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New Honda Accord Drives Itself
pmenefee writes "Japanese car manufacturer Honda has launched a new self-driven car. Dubbed Honda Accord ADAS, the vehicle can change gears and steer itself around bends. While the auto-pilot function will currently only operate on motorways and dual carriageways, officials at Honda believe that future ADAS models will tackle all roads."
Well, not quite- nice to see that Honda could come out with an ADAS system barely a month after it becoming legal....
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
No more DUIs! There is a God!
Bartender! Another shot!
Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
Is this some kind of euro-test?
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Does this make anyone else think of the old Looney Toons cartoons where one character diverts another character's path of travel by painting a false line from the middle of the road to someplace else?
In Soviet Russia... YOU drive Car!
Hmmm witty sig or funny sig? Maybe elitest techy sig!
Okay, now I'm just confused
The only model available is the 'asian women driver 1.0'. The car repeadely slows down, then speeds up, randomly activates turn signals, and never yields to oncoming traffic.
Don't most Chrysler products choose their own gears as well... sometimes against the wishes of their owners?
Lenny: Hey look, Homer's got one of those robot cars!
*Crash*
Carl: Yeah, one of those American robot cars...
In Japan, cars drive you!
*ducks*
I for one welcome our new Advanced Driver Assist System Overlords...
no? yeah, I agree, that was pretty weak.
if only to repeat scenes from minority report, the 6th day and i robot.
Hood-surfing anyone?
--cros13
Finally, i can get a BJ while driving without using all 4 lanes of the highway..
What would you do without a monitor? Sit and look stupid behind a keyboard and a mouse
It's a driver assist, so it's not going to replace the driver. But it will help keep the car on the road if the driver loses control of the wheel somehow, whether it be caused by illness, drunkeness, fatigue, or ninja attack.
At least on the us website [www.honda.com] and the automotive website, searches for "ADAS" and "driver assist" don't turn up anything. Surprising, considering how well Honda is rebranding itself as a purveyor of cool technology (like the hybrids) in its cars.
It would have been nice if the article mentioned which models this system will be available on. Is this only for luxury cars? Will it make it into family vehicles like minivans? There seem to be some obvious problems with something like this: fading line markers and precipitation/condensation on the camera come to mind immediately. Is this thing being mass-marketed already?
ADAS system will beep every 10 seconds to make sure you're paying attention
You've got to be kidding. Who is going to drive (and I use the term loosely per the subject) a car that beeps at them every ten seconds?
I'm guessing "motorway" equals "highway" or "freeway", but what the heck would a "dual carriageway" be? Do you guys still drive horse-drawn carriages in England? :)
The article should probably clarify that it's Honda's UK division that's producing the car, and it's for use in the UK.
1) Honda makes self-driven car.
2) ???
3) Hilarity ensues
Fascism trolls keeping me up every night. When I starts a preachin', he HITS ME WITH HIS REICH!
The sweet thing about the new Honda Borg is that once you've keyed the lock the car will drive itself to your crib. And if the cops intervene, there'll be no one in it to arrest!
Las qué passoun
tournoun pas maï
"Five beta testers found deadly glitches in the navigation system of the recently launched self-driven cars. Unfortunately, they are not available for comments anymore."
Aibo kept getting us lost when I was too drunk to drive.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
This system looks at white lines in the rear view mirror.
Isn't this likely to cause carnage the first time you hit
a contraflow system.
Phil
so there goes the "fun", I have to tap it regularly not to make it feel deprived..
Albeit, they don't do such a good job of it
And yes, I do have a lot of time on my hands today (I think someone's stealing CPU cycles from my computer to help calculate Bill Gates' taxes...)
This space intentionally left (almost) blank.
Unfortunately, as self driving cars become more and more viable, we're going to run into a liability problem. Sure, the self driving cars can probably cut crashes and resulting deaths by some huge percent, but there will still be some that happen. Then, those crashes and deaths will be the responsibility of the car manufacturer who will get sued into oblivion.
Jerry
http://www.networkstrike.com/
(Sitting in my RV) Wait a minute? Isn't that was cruise control does!? Oh crap, I got to go!
So we're one step closer to AI cars. I'm still gonna want my archaic internal combustion vehicle, but when do Lorna and Lisa show up? I'm all for that part of things.
I can't imagine that they'll bother hiding this noise maker any better. Yes, I know the blasted thing has a function, which I'm pretty sure is to irritate me.
Here's what I'm thinking:
I think that this system, as long as it had *only* robot cars, and no human drivers, would work.
Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.
-- Pablo Picasso
So how long until Toyota releases a Camry that can play a trumpet?
For security, the MD5 hash of this message and sig is 09f911029d74e35bd84156c5635688c0.
This has more to do with auto safety in general, but I think it was a Times story in which I read that a trained, unpanicked foot can outperform antilock breaks. The average person, however, much different story of course. I, Robot is correct in predicting that Will Smith can engage a manual override.
I live in Houston Texas and I for one cannot wait until we all have a complete and reliable auto-pilot system on most if not all cars. No more heavy traffic or people cutting through 4 lanes to exit the freeway, no more soccer moms in a giant Ford Excursion with one hand on the wheel and a cell phone in the other with screaming kids in the back seat slowly creeping into my lane. Also, no more redneck cops on the interstate setting up speed traps in their tiny towns just so they can get their greedy hands in my wallet.
