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Lyft CEO: Self-Driving Cars Aren't the Future

Posted by timothy on from the but-the-future-branches dept.

Nerval's Lobster writes Google, Tesla, Mercedes and others are working hard to build the best self-driving car. But will anyone actually buy them? In a Q&A session at this year's South by Southwest, Lyft CEO Logan Green insisted the answer is "No." But does Green truly believe in this vision, or is he driven (so to speak) by other motivations? It's possible that Green's stance on self-driving cars has to do more with Uber's decision to aggressively fund research into that technology. Uber CEO Travis Kalanick announcing that self-driving cars were the future was something that greatly upset many Uber drivers, and Green may see that spasm of anger as an opportunity to differentiate Lyft in the hearts and minds of the drivers who work for his service. Whether or not Green's vision is genuine, we won't know the outcome for several more years, considering the probable timeframes before self-driving cars hit the road... if ever.

28 of 451 comments (clear)

  1. Buggy whip makers said automobiles aren't... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Buggy whip makers said automobiles aren't the future.

    1. Re:Buggy whip makers said automobiles aren't... by pollarda · · Score: 4, Insightful

      That may be true. However, self driving cars are an entirely different matter. While they are really cool, do you really want to be in one hurling down the highway at 85MPH (I'm in Utah) and trusting that the automated systems are going to know the difference between a coyote or a tumbleweed? There are an incredible number of obstacles that a person can instantly recognize that even today, a computer can't. If a child and a dog run out into the street at the same time from opposite sides, do you trust the car to make the right decision as to which it will run over? How would you like to be legally responsible for your self driving car if it runs over a child? What about black ice? What if a person is in the road and the car has a choice of running over the person or crashing and possibly killing you. Do you trust the car to make the right decision?

      As much as I like software (and writing it), there are IMHO too many judgement calls for a computer and in many situations too many for a lot of (supposedly sane) people.

      The only way I can see self driving cars really working is to have special roads to carry them. These would be isolated from regular traffic and most of the regular road hazards. They would be in many ways analogous to a set of rail road tracks. (You don't see trains often running into problems with obstacles -- though when they do, the train usually comes out ahead.) Once you get to where you generally plan on going, you jump off and drive the rest of the way manually.

    2. Re:Buggy whip makers said automobiles aren't... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2

      I notice that a lot of your examples are the type of "You are already screwed."
      The point of self driving cars is that they don't take the risks humans do and don't end up in those situations.
      Also, in the examples you mentioned it is pretty common for humans drivers to panic and make the wrong or no decision, heck, I've even seen drivers let go of the steering wheel when panicking.
      So to the question whether I trust a car to make the right decision the answer is that I know that I don't trust human drivers. I'm willing to try automatic drivers and see if they are any better.

    3. Re:Buggy whip makers said automobiles aren't... by MalleusEBHC · · Score: 5, Informative

      Not only do automated cars not panic, but they can notify and coordinate with other cars on the road. With human drivers, even if you spot the obstacle up ahead, what's to prevent the asshole behind you from rear-ending you as you brake? With automated cars, the braking car can signal the cars behind it, and they can start applying the brakes before it's even humanly possible to react.

      Automated cars will surely not be perfect, but human drivers have an atrocious safety record.

    4. Re:Buggy whip makers said automobiles aren't... by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 5, Insightful

      SDCs are not perfect. They will make mistakes. But, because of faster reaction times, and 100% attention span, they will make fewer mistakes than humans. If a dog and a child run into the road at the same time, a human might make a better decision, or a computer might make a better decision, but the computer will certainly have an extra 500ms of braking time.

    5. Re:Buggy whip makers said automobiles aren't... by Dog-Cow · · Score: 2

      Compare the number of miles driven and/or the number of distinct trips to the number of accidents. I think you will find that humans are far from being atrocious drivers. Don't let confirmation bias cloud your thinking.

    6. Re:Buggy whip makers said automobiles aren't... by Hognoxious · · Score: 2

      Barber tells me I need a haircut, shampoo maker says long hair is trendy.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    7. Re:Buggy whip makers said automobiles aren't... by jandersen · · Score: 2

      The only way I can see self driving cars really working is to have special roads to carry them.

