Mars with 3 different scopes - comparison

On Friday, July 15, 2016 at 2:33:36 PM UTC-5, palsing wrote:
On Friday, July 15, 2016 at 12:17:23 PM UTC-7, wrote:
On Friday, July 15, 2016 at 2:54:28 PM UTC-4, palsing wrote:

Snell is assuming that the motorcycle riders themselves will not take any evasive action!

They might be standing still at a light.

'Might be'? so much for your 'exact' scenario. You are losing traction fast here.

A motorcycle is much more maneuverable than almost any car, and skilled riders are much more aware of their surroundings than are auto drivers.

Not always.

Yes, pretty much always.

In any case, it is wrong to blame either a living driver or an autonomously driven vehicle which happens to collide with a person who darts into the road unexpectedly.

The pedestrian would be causing the situation, but why should someone who did not cause the situation (the helmeted cyclist) be made to suffer as a result?

Why indeed? So, here you are basically saying that it is the pedestrian who should suffer. Why didn't you just come out and say this at the beginning? Of course, you were careful to specify that this pedestrian was a child, which somehow should change the ethics of the whole situation, implying that anyone who would choose to hit the kid would now be a child killer, you sick S.O.B.

A human will probably hit the brakes. In some situations the automated car will swerve. In some situations the human will swerve.

'Some situations'? More clear evidence that your so-called 'exactly enough information has been presented' scenario is completely full of holes.

What's your next lame zig-zag going to be?

I recall many years ago my 90+yr old Ukranian neighbor lady in Garfield Heights, Ohio. Grew flowers and vegetables in a small garden in her front yard.. She was very spry, was out there every day weeding and fussing, often times singing to herself, joyful at life. Once a week she would cross the local main drag to go to the supermarket on the other side of the road. 4 lanes, marked 30mph with painted crosswalks. Unfortunately many drivers ignored the speed limit. One day unfortunately she didn't move fast enough, the driver who hit her was going close to 60mph based on skid marks and how far her body was thrown. Really sad. I wonder if a driverless car would have been going that fast. Most probably they adhere to the speed limit, so no fun for some people.

What's also sad is that a perfectly good thread is ruined again by people bickering about something totally disconnected from the original post. Hijacked and polluted by the same actors. Every thread, sigh..

On Fri, 15 Jul 2016 12:49:25 -0700 (PDT), wrote:

You. You only focus on extreme and unlikely cases, while ignoring the
typical situation where the automated car totally avoids an accident
that a person couldn't. As usual, you refuse to look at the entire
picture.

Humans handle the routine stuff rather well, on the whole. It's the weird, freaky, uncommon things that a human will always handle better than a machine.

Actually, humans almost always fail in the latter case. People don't
reason during the seconds before an accident. They act reflexively.
What happens is largely a matter of chance. A machine will do vastly
better.

I have stated before that most auto fatalities are self-inflicted and avoided by most humans. Do you disagree with that?

Yes. Most auto fatalities are the result of some kind of human error
(as likely someone else's as the person killed), and most humans do to
avoid accidents (although most will not be killed).

Ok, so once we have these crazy robots to deal with, where should we stand in order to avoid their unpredictable behavior?

Some experts think this could be an issue, others not.

We won't really know why the machines will do what they do, or what they will actually do, therefore any "expert" who disagrees with me is no expert.

You keep telling yourself that.

Again, stupid child runs out into street, automated car can't stop, swerves and hits which of two motorcyclists?

A swerve is a somewhat uncontrolled maneuver. The car will probably
avoid it completely and hit nothing.

That is NOT the scenario. There is no time to brake, there is time to swerve.

If it must hit something, it
calculates the equations of motion and figures out which hit is likely
to cause the least harm.

Again, you need to consider the question "The least harm to WHO?"

Least harm. To all parties involved.

On Friday, July 15, 2016 at 12:49:27 PM UTC-7, wrote:

... any "expert" who disagrees with me is no expert.

This is exactly what is wrong with you, your super-ego runs rampant.

On Friday, July 15, 2016 at 5:49:26 PM UTC-4, palsing wrote:
On Friday, July 15, 2016 at 12:49:27 PM UTC-7, wrote:

... any "expert" who disagrees with me is no expert.

This is exactly what is wrong with you, your super-ego runs rampant.

Ah, quoting out of context, palsing.

Here is what I -actually- wrote:

"We won't really know why the machines will do what they do, or what they will actually do, therefore any "expert" who disagrees with me is no expert."

Simply put, for your benefit, there are no self-driving cars, therefore there is no experience with self-driving cars, therefore there are no "experts" in self-driving cars. Get it?