No one cares what your captcha was
Houston TX, USA
Train ot links/news: Slashdot-->Engadget-->TGdaily-->Newsfactor and there it is broken. Here is the official press release
We had self driven (bullock) car(t)s in India long back. I still remember the early mornings when we used to start for the farm in the cart and fall asleep - hour later we used to be on the farm without anyone driving the car(t) - smart bullocks those!
This is a really neat concept, and in light of the recent success of the DARPA grand challenge, I see that navigationally-useful "AI" is now finally making advances on the road (in the air, autopilot has been around for quite some time).
Nevertheless, I honestly can't see the masses (myself included) trusting one of these things to the point where they would acctually allow themselves to be driven by this car (or future versions) for quite some time. Even the Honda doesn't completely trust the car, as demonstrated by the fact that the human driver/passenger is required to respond every 10 seconds. Given that the car's software is constantly asking for reassurance, it's not like the human sitting in the driver seat can accomplish anything useful, or even sit back and enjoy the ride.
I think a few people are going to get in serious accidents with this car (assuming someone actually buys it) because either the car's designers have not taken some situation into account (which is likely), or because the car's users will use this car in ways not intended by the designers (which is also likely).
Ultimately, while this news is exciting, it makes me worried that the new technology will make the roads more dangerous
(( (CRAYON) )) >
What's next, a car that detects if your driving is substandard and forces itself off the road and won't let you drive? Might be good to install such a thing in repeat DUI or DWI offenders vehicles, like how they have breath machines you have to blow in before you can start the motor. Of course, then what would it do for people who just drive shitty even when completely sober...
Windows has more viruses because linux has more virus coders.
You mean, "motourway." ;)
Would probably suck to drive by one of these London crosswalks
Thank GOD. The less people have to do with driving, the better. I would argue that at least 9/10 of drivers are less competant than a properly skilled and trained driver would be while intoxicated, and therefore should be given DUIs just on principal. Honestly, when did we decide that the right to convenient transportation was more important than the right to not be killed by a driver who is just plain stupid?
"Fight for lost causes. You may discover they weren't."
"Officer I swear! It wasn't my fault! The car drives itself!" -- riiight. Little too soon I think. I'll let the technology grow up a bit before fall asleep at the...drivers...seat?
Ever see "logan's run"? The subway / rail system there would make ever so much more sense. Why bother having this big, dangerous open motorway if you're just going to force everyone to buy robots to navigate it? This problem was solved over a hundred years ago: use rails, silly.
...you drive car.
Hopefully this thing doesn't run Windows, otherwise this would give a new meaning to the term "Blue Screen of Death", eh?
I hope it stops for deer in the road!
nothing
Cool! Now, if they'd just figure out that whole A.I. technology thing. Then I could mod a 1982 black Trans-Am and make my own K.I.T.T. car. "No, I'm not okay. I'm nowhere near okay. Most of my functions are out of order, and I'm being treated like a side of beef." - K.I.T.T.
1. How on Earth would it cope with extremely snowy and icy conditions? Heavy rain? Fog? Radar and imaging will have a heck of a time in less than perfect environments.
2. Accident avoidance becomes a huge isse with an automated system. Drivers who learn to trust their computerized cars will be more likely to play with Blackberries, fiddle with the car stereo, read, or carry on conversations without watching the road. That'd make it pretty hard to react quickly to sudden lane changes or accidents in adjacent lanes.
3. How would the system cope with a flock of birds or junk on the roadway?
4. What if the driver fell asleep and the system failed to correctly detect traffic pylons or railway crossings?
5. Just wait for the onslaught of DUI arrests when people try to get their car to drive them home.
In other words, this is a brilliant ideas that's time should never come.
and the next model will:
a) buy itself
b) make its own payments
And you still have to know the way home.
I don't know the way home now! Seriously, I just moved to a new house in a new state. I have a Magellan Roadmate 700. If it were to quit working, I wouldn't be able to get home tonight.
Avoid Missing Ball for High Score
Have a raed of "The American's guide to speaking British.": http://www.effingpot.com/
Dual carriageway - Divided highway. All have a 70mph speed limit unless indicated (posted) otherwise.
Motorway - Freeway. Very strict rules apply to motorways, only drive faster than 100mph if you are happy to lose your licence (or are very good at haggling!). Always drive in the slow lane, unless overtaking (or risk being arrested). Always enter and exit via slip roads on the left hand side.
If I have nothing to hide, you have no reason to search me
motorway = highway.
dual carriageway = divided highway. i'm guessing not necessarily limited access.
All those tax payer dollars DARPA spent looking for a robotic car when all they had to do was go buy a Honda
I have something like this. I walk a couple of blocks to my special "garage" and swipe a special mag-stripe card. I wait a couple of minutes and my self-driving car comes along. The doors open, I get in, and when I reach another special "garage" near my destination, the doors open and I get out of my self-driving car. It's no more than $2 per use and other than some taxes, I didn't pay anything up front.
... of your robot escape techniques.
Crash Detected, Deploy Airbags?
[YES] [NO] [CANCEL]
Windows has more viruses because linux has more virus coders.
somethingl like that would be good and seems great and realatively inexpensive. i dont know how honda has the cars identify the roads or directions, but maybe they could merge the 2 ideas?
