle of a straight road, but I don't see why the same thing wouldn't happen at a crosswalk or other place where pedestrians are often in the path of a vehicle. If an autonomous system cannot make out pedestrians in the rain reliably, that alone should be enough to prevent these vehicles from being legal.

[–] Corno@lemm.ee 3 points 32 minutes ago* (last edited 29 minutes ago)

"Wile E Coyote was here"

[–] King3d@lemmy.world 14 points 1 hour ago (1 children)

This is like the crash on a San Francisco bridge that happened because of a Tesla that went into a tunnel and it wasn’t sure what to do since it went from bright daylight to darkness. In this case the Tesla just suddenly merged lanes and then immediately stopped and caused a multi car pile up.

[–] fallingcats@discuss.tchncs.de 9 points 1 hour ago (1 children)

You'd think they have cameras with higher dynamic range and faster auto exposure in their cars by now. Nope, still penny pinching.

[–] Strawberry@lemmy.blahaj.zone 5 points 1 hour ago

If only elon hadn't insisted on not using lidar or anything other than just visible light cameras

[–] CPMSP@midwest.social 13 points 1 hour ago
[–] rumba@lemmy.zip 6 points 1 hour ago

Mark Rober is about to be listed as FBI public enemy #1 :(

[–] fubarx@lemmy.world 30 points 2 hours ago (7 children)

There's a very simple solution to autonomous driving vehicles plowing into walls, cars, or people:

Congress will pass a law that makes NOBODY liable -- as long as a human wasn't involved in the decision making process during the incident.

This will be backed by car makers, software providers, and insurance companies, who will lobby hard for it. After all, no SINGLE person or company made the decision to swerve into oncoming traffic. Surely they can't be held liable. 🤷🏻‍♂️

Once that happens, Level 4 driving will come standard and likely be the default mode on most cars. Best of luck everyone else!

[–] hedge_lord@lemmy.world 1 points 45 minutes ago

Kids already have experience playing hopscotch, so we can just have them jump between the rooves of moving cars in order to cross the street! It will be so much more efficient, and they can pretend that they are action heroes. The ones who survive will make for great athletes too.

[–] Ulrich@feddit.org 2 points 1 hour ago

Once that happens, Level 4 driving will come standard

Uhhhh absolutely not. They would abandon it first.

[–] chilicheeselies@lemmy.world 8 points 2 hours ago (3 children)

There is no way insurance companies would go for that. What is far more likely is that policies simply wont cover accidents due to autonomous systems. Im honeslty surprised they wouls cover them now.

[–] ThePantser@sh.itjust.works 1 points 12 minutes ago

If it's a feature of a car when you bought it and the insurance company insured the car then anything the car does by design must be covered. The only way an insurance company will get out of this is by making the insured sign a statement that if they use the feature it makes their policy void, the same way they can with rideshare apps if you don't disclose that you are driving for a rideshare. They also can refuse to insure unless the feature is disabled. I can see in the future insurance companies demanding features be disabled before insuring them. They could say that the giant screens blank or the displayed content be simplified while in motion too.

[–] p03locke@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 2 hours ago

What is far more likely is that policies simply wont cover accidents due to autonomous systems.

If the risk is that insurance companies won't pay for accidents and put people on the hook for hundreds of thousands of dollars in medical bills, then people won't use autonomous systems.

This cannot go both ways. Either car makers are legally responsible for their AI systems, or insurance companies are legally responsible to pay for those damages. Somebody has to foot the bill, and if it's the general public, they will avoid the risk.

[–] rumba@lemmy.zip 1 points 1 hour ago

Not sure how it plays for Tesla, but for Waymo, their accidents per mile driven are WAY below non-automation. Insurance companies would LOVE to charge a surplus for automated driving insurance while paying out less incidents.

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[–] pjwestin@lemmy.world 28 points 3 hours ago

To be fair, the roadrunner it was following somehow successfully ran into the painting.

[–] Coreidan@lemmy.world 8 points 3 hours ago

Tesla is trash.

Fuck Elon musk.

[–] elatedCatfish@lemm.ee 2 points 1 hour ago

New Trump-Hitman challenge unlocked

[–] some_guy@lemmy.sdf.org 2 points 2 hours ago

Wonderful news.

[–] cupcakezealot@lemmy.blahaj.zone 7 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

can someone do this to trumps tesla please

[–] lonerangers1@lemmy.world 2 points 18 minutes ago

In silicon valley there is an episode where a bunch of phones explode because of a software problem. A lot like the pager attack trump got a trophy for. And musk could take any of these cars and "self drive" them to where ever, and "update" their discharge parameters or something, then boom. The trucks are 10k lbs too. Bet you could take a small building down with one without much fuss. They are pretty fast. Scary shit. Musk is a huge problem. Watch all gov envoys being his swasticars and then he can take people out russian style. opps, accident, again.

To any artists in Austin,TX: you have your work cut out for you. Godspeed.

[–] ikidd@lemmy.world 4 points 2 hours ago (1 children)

To be fair, I'd be surprised if half the humans driving didn't do the same.

[–] osugi_sakae@midwest.social 1 points 29 minutes ago

this. watching the video, I had some trouble telling the difference. sure, from some angles it is obvious, but from others it is not.

That said, other cars, with more types of sensors, would probably have "seen" the obstruction on the road.

[–] Formfiller@lemmy.world 2 points 2 hours ago

They sound like they’re perfect for red states

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