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Stanford Robot Car Capable of Slide Parking
kkleiner writes "Stanford's Junior, the robot car that took second place at DARPA's Grand Challenge in 2007, has learned how to perform a tire-squealing 180-degree spin into a skin-tight parking space. Similar to a James Bond action scene, the maneuver is impressive and would be extremely difficult for a human to pull off. We won't be handing the keys over to robot cars anytime soon, but Stanford shows us that at least for some driving tasks robot cars can already meet or even exceed human ability."
A youtube comment points out there are people in both the driver and passenger seats. The person in the driver seat looks to be spinning the wheel, and then ducks down as the car comes to a stop. There is a response from the uploader claiming the driver is there for "safety reasons" -- pretty dubious in my opinion. What is safe about a driver and passenger inside an autonomous car? Don't they have remote kill switches for that?
look at the obvious tire marks on the pavement. This was done several times before. Stop and think everyone...
They start the car at a precise position, have it do a backwards run and slide. Then place the cones to miss the tire tracks...repeat program.
Just like most action scenes with cars from Hollywood (where you see the repeated skid marks right where cars are in a chase scene), this was obviously done a few times before...Why should anyone believe the cones where there and the car figured out how to do this using its camera
So? Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't realize he was a TEENAGER, that makes it all right. I forgot that teenagers are invincible, and that as adults we should look back fondly on the stupid ass things we did that should have, by all rights, caused us to get killed and take others with us.
Don't be a putz. What the GP described wasn't an accident. He wasn't "going a bit too fast," it was willfully and criminally negligent. "Hey, let's go toss 50-pound weights off a skyscraper an laugh about how close they come to bashing someone's skull in. It will be awesome! Afterward, we can run down the street and shoot guns in random directions!" Ah, those zany teenage shenanigans.
Again, this wasn't awesome. The GP was a dumbass, period, end of story.