Menya zovut Shnur
So, if Honda gave their Asimo robot the ability to drive cars, and the Asimo was driving one of these Accords, how would race conditions between the Asimo and Accord be handled?
Prove it.
What about low visibility conditions, like snow and rain?
You sly dog: you got me monologuing! - Syndrome
so there goes the "fun", I have to tap it regularly not to make it feel deprived..
That's what she said
I'm redminded of the movie The 6th Day (starring the Governator), where in one scene Ahnold and whoever was co-starring were sitting in a truck, looking at each other and talking while the car drove. When they got close to their destination, the car beeped and informed them that it would be returning to manual in 10... 9...
The car also had built in GPS with maps, and seemed to be able to drive itself anywhere, though not from the exact beginning to the exact end (it relied on humans for such things as parking.)
Does this new Honda have any of this? Being able to have the car hold your position is helpful, especially because it will allow you to pay greater attention to other driving matters, such as cars surrounding you and judging your next turn off (though, at least in America, it will just allow Soccer Mom's to apply more make-up, sigh.)
Can the Honda steer around cars that are going too slow? Say it's set to a +/-10 mile variance; if a car in front of you is going 10 miles slower than you want to go (or the speed limit allows, depending on how its set up), will the car automatically work around it? What if a car is coming up behind you too fast; will it move over to let the other car pass?
Can it navigate itself off of highways? We already have GPS-enabled systems that inform you when a turn or exit is coming up that you need to take; how well could they integrate that into the car steering itself?
What happens if the road lines dissappear or become unreadable, be it from construction or wear? Does it hold a straight course, alerting you right away? Does it slow down? Or is it looking far enough ahead that it would have enough time to alert you to resume manual control?
Does it merely watch the road, or does it calculate the shape? What if a car changes lanes in front of you, blocking the camera from seeing the lines, and right after the road goes straight after being a curve? What will the car do? Will it have enough data to know the road it about to straighten?
I love the idea of a car driving itself, if only because that means less asshats on the road (their car, unmodded, will certainly respect road rules and common decency, even if its owner doesn't.) However, there are a lot of questions I have before I feel safe driving in one of these. Also, I'm sure someone will figure out within a month how to clip something onto the steering wheel to make it think that someone is touching it. (Or, the stupid parents will just tell their kid in the passenger to reach over and touch the steering wheel, while said stupid parent goes on talking on a cell or grroming his/herself or whatever.)
And heaven help us if it runs Windows.
Imagine the lawsuits! Somewhere, somebody's gonna get electrocuted; imagine the liability lawsuits against the deep pockets of the companies responsible for implementing this obviously dangerous technology I have devised.
Wait, I know! We'll devise a system of "plugs" and "sockets" which will mediate the risk. Or maybe a "beeper" to warn you that the circuit is active?
Not the best analogy, but I think you get my point. By current definition the registered owner of a vehicle is financially responsible for all damages caused by the operation of that vehicle even if that operation occured without the knowledge or consent of the registered owner (US only, ymmv). I don't see that changing.
Either go all the way with the concept or stick with driver assist options. And we're going to need to give the auto pilot developers some type of insurance or immunity early on or no one will want to risk the liability issues of self-driving cars.
There will be bugs and some of those bugs will turn passengers into grease spots. Ultimately auto drive will save lives, but there will be some accidents getting there.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
I really don't think the future is in self driven cars.
While science fiction, and apparently car companies, suggest that this is a possibility, here are two reasons why this will never happen:
1) All or Nothing. Either ALL cars on the road are self driven, or none are. The moment you get a human interacting with computer driven cars, all chaos will result. No computer system, radar system, and automated response system can anticipate a drunk human driver swerving across 6 lanes of traffic at 100 mph in order to make an exit.
2) Too many degrees of freedom. The car has too many degrees of freedom that affect safety. Tire wear, engine wear, body wear, road conditions, weather conditions and unexpected obstacles like rocks, tree branches, other debris, animals, or other people act against the safe driving of a vehicle. A computer can't take all these degrees of freedom into account. An auto driven car with lousy tires, paired with poor weather and icy roads won't be able to swerve in time to avoid a deer that suddenly dashes out on the road. A human might see the deer emerging from the woods long before it dashes out on the road, a human knows what to do when seeing a deer approach the road. A computer might interpret the deer as a stationary obstacle on the side of the road and take no precautions like slowing down to avoid hitting it if it suddenly moves.
Auto driven cars only work in a few carefully controlled conditions, not in real life. Perhaps an automated highway system is the only application for automated cars, one that prevents external influence like weather and animals and other humans, but it would require billions in infrastructure changes to make highways safe and usable as automated freeways.
The concept just isn't practical. I for one will stop driving if I had to use or contend with computer driven vehicles. While humans are infinitely capable of bad driving, knowing I can react to whatever some brain dead human driver can throw at me makes me feel safe as opposed to allowing a computer to decide how to react to unexpected (and unprogrammed for) conditions.
I haven't thought of anything clever to put here, but then again most of you haven't either.
"Bend over... I'll drive!"
cars drive YOU. In Japan however, cars drive themselves.
When they do this overhaul I wonder what the new road system will look like.
You could probably fit A LOT of cars on the road and through intersections if you only had to mathematically ensure they didn't collide.
"the Lane Keep Assist System keeps you headed in the right direction by using a camera on the rear-view mirror to watch the white lines and turn accordingly."