      This may well be the best way to do it, at least initially. A sort of small train wagons that could aggregate into whole train sets for part of the way and split off to different routes when appropriate. The biggest problem with public transport atm is that trains and buses are too inflexible - they don't go exactly to where people need them, and they too often aren't full to capacity - and when they are full, they are usually not big enough. A system of self-driving cars could address both problems, thereby becoming competitive with private cars, plus, they could be better optimsed for fuel efficiency, since they won't be driven by impatient drivers; if you don't have to keep your eyes on the road, you won't mind too much that you aren't driving as fast as possible. And of course, a well managed network of automatic vehicles would be able to avoid congestion most of the time simply by coordinating the way each vehicle moves.

    8. Re:Buggy whip makers said automobiles aren't... by leenks · · Score: 2, Interesting

      More like 1500ms of braking time (it is likely the child / dog running into the road is an unexpected event so reaction times are *much* slower).

    9. Re:Buggy whip makers said automobiles aren't... by tinkerton · · Score: 4, Insightful

      It's easy to see that self driving cars will come if you look at it as a feature. Take a normal car with a self driving button that you can switch on and off at your own judgement. You don't have to use it, but slowly you start to detect situations where the self driving button comes in really handy, such as traffic jams. And then some slow city traffic. And as confidence grows you switch it on on a long highway journey.
      So you end up with all the cars having the option but some never use it, others sometime, some as much as possible.

    10. Re:Buggy whip makers said automobiles aren't... by AikonMGB · · Score: 5, Insightful

      For what, +1 Irrational Fear? Seems like that should be -1 to me. You won't see ubiquitous self-driving cars until the system is better than meat-popsicle cars. Once that happens, the rational argument flips: "do you want some incompetent person driving a hunk of steel on a road near where your child plays? *shudder* Think of what would happen if that human had to react to something!"

      Sure, you could say you don't think self-driving cars will ever be safer than meat-popsicle cars, but that's like saying "640 kB ought to be enough for anybody". Technology is advancing at a staggering pace, and these systems are only getting better and more reliable.

    11. Re:Buggy whip makers said automobiles aren't... by conquistadorst · · Score: 5, Interesting

      For what, +1 Irrational Fear? Seems like that should be -1 to me. You won't see ubiquitous self-driving cars until the system is better than meat-popsicle cars. Once that happens, the rational argument flips: "do you want some incompetent person driving a hunk of steel on a road near where your child plays? *shudder* Think of what would happen if that human had to react to something!"

      Sure, you could say you don't think self-driving cars will ever be safer than meat-popsicle cars, but that's like saying "640 kB ought to be enough for anybody". Technology is advancing at a staggering pace, and these systems are only getting better and more reliable.

      Amen, as long as avoiding risking behavior is a mandatory feature in autonomous driving software. I'd speculate a majority of accidents and road fatalities are nearly all avoidable, brought on by either poor choices, risky behavior, or bad driving habits. Case in point just today on my way to work I narrowly avoided two accidents. The first, the driver did not scrape his windows from ice and could not see any of the drivers around him - nearly plowing into me and others around him as he was changing lanes. The second, another driver decided to use the right lane as a passing lane in a 4 lane road, driving 55 while everyone else is going 35, denying anyone in the left lanes the ability to change lanes and make a right turn. Let me repeat, that was just today. Stuff like this happens everyday to millions of people. For myself, getting tail gated while I'm already going 10 above the limit is a regular *daily* occurrence. I'm barely even going to bring up the young, inexperienced, risk-loving drivers because all of the problems there should be understood without even saying.

      I for one am eagerly looking forward to autonomous cars purely because of the minor few that make the roads dangerous for everyone else. But like the poster above, it's probably going to be awhile before they're reliable enough for use. But it will happen because technology will be improved over time. Changing, people's attitudes and driving habits? Yeah, far more difficult and expensive than technology with diminishing returns. Good luck on that!

    12. Re:Buggy whip makers said automobiles aren't... by Jason+Levine · · Score: 2

      Do I trust self-driving cars today? No, but the thing about technology is that it is constantly being improved. The first generation of consumer model self driving cars will be glorified cruise control. You'll put in your destination and keep your hands ready to take over on a moment's notice. You might even have to do this once or twice a trip. It'll be better than human drivers in most situations, but you won't activate it (or will take over from it) during risky situations. (Similar to how you disable cruise control when you see an accident ahead of you.) Subsequent generations of self-driving cars will improve more and more until the human driver backup is no longer needed.

