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Nissan Develops Emergency Auto-Steering System
AmiMoJo writes "Japanese automaker Nissan Motor says it has developed a new technology to help drivers avoid collisions. A new computer system automatically steers the car to avoid colliding with objects in the road. The system relies on radar and laser scanners. It also uses a front-mounted camera to provide information on what's happening outside the car. The system first alerts the driver to turn in a certain direction. If the driver cannot immediately turn in that direction, the system takes over the steering to help avoid a collision."
How well does said auto-steering system perform on ice, mud, or fording small streams?
I hope that there will be plenty of logs, just in case that when your car avoids a dog and kills a kid you can go to cort and blame Nissan for it
Programmer accidentally casts unsigned to signed: steering wheel turns full lock right instead of a bit to the left?
I cannot help but actually be quite wary of how these kinds of things are starting to crop up in modern cars. How well do these work e.g. in an abnormal situation, like e.g. there's flood water on the road, or lots and lots of snow like we here in Finland tend to get, or what if the system detects something on the road that it really wants to steer away from, but doesn't detect what's coming up on you from the side and steers you in even worse direction against your wishes? Hell, a proper snow storm is a common occurrence here in Finland and even humans have trouble keeping track of everything that's happening; I really, really doubt a computer can do a better job at it.
These things might be good for people with serious attention deficits or other kinds of similar issues, but an experienced, careful driver could quite possibly make better decisions than these and thus these systems would actually be detrimental in such cases. Hell, they could just as well turn a not-so-serious crash into a major disaster if they screwed up and took control of the car over the driver.
I can just see it, a metallic balloon drifts through a lane of traffic and the Nissan goes into panic mode and starts a big chain reaction because the radar, camera and laser scanner detect it as a threat. A real driver would just try and pop the balloon.
That is also one of my questions about how the Google self-driving cars behave in similar situations. Do they panic when a tumbleweed blows across the road?
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If Slashdot had been around 120 or 130 years ago, the first story about a new invention with four wheels and a motor would've been rife with comments about pedestrians not being able to get out of the way, horses being frightened, and predictions of other problems so severe the automobile would never see the light of day as an invention for the common man.
How easy is it to find a car now without ABS? or even traction control? both of these systems cause far more problems than they solve with even a half way competent person behind the wheel, and yet you can't buy a vehicle without them.
The problem is a dearth of halfway competent people behind the wheel. Even if only a tenth of all drivers were incompetent, mandating things like ABS and traction control will have a positive impact on accidents. And reality is that most drivers would lose the cool and slam on the brakes in a dangerous situation.
IMO, we need two levels of driver's license. A higher level that requires true training, and is much harder to obtain, and which brings privileges like being allowed to disable certain "safety" features when they have shown they can do it manually as well as or better than the expert systems, or exceed speed limits on certain roads like divided highways.
"I wonder who the first fucker will be to hack together a radar/laser jamming system.."
It's called a 'ball'.
I wonder how the system would handle animals on the road. I don't know exactly how many animals I've hit since I've been driving, but I'd bet it's been dozens. 3 deer, all on the highway, some raccoon, some squirrels, some opossum. I was in a situation where I literally had to choose between swerving and wrecking in to the cars beside me on the freeway or hitting the deer. Needless to say, if its an animal, it's game. But, OTOH, computers are faster than humans, and sometimes things happen so fast that you don't get time to think.
In the split second between imminent danger and reaction, the speed of your vehicle, it's trajectory, and where your likely to have impact...these are all things a computer can calculate nearly instantly. I am not saying Yay for driver-less cars, i'm merely saying that If your going to crash, and with so many variables associated with crashes, at least if it's computer controlled, your risk is calculated, instead of solely relying on random reactionary impulses.
There is always that scary feeling like you lost control. Humans like to give control up for mundane and repetitive tasks, However, this is literally putting your life in the hands of a machine.
I'm more in favor of safety warnings that get noticed by the computer and escalated to the driver. For example, if your switching lanes and a car is in your blind spot, and you put your signal on, the computer warns you there is a car there in the blind spot. That's awesome. Or if standards were in place cars would talk to each other in such a way that Jimmy's BMW could bug the shit of of him for being a dick and cutting me off and getting too close while doing it...that's awesome too.
Or if i'm getting on the freeway and my Jeep knows that the guy coming down the road is going too fast and chances are high that if I try to merge on, he'll hit me in the rear. Or, (and this one is great) if your trying to get out on a busy road, the system could let you know when it is truly safe to pull out on to the main road, based on the speeds of the oncoming cars.
There are all kinds of things a computer system can do to make us safer drivers, without outright taking full control of the situation.
A Penny for my thoughts? Here's my two cents. I got ripped off!
Yes, the first generations of traction control systems were rather crude and didn't work well on ice. However, some manufacturers actually evolve their product and modern TC systems are doing a whole lot better than the ones that caused all the urban myths. That doesn't mean that every car you buy now has a capable TCS on it, but if you steer away from "We sold this model for the last 100 years, why change?" or "Our car is cheaper because we copy old Euro tech" style manufacturers, you will probably find capable electronics that actually help prevent accidents. However, there is no recipe against a driver that chooses to drive way too fast under circumstances that will most likely cause ice on the roads. Once you go 50 mph in a certain direction and hit ice, there is no amount of electronics or steering that will stop you sliding straight ahead in the direction you were going. It often takes a tree, house, rock, car or other large object to stop you, or you'll roll over once you gain grip again or hit a ditch. Physics can be a bitch sometimes and there will always be people that fail to realize that in time.
This new technology isn't about traction control, it's about not hitting that pothole or lost cargo on the road. This will mean that your car will suddenly swerve hard, slamming the steering wheel out of your hands, breaking your thumb or fingers and making you spill your hot coffee on your lap. People will blame that on their car, but they fail to realize that you shouldn't be holding the wheel with just one hand, or with your thumbs hooked, or drinking hot coffee while driving. It's the same as with driving under icy conditions; these mechanisms are put on cars to help good drivers deal with situations the human brain can't cope with, not to substitute the driver. If you want that, go talk to Google.
I was promised a flying car. Where is my flying car?