Let's hope that after the UK trial they remember to switch mirrors...
Finally, SOMEONE is driving when I'm on the phone.
from the article: "Honda was quick to point out that their system isn't exactly set up for you to take a nap, since the ADAS system will beep every 10 seconds to make sure you're paying attention, requiring you to touch the steering wheel to inform the car you're still in charge..."
So what if you do, for whatever reason, neglect to touch the steering wheel every ten seconds? After beeping for ten minutes does it just shut itself off and send your car carreening over a cliff? slam on the brakes in the middle of the highway? Or just keep driving and beeping until you physically wrest control from it (presumeably by taking the wheel and changing lanes or exiting the highway, tapping the brake, whatever.)
On the other hand, a system that could take over when the driver is incapacitated would be a good thing. Many accidents are caused by fatigued drivers. I was lucky that I didn't crash when I "fell asleep" for about 5 miles on the highway (Chevy Chase?) and "woke up" and I realised that I had taken a wrong turn a few miles back, and couldn't remember anything about the last several minutes. This was on my normal commute, that was a turn I just never would have made even if I weren't paying attention.
More music, fewer hits
In Korea, only old people drive their own cars.
An Accord which drives on it's own accord ...
As a kid I loved watching Speed Racer, who always drove right down the middle of the road. For that part of my childhood I thought the proper way to drive was to keep the white line centered under the middle of the car.
Here's a guy who may be in the market for this thing... no longer a need to keep hands on the wheel. http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/01/31/D8FFUHC01 .html
This is great, just buy a few acres of land, build an enclosed planned community and reside in a house in the center of it.
Then, buy a bunch of these Honda ADAS, set them loose and...Voila!
Your very own Twilight Zone isolation nightmare!
He who knows best knows how little he knows. - Thomas Jefferson
we see legislation banning dangerous cars that in their obsolescence allow the driver to take control of the vehicle.
I guess I need to enjoy my '84 cement grey rusty moss covered honda station wagon with the 145 horse motor and tokico suspension before they drag it from my cold dead hands... REPENT HARLEQUIN... REPENT!!!
Didn't the actress who played Lorna also play Narusegawa and Belldandy on those other shows?
Can it read signs? Judge weather conditions and drive appropriately? Respond appropriately if the vehicle gets out of control (say, crosses a patch of ice?), or if something unexpected happens?
Well, neither can most of the people on the road today.
Here's a shocker: let's give people a better education in how to drive, than spend billions on cars that "drive themselves".
Amazingly, it pays off in the long run, because parents have to teach their children how to drive (in many cases). The overall work needed to "educate" society in how to drive, drops over time. Eventually, we become less of a danger to ourselves on the roads, so that having 9 airbags instead of 2 doesn't become quite an issue.
Of course, it'd also be nice if highschools spent a few days in physics class on how physics affects cars (ie, basic vehicle dynamics.) Then again, that'd acknowledge a need to teach students real-world, useful information in school, instead of theoretical skills. When was the last time you saw "how to figure out if you're getting ripped a new one on your home mortgage" on a math teacher's curriculum?
Please help metamoderate.
Many of the roads here don't have any lines. They got too frigging lazy after shifting everything around during the Big Dig.
-William Shatner can be neither created nor destroyed.
Let's hope it performs better than the Mercedes auto-braking!
Paid Q&A/Research
This would be a great advancement in driving for the elderly. Just imagine, a car that plows through a farmers market automatically! They should beta test it in Florida.
Now ASIMO can go to work in style....
Blue screen of DEATH--literally!
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In the US you can't just be pulled over because the officer suspects you are drunk. You actually have to commit an infraction.
I supsect the common ones are:
1) speeding
2) not keeping a safe distance
3) poor lane control
4) out of date vehical tags/tail light out etc..
5) failing to signal for a turn
6) failing to stop at a stop light
If the car can more or less take care of 1-3 then it does reduce your chances of getting caught.
Unfortunately the US still has a culture where it's considered acceptable to drink and drive. Perhaps this sort of system can be combined with one that makes sure the drivers eyes are following the road correctly so it won't be so easy to abuse.
when the driver fails to touch the steering wheel after the 10 second warning?
(My guess would be that the car slows down and pulls to the side of the road but I couldn't find anywhere in the articles that stated this.)
If liability issues kill the implementation of self-driving cars, then it's time to kill all the lawyers.
Personally, I would much rather have a robot driving a car than a teenager. Or an old person. Or a drunk. Or somebody on a cellphone. Or me, when I'm daydreaming, frankly. Who hasn't experienced that thing where you jerk alert and suddenly realize some part of your brain you're not even aware of has been driving for the last 45 minutes - on the freeway, at 75 mph - while the rest of your head has been somewhere else?
There will still be wrecks, but I think we'll have fewer of 'em. I'll take my chances with the robots.
Really, one HUGE problem in this country is that nobody understands risk assessment. It's the kind of ignorance that gave us the completely ineffective PATRIOT Act in response to 9/11.
Serving your airship needs since 1995.
I saw GM doing this on their test track - what 15 years ago?
the ADAS system will beep every 10 seconds to make sure you're paying attention, requiring you to touch the steering wheel to inform the car you're still in charge
What happens when you don't touch the steering wheel because you've fallen asleep?