      Once self driving cars have had a few generations, they'll be better than human drivers and people will talk disdainfully about those meatbags who insist on manually controlling their automobile.

      --
      My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
    13. Re:Buggy whip makers said automobiles aren't... by invid · · Score: 2

      It's all going to come down to texting. While you're in a driverless car you can text to your hearts content while traveling without fear of being pulled over. Or watch movies. Or have sex. Or drink a fifth of Scotch. Or do all at the same time. How many people are going to turn down this ability for some hypothetical baby/dog recognition bug?

      --
      The Moore-Murphy Law: The number of things that will go wrong will double every 2 years.
  2. Re:Death traps. by Neil+Boekend · · Score: 2

    A properly taught ant would probably be better at driving than about 80% of human drivers.

    Have you been out on the road? With all the idiots making cellphone calls/driving drunk/texting/facebooking/putting up makeup/whatever? Have you seen the current state of affairs on the road?

    My prophecy:
    Self driving cars will be better than humans in 99,99% of the situations within 3 years. Sadly it will take another 5 to wide scale adoption and yet another 10 years for human driven cars to be banned to racetracks.

    --
    Well, I might have a way, but it only works on a semi spherical planet in a vacuum.
  3. greedy liar by Tom · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I'll tell you what the future is, and the CEOs of Lyft, Uber, etc. know it as well:

    Self-driving car-sharing vehicles.

    I'm a huge fan of the new car-sharing services that have popped up in recent years. The ones where you simply pick up a car wherever you find it (your iPhone App will show you the nearest ones if you are looking), drive to where you want, and leave it there for the next person to take.

    You have a car when you need it, don't need to bother with it when you don't, you don't need to worry about fuel, inspections, washing it - nothing. And you can take the car you need for today. Good weather? Cabrio. Need to transport something? Bigger trunk. etc.

    Main disadvantage? Sometimes there's no car nearby, and of course the usual parking space hunt in the city.

    Solution: Self-driving cars. Tap a button on your smartphone, the nearest car comes and picks you up. Just exit it at destination and it'll go away by itself, either finding a parking space or going to the next person who called one. If it's an electric car, it can also go and find a charging station if it wants.

    Who needs taxis? Who needs Lyft?

    They know this, of course, and they know it's coming.

    --
    Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
    1. Re:greedy liar by dave420 · · Score: 2

      The actual problem is you think you being able to tell a car has had 500 people in it is somehow more important than the 30,000+ people who die in traffic accidents every year. You can be as entitled as you want, but don't pretend it's a sensible or honorable stance.

  4. Re:Death traps. by Pentium100 · · Score: 2

    One problem is who will bear the responsibility for the accident. As it is now, if I hit another car or a person, I am responsible for it and am punished for it. This is fair. Now, if a self-driving car hits someone and the car was maintained properly (no problems with brakes etc), then the accident was really caused by the software. Will the manufacturer pay for the damage caused? Because now I am not responsible for something I had no control over.

    Another problem is that when a self-driving car causes an accident, it will be something that would have been obvious to a human driver, resulting in the general opinion that self driving cars are stupid.

    As for me, I love my car made in 1982 with no computers in it (yes, it has a carburetor and mechanical controls) and would not want to replace it with a car that has software. Not as much for the software by itself, but the possibilities of lock-in, DRM, hacking and so on.

  5. Re:Death traps. by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 4, Insightful

    One problem is who will bear the responsibility for the accident.

    We already know that. The insurance company is responsible.

    Three states (California, Nevada, and Florida) already allow SDCs on their roads. The liability issue is already resolved.

    Another problem is that when a self-driving car causes an accident, it will be something that would have been obvious to a human driver, resulting in the general opinion that self driving cars are stupid.

    When a human causes an accident, it is almost always something that would have been obvious to another human driver, resulting in the general opinion that humans are stupid. Most people are intelligent enough to realize that SDCs will not be perfect, but they will prevent a lot more accidents that they will cause, and the tradeoff is worth it. Seat-belts and airbags also occasionally kill people, but they save ten lives for every one they take, and people accept the tradeoff.

  6. Re:It won't understand situations, it shouldn't ma by Kokuyo · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I'm really sorry to have to be so direct but that is the dumbest argument I've ever heard.