On Friday, July 15, 2016 at 5:10:33 PM UTC-7, wrote:
On Friday, July 15, 2016 at 5:49:26 PM UTC-4, palsing wrote:
On Friday, July 15, 2016 at 12:49:27 PM UTC-7, wrote:

... any "expert" who disagrees with me is no expert.

This is exactly what is wrong with you, your super-ego runs rampant.

Ah, quoting out of context, palsing.

Here is what I -actually- wrote:

"We won't really know why the machines will do what they do, or what they will actually do, therefore any "expert" who disagrees with me is no expert."

Yes, and this clearly demonstrates 'exactly' your problem, that being your super-ego running rampant. It is as clear as day. You are superior to all of the hundreds or thousands of engineers working towards perfecting autonomous autos, all one has to do is ask you... because you know better!

Simply put, for your benefit, there are no self-driving cars, therefore there is no experience with self-driving cars, therefore there are no "experts" in self-driving cars. Get it?

What I 'get' is that you tend to make blanket statements without thinking enough about them first. From here..

https://www.google.com/selfdrivingcar/

.... we can read...

"We’ve self-driven more than 1.5 million miles and are currently out on the streets of Mountain View, CA, Austin, TX, Kirkland, WA and Metro Phoenix, AZ.

Our testing fleet includes both modified Lexus SUVs and new prototype vehicles that are designed from the ground up to be fully self-driving. There are test drivers aboard all vehicles for now. We look forward to learning how the community perceives and interacts with us, and uncovering situations that are unique to a fully self-driving vehicle."

So, although they not nearly perfect, there certainly ARE self driving cars now, and there likely to be many more down the road, so to speak. Sure, there are lots and lots of issues to be resolved, and hundreds of millions of test miles yet to be driven. Sure, as mentioned, there are unique situations that need to be uncovered, and sure, I myself would NEVER buy a car that had no steering wheel nor any pedals, but things are going to be very different someday, whether you or I like it or not. I doubt they will ever be able to build a self-driving Big Honkin' Van that can navigate the 4-wheel-drive roads that I currently favor.

You may as well give up on trying to defeat progress just because it is not to your liking. Perhaps you will someday have the honor of being the first person to be run down by an autonomous car, and your name will go down in history.

On Friday, July 15, 2016 at 8:48:32 PM UTC-4, palsing wrote:
...

"We’ve self-driven more than 1.5 million miles and are currently out on the streets of Mountain View, CA, Austin, TX, Kirkland, WA and Metro Phoenix, AZ.



That's not 1.5 million miles of driving, that's one mile of driving repeated 1.5 million times.

Each time a human intercedes the "self-driven" odometer resets to zero.

Now see if you can participate in "engaged discussion" instead of "empty insults," palsing, should you dare to respond.

On Friday, July 15, 2016 at 5:33:46 PM UTC-4, peterson wrote:
On Fri, 15 Jul 2016 12:29:43 -0700 (PDT), wsnell01 wrote:

The point is, I don't
tell you that your views on matters of value are wrong. Only that I
disagree with them.

Let's see if you can avoid criticizing me and my views. Let's see if you can avoid committing any more libel.

Why would I avoid criticizing you. Man, you are dense!

You would be a hypocrite otherwise?

Thick as a brick!

Every time you resort to an empty insult, you do what you claim not to do.


You have no clue what reasoning is.

We'll that didn't take long. You just criticized me, again.

Not exactly a criticism, just a simple observation of fact.

No, just an opinion.

Some things are opinions. That you are largely incapable of reason,
however, is demonstrated by the fact that you don't reason.

You lack ANY reasoning ability, peterson. We see this by your refusal to engage in discussions.

Well, to
be more precise, it's possible you are capable of reason but just
don't choose to demonstrate that on this forum.

I demonstrate my reasoning ability constantly, peterson. You never do.

On Tuesday, July 12, 2016 at 11:10:45 PM UTC-4, Davoud wrote:
StarDust:

Newer toy telescopes hook up with the Iphone [sic], by wifi, BT, than [sic] the phone
pointed [sic] at the sky object and the telescope points there.
How retarded it is?

You mean the mount, not the telescope. My Astro-Physics mount, which
carries two research-grade refractors, a research-grade CCD camera and
a guide telescope with a combined weight of about 41 kg, is
controllable from my iOS devices. Some "toy!" A precision,
research-grade telescope mount controlled by a device that fits in a
shirt pocket. How "retarded" is that? Report back after you have done
it yourself. Until then you know nothing.

Possibly the reason that he thinks that users of such devices are "retarded" is that it is perfectly possible to simply use printed star charts to learn the sky and find one's way around it.