Read here (Wired News search took me to a missing story so I had to use Internet Archive's copy and tinyurl or else /. messes up my URL up!) about parking. I don't remember if there was another story on driving on streets/freeways though. Does anyone remember?
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
When I saw this acronym before reading the article, I thought it meant "All Dancing, All Singing", a marketing re-write of "All Singing, All Dancing" (ASAD) which wouldn't play as well.
[Insert video of a Toyota in tails, top hat and cane, doing a rendition of "Putting on The Ritz."]
If it weren't for deadlines, nothing would be late.
If this type of system becomes widely used and it gains the ability to tackle other roads... should this affect our drunk driving laws?
Am I the first one to think that I wouldn't want one of these if I had a child?
Imagine getting out of the shower in the morning to see that your 5 year old took your car for a joy ride looking for Sesame Street.
We will not be "driven" by this car or any other car until they can take a lot more into consideration than staying between the lines. Along with this technology, you have to add collision avoidence (roadkill anyone?), as well as the ability to detect road hazards (i.e. ice, potholes - try driving in Michigan with this thing just staying in the lines).
None of that is out of the realm of possibility, but to pack that much extra wiring, hardware, and software to perform all that into a vehicle is going to do several things. Raise the price of the vehicle beyond the reach of the average joe, increase repair costs for both warranty and other, problems with that much new technology and no agreed upon standard will cause serious issues for aftermarket repairs and upgrades, and with that many different systems depending on each other the reliability of the vehicle will be difficult, to say the least, to ensure.
I just think that getting all excited about this technology or putting it down is a way to premature. There is simply too much else to consider before this can be feasible to offer in a public market.
Do what is right and let the consequence follow
Hopefully due consideration has been given to drivers who can't finish their coiffe before leaving the house, and the camera has been mounted in a fixed position to the mirror stalk, instead of the mirror itself.
Mirror, mirror, above the dash,
While I applied my make-up, you made me crash.
unsigned int question = 0x2B | ~(0x2B)
I just need a car to do my work for me.
Of course the thought of having an auto-pilot in a caar is seductive but I really think that the money would be better spent in putting more existing technologies into mainstream models, like -night and fog vision -heads-up display -collision detection, warning and avoidance -road condition awareness (wet/ice/snow) It's already in some luxury cars, but it should be in all cars.
AH HA!, One step closer to the flying cars we were promised.
... I'd rather drive than have something beep at me every 10 seconds.
In Soviet Russia, Honda Accords drive you.
You are in a maze of little twisting passages, all different.
Your description fits a motorway just fine. It doesn't fit freeways so well. There doesn't seem to be any rules about which lane to drive in on freeways (passing on the inside seems to be the only option at times due to the oblivious slow moving minivans in the outer lanes), and entry/exit points can be and often are on either side.
The three-second beeps are interesting, but I think people will become accustomed to the sound and begin to tune it out. At least they have to keep their hands on the wheel. Hopefully they'll keep their foot somewhere near the brake.
Those who believe the Internet is private,
find their privates are on the Internet.
On a short trip, somewhere in America...
Lemme see, auto pilot on. *Yawn* Just a couple winks....
WTF Idaho? What am I doing in Idaho!
It's only meant to fit a motorway, as far as I can tell, the site is aimed at americans coming here to Britain. A motorway is the closest thing we have to a freeway, so when an American hears us talking about motorways, the best way to explain is "that it's like a freewy but..".
If I have nothing to hide, you have no reason to search me
...the important question is: does it speak with a robotic voice, does it have a red laser beam mounted on its hood, can it drive thru walls without getting damaged, and must the occassional human driver wear a black leather jacket and a curly wig?
And how does this differ from any other car with automatic transmission?
"The White House is not an intelligence-gathering agency," -- Scott McClellan, Whitehouse spokesman.
Where is my affordable FLYING CAR? Its 2006 and I'm STILL WAITING. Who f'ing cares if it drives itself. When it can FLY itself I'll be all over it.
The problem with quotes on the internet, is that nobody bothers to check their veracity. -- Abraham Lincoln
Just as there is no "Fast lane". A fact that seems to escape virtually every BMW driver on the UK roads.
Volkswagon talks about "On the road of life, there are passengers, and there are drivers. Drivers wanted."
If they adopt a technology such as this, will their ad be "On the road of technology owned life, there are passengers, and there are more passengers. Drivers need not apply."?
If big boobed women work at Hooters do one legged women work at IHOP?
Honda is a Japanese company, if I remember correctly. Does that mean they are still designed in Japan? Therefore, are we to assume this car will drive in the left lane, doing 5 miles, with its blinker on?
Really, its ok if I say it; I'm asian. *Turns blinker off*
I, for one, welcome our automatic car overlords.
I just copied and pasted from the site; don't shoot the messenger. Of course I realise that it's an inside lane, middle lane and outside lane, but when many people in this country don't realise it why tell Americans? They'll try and show off this new found knoledge, and promptly be (wrongly) derided as ignorant forigners. =)
If I have nothing to hide, you have no reason to search me
sitting in the drivers seat of this new Honda Accord thinking, "Well, this car isn't going to drive itself" when, all of a sudden....
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
If these cars crash while on their automatic-pilot mode, are the makers liable for lawsuits? Or is it the fault of the (drunk) idling driver?
How well will it perform on Canadian roads? Esspecially during winter.
For years now, Ford have been selling cars that partially dismantle themselves...
GCHQ Quantum Insert installed. If only our tongues were made of glass, how much more careful we would be when we speak
Does anyone know what the car is supposed to do when it decides your not paying attention? Does it slow to a stop at the edge of the road or beep really loud or what?
And if there is no recourse for the car, why the test?
I think you underestimate just how much I just dont care.
I believe if automatic driving did come into existance, insurance companies would need to change their model. With little accidents occuring, the driver's premium should drop significantly. There are 2 solutions that may fix this problem.
1. Have car manufacturers buy insurance that would take care of the accidents that occur which in turn would add cost to the car.
2. Do not bother lowering the insurance rates for end-users, but the additional funding will be used for such cases and the car manufacturers will be off the hook.
Yet another example on how our judicial system can only try to catch up to technology.
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Leave it to Honda to re-invent "public" transportation for Americans. Instead of taking a cab/bus/train/monorail and paying taxes/fees/fares to a central transportation authority, we will be convinced to buy our own automated transportation units, and drive on Honda-owned tollways to get where we want to go in the future.
Texas is in the midst of privatizing toll roads at this very moment.
I'm not completely against this model. I'd like to be able to "dial in" my destination and be told in advance exactly how long it will take to arrive, and let the transportation system drive me there while I do other things. It will make arriving on time very easy--schedule your destination in advance, and it tells you when you MUST be in your car, or you'll be late.
No more road rage. No more rude drivers. Just my Kamakiri:
With all screens and functions
In sync lock with Tripstar
This cool rolling bubble
Is all set to samba --Donald Fagan, Kamakiriad
If the self-steering Honda steers itself into oncoming traffic, could the self-braking BMW stop in time?
120 characters for a sig? That's bloody useless.
Dubbed Honda Accord ADAS, the vehicle can change gears ...
... this... "automatic transmission" (for lack of a better name) will surely revolutionize how people drive! No more depressing the clutch, no more taking one hand off the wheel in order to shift gears.
This
Amazing. Honda has true engineering geniuses working for them.
"Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives" should be a convenience store, not a government agency.
Does this technology help us or hurt us? This guy couldn't keep in his lane because he was "distracted."
3 3
Man distracted by pornography arrested for erratic driving
http://www.wbir.com/news/archive.aspx?storyid=317
- Phil
except I-80 and I-15, they have 4 lanes (two each way)
still, ya gotta love PAVED roads! So nice and cushy to drive on!
If the truck is also automated, and if there's sufficient reliable communication between the two vehicles to indicate each other's intent, it probably can be automated. To be most efficient, this would probably require a trusted road network that might only allow trusted and authenticated automated vehicles to drive on it, or any automated vehicle would have to assume that anything not communicating was a potential hazard. But I get the impression that people in a country like Japan might just accept such a road network that would require modified vehicles.
If implemented well, automated vehicles would certainly be able to travel much faster, closer together and more safely than human-controlled ones. It'd reduce congestion, decrease travel time, make travel times more predictible, and reduce a lot of people's frustration at the cost of letting people control their own vehicles.
Wow, I'm impressed... sigh...
Oh well, what the hell...
It's about time someone came up with an idea that would allow the car to change gears for you! This will sell like hotcakes. Now if they could just come up with a way to replace the carburetor with an electronic device to syringe or inject the fuel into the engine...
without changing their "we are driven" slogan...
"Waste not one watt!" - CZ
It can change gears on its own? Whoa, and Auto-Matic transmission. Thats friggin cool. I'm so tired of that clutchy thingy.
Knightboat, the Crime-Solving boat.
Its no big deal. Toyota's Prius in Japan had a parallel parking feature where it autoparked using a backup camera on the dash. Its been out for 3 years now or so (and no telling what else there was before that)
Most newer vehicles are going all drive-by-wire now; including the steering, brakes, and throttle. All new Lexus vehicles coming out have these features; combined with stability control, motion sensing, radar for finding distance between the cars around you, etc to create an entire package called VDIM. Its the most sophisticated safety package in the world. With the absensce of a steering rack; the wheels, throttle, etc are all controlled by the computer. So small wonder that a vehicle could be made to drive itself.
Trouble with most new vehicles using this is reliability issues. You don't have to worry about that with Toyota or Honda; but Mercedes, BMW, Audi, and a few others from Europe would scare the hell out of me. I've heard numerous stories of Mercedes E and S class vehicles just STOPPING in the middle of the freeway, not cranking, and losing control of steering. Something that advanced is VERY dangerous when you couple shoddy German (and general European) electronics with it.
Just the other day I hit black ice (which is ice on the road you can't see), I was doing 5mph but down hill and couldn't stop and sliding ever more closer too the car that had stopped in the middle of the road (due to the conditions).. What would the computer do in a situation like that? Hit the car in front? Well in this situation I managed to drive into the square bit of curving on the side of the road and pull myself to rest. This example is only one of many situations that you need to take in your suroundings, such as driving near a school with teenagers running onto the road without warning.
Will it drive like an asian?
You know where this is going, don't you? One of the biggest problems with the freeways in places such as Southern California is that even a 10 lane freeway can only carry so many cars before things jam up. Drivers simply cannot drive closer than about one car every 2 seconds per lane.
If we can create a car that can more or less drive itself, has a faster reaction time to sudden stops or changes than a human, and can pilot itself down the highway sharing information with cars before and after it, it means we can designate a lane or two on the freeway as "auto-drive" lanes, where cars can then be brought together even closer than they would be spaced by humans.
That would allow you to dramatically increase the carrying capacity of the freeways without having to widen them--just by designating a couple of lanes for auto-drive cars.
I'd love to have a car that would drive itself on the freeway to some designated zone a few miles shy of my destination. It may be freaky at first to be within a quarter second of the guy in front of me, without touching the steering wheel, barreling down the highway at 80 miles an hour. But if it gets me to work or home faster, I'd be all for it.
2006 cars drive themselves .....2006 and a couple seconds .....cars crash themselves
I live and drive in Los Angeles. I'd much rather take my chances with the robots driving, thanks.
when *do* I get a free chance to kill?
Like parallel parking and driving in stop-and-go traffic jams.. (like when you just have to inch your car forward a few feet, then stop, then do it again) Eventually, I see cars being able to drive themselves, and most delivery tasks will probably be handled by robotic vehicles. With Moore's Law being fairly right so far, I'd say that we are looking at around ten years till at least one standardized technology to enable driverless roads and deliveries (at least some roads) begins to be adopted. Yes, many people who currently earn their livings driving will eventually be tossed into the growing ranks of the unemployed - machines will be doing more and more with less and less.. We better get used to that inevitability, the end of 'the job' and figure out a way to adjust to it and still suitably incentivise people to do what they need to do.. I think this demands more education, not less. Note: Public education was made universal as a response to the need for employees by the industrial revolution, a need that is now already declining in developed, high wage nations, and will accellerate and spread to low wage nations as well, as technology improves and enables more kinds of work to be done by machines. The social implications of this are staggering. barring war, they are also pretty exciting. (A world of abundance, in which learning becomes much more important as mankind reaches for the stars?) People may no longer 'work to live' - but hopefully, those who want to will work because they are excited by being able to add to the sum total of human endeavor and knowledge. (Those creative jobs are the only jobs that won't be done by machines) Note to global governments. This will make nations far more vulnerable to EMP terrorism. The only predictably safe way to prevent terrorism - long term, is to eliminate the STARK inequalities that ruin the lives of so many millions (billions?) of people through preventable poverty. In 30 years, the world's population will begin to shrink naturally. So we need to prevent global nuclear war, even if it means having to share a little..
I'm curious, if you don't touch the steering wheel after the beep, what will the car do? Disable the ADAS system? Stop the car? Beep again, louder? Call 911?
I don't care if it's 90,000 hectares. That lake was not my doing.
And if you don't touch the steering wheel in 10 seconds -- maybe because you're sleeping -- does the system shut itself off, sending you driving straight into the ditch or the oncoming traffic ......
The big problem I see with this is that if my car stayed level on roads, I know that it wouldn't be long before I was climbing into the backseat to get at things, drifting off to sleep, reading books, etc, and then getting in accidents when we hit suddenly unhandleable conditions and I can't get back in control in time.
It doesn't have to happen often, it just has to happen enough to make CNN.
I give it a 50% chance there's a huge backlash within a year of these being introduced.
I've always wanted a steering cruise-control, ever since seeing the first research on these. I just think we're gonna have a lot of trouble introducing them.
xkcd.com - a webcomic of mathematics, love, and language.
Personally, I would much rather have a robot driving a car than a teenager. Or an old person. Or a drunk. Or somebody on a cellphone. Or me, when I'm daydreaming, frankly.
I read things like this here occasionally and the only way I can make sense of it is by figuring the writer has read too many science fiction books.
There's simply no evidence that computers are capable of handling the number of variables in play when driving on busy roads with people, and I don't see how they ever will on their current development path. Driving involves way way more than just piloting the thing down the lane and not hitting things in front of you. To really drive safely you need to be monitoring the environment and anticipating what every person near you is going to do. This requires basically running multiple people simulators simultaneously and monitoring for emerging solutions that represent a threat.
Your brain automates this in the background; building these simulations is part of the 18+ year process of becoming a functioning adult. To get a computer to the same level it would have to start with the processing power of the human brain, then interact with humans 16 hours a day for nearly 2 decades.
In addition computers and robots have absolutely no sense of self-preservation. If you give a computer a wrong instruction it will follow it, to its own destruction even, without hesitation. There's no billion-year-old base programming that checks every single action for self-danger.
Really, one HUGE problem in this country is that nobody understands risk assessment.
The irony of this statement just kills me. (/pun)
Build a man a fire, he's warm for one night. Set him on fire, and he's warm for the rest of his life.
I think that this is great, and a way to provide more efficiency, more safety, and less trouble. Of course there are going to be bugs to work out, and the driver is still in control(and needs to be) of the car provided that all systems work as they are supposed to. That being said, it is an option, not required for anyone to use. Most vehicles today already have computer controlled systems that they depend on, and most of the drivers of those vehicles don't even know that they are at work. One example would be Anti-Lock Brakes(ABS) that most people use, don't know how it works, and might not even know when it is working or not except for when an ABS light comes on the dash. I have seen people that are so used to ABS and get into a vehicle without it and can't control the non ABS vehicle in certain situations. I feel that this tech will go in the same way, eventually you will have people that can't seem to drive without it. Now this takes time and won't happen over night, but I do see it in the future. Plus you have to confirm that you are still there by touching the wheel every 10 seconds, if you are one of those people that can't keep their kids in line, those 10 seconds I am sure will be a bonus for you.
Yeah, and rip out that stereo! And stop bringing passangers!
the paint that devides lanes could have nano rf devices in it telling the car the speed limit, when to stop, when to go, what the road is like ahead, unlimited!
Enjoy Every Sandwich
GM has had this for over a decade. I remember them doing it with Buicks in the late 90s.
[insert lame joke here]
Like a special color of marker light reserved for cars that have auto-drive on? You know, so you could give it wide bearth while giving the laptop-using driver the finger?
With Honda Accord, car drives you!
I was trying to think of why they would bother making a car that could steer itself, yet required your hands on the wheel every 10 seconds. And it occurred to me it's not for people to take naps at the wheel. It's for people who have trouble staying in their lanes. And who has trouble staying in their lanes? Old people, people with bad eyesight, and drunks.
So if you've tipped back one to many and have to drive yourself home, instead of weaving all over your lane and announcing to the world your drunk, you turn on the steering assist and let the car make you look good.
If your not weaving all over the road you could knock back more than your share at the local watering hole and not worry about attracing the attention of the police.
Now here is what I'm wondering. If you do manage to get pulled over and the cop smells your breath, who was driving the car? You or the computer? I can easily imagine a situation where someone fights a DUI by saying they were not driving it, the car was.
Or we could look at the flip side of that. A normal driver, who for whatever reason, has the system engaged and the lane markers are incorrect and the car causes an accident. You have all seen it, they are doing road construction on the highway and have you detour across several lanes but the painted lines keep going straight. Even a normal person has a little confusion about which lane they should be in during these abrupt detours. Imagine how it would mess with the AI of the car.
In any case am I crazy to think that these cars are going to be loved by heavy drinkers?
There's plenty of evidence that humans are pathetically bad at it. Quite simply, you overestimate the number of variables in play.
And you completely over-estimate how bad humans are at it. Think how many accidents the average American gets into, then think about how much of their lives are spent behind the wheel of a car. The percentage of accidents per hour traveled is vanishing small across the entire population. It's even smaller if you take out single-actor accidents like backing into sign posts or parked cars.
How many times have you seen someone:
- Pulle out in front of you
- Stop abruptly
- Change lanes without signaling
- Run a red-light
- Fail to yield
100s? 1000s?
I've seen stuff like this probably hundreds of thousands of times in my life, and out of all those times I've only been in an accident as a result once. Assuming it's 100,000 times even, with one accident, that is 3 9s of reliability in what you claim is a completely unpredicable, chaotic environment. That is very good reliability.
Even if we assume I'm an order of magnitude off, that still means I have avoided accidents in those situations 99.99% of the time! And those are only the worst-case scenarios...you're apparently not even counting the number of times I've pre-emptively taken myself out of dangerous situations, by changing lanes, slowing down, speeding up, etc.
How many times have you been caught completely off guard? If you're like most drivers, it's probably too many to remember. Rule number one of driving is that other people are unpredictable and stupid. That's why it's important to keep a safe following distance, to check carefully at 4-way stops, and to do the 100s of other "checks" that we do to avoid accidents.
Wait, if driving is so simple, why do we have to do "100s of other checks"? Isn't that my point?
If we really could tell what everyone else was going to do, then why would we need delayed lights, stop signs, or turn signals at all?
Way to completely miss my point. I never claimed that we could absolutely predict what other people do, I claimed that we monitor other vehicles and pedestrians with a system far more complex than simple read and react. Safe drivers anticipate potential problems and take action to minimze the likelihood of an accident.
A sense of self-preservation has little to do with safe driving.
Uh huh. Remind me never to ride with you. Personally I have a pretty healthy sense of self-preservation when I'm driving.
Most accidents occur because we are unable to anticipate danger, unable to react to danger quickly enough, or are unable to make the right decision. Self-preservation is irrelivent because we don't *know* what's dangerous, or because we make choices that are bad.
Humans cannot predict future danger with 100% accuracy, so they sometimes get into accidents. Does that therefore mean, as you seem to assert, that self-preservation is irrelevant? I think you're getting a little carried away. The issue at stake is not why humans get into accidents, but whether robots would be better or worse at avoiding accidents. One of the reasons they would be worse is that they execute bad commands whether it kills them or not. That is the nature of machinery.
Machinery only operates reliably safely when a) it has been exhaustingly checked by humans (who do so out of self-preservation, I might add) and b) it is operated within its design limits. If you believe that driving is as chaotic and unpredictable as you've described here, I don't see how any robot or computer could be designed to operate reliably safely.
The autopilot on a 777 has no sense of self-preservation either, yet 700+ flights per day confirm the safety of the system. The 777 autopilot isn't concerned with "saving lives", it's running the numbers and doing what is necessary to keep the aircraft on-course and flying properly.
Every 777 that flies, does so with a human pilot and backup
Build a man a fire, he's warm for one night. Set him on fire, and he's warm for the rest of his life.
Just how stable is this system? I for one wouldnt like it to freeze up when going 70 down a motorway. Gives new meaning to the phrase Blue Screen of Death.
To err is human. To forgive is not company policy.