    Driving is not a matter of intelligence. It's a matter of reaction. Sure, intelligence and experience help you anticipate when other drivers are being idiots, but there is very little involved in driving that can not be compensated by reaction time and adhering to proper distances.

    The biggest hurdle to take is to correctly measure the surroundings. If you did that via image recognition, then yes, AI would be important. But there is laser, radar, GPS and so many other sensors involved that do nothing more than note distances to targets, location on road etc.

    Autonomous driving certainly isn't trivial, but the other thing you have to keep in mind is that your oh so intelligent human drivers are actually driving like morons a lot of the time.

    Please stop putting the bar for autonomous driving so high the systems have to practically be perfect the be viable. The moment they are twice as good as a human should be the moment we start switching. And we're not far from that.

    Remember how badly the average driver actually drives. And then remember that half of them drive worse than that.

    Add on top of that networked driving, where cars coordinate over several hundred meters and you'll see so much potential gain even from non-perfect systems it's staggering.

  7. GPS aren't as acurate as they pretend to be. by Cafe+Alpha · · Score: 2

    There's a lot of filtering to hide just how inaccurate GPSes are. That doesn't matter when a human is looking at a screen and ignoring it when it's obviously wrong. But it makes a huge difference when an idiotic machine is driving.

  8. Self driving taxis will be a harder sell by John.Banister · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Self driving cars operated by the owner are a different situation from that of self driving taxis. The owner and rider interests diverge when those are different people. A self driving taxi has to protect itself from theft & abuse and protect its owner from lawsuits. That mean the person riding in the taxi won't be allowed to arbitrarily stop it, assume manual control, or exit in locations considered by the taxi owner to be unsafe. Putting my car in self driving mode with my average speed 10 mph in gridlock sounds attractive. Getting into a little vehicle capable of traveling to arbitrary locations and trusting it like I would a train takes the early adopter impulse right out of me. Maybe self driving buses would make the transition better.

  9. Re:Death traps. by stephanruby · · Score: 2

    My prophecy:
    Self driving cars will be better than humans in 99,99% of the situations within 3 years. Sadly it will take another 5 to wide scale adoption and yet another 10 years for human driven cars to be banned to racetracks.

    Your calculation implies that everyone replaces their car within a 5 year period.

    That may be true in Beverly Hills, but it's certainly not true in the rest of the US.

    The average age of cars on U.S. roads is 11.4 years, IHS Automotive reports. The average age of vehicles on U.S. roads has hit a plateau of about 11.4 years, according to an annual study by IHS Automotive, an auto industry research firm. Jun 9, 2014

    In any case, I find your optimism unjustified.

    In the Bay Area for instance, we could already make BART trains fully automated, and it's been studied they would become safer to boot, but attempting to change that system to get rid of the operators would be absolute political suicide.

  10. Re:Bulls... since when will self driving cars have by Dagger2 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I don't know that. It should be perfectly possible to make a machine that can drive as well as, or better than, a human can. Have we managed to make that already? I don't know, but from the info Google have been publishing, it actually looks like we have, or are pretty damn close.

    Just because it's a machine doesn't automatically mean that it sucks at making decisions. Humans are machines too, and we let them drive.

  11. Re:Wait, can machines even walk yet? by IamTheRealMike · · Score: 2

    Yes they can walk

    So we're suppose to have machines driving vehicles some 80 years before they're smart? What idiot thought THAT was a good idea?

    Your realise machines are routinely put in charge of vehicles that travel at 600 mph and in which mistakes can cause disintegration of the machine, killing everyone on board? Yet they're much safer than the human pilots we keep around as psychological placebos.

  12. Re:Honest Thought by Jack+Griffin · · Score: 2

    I don't think that we'll ever become so densely populated that the world is one big city, but I'll bet that we'll see large high-rise condos become much much more common, and then it'll be a ride down an elevator to do your shopping and a walk or train ride to school.

    It's not that suburbia isn't awesome. It's just the direction I kind of envision things going in. I could be wrong. This sort of radical shift in urban planning would take centuries, to take hold in the west.

    This already exists in places like Hong Kong and Singapore, and is starting to take hold elsewhere. The exodus to the suburbs in the 60's is slowly being reversed as people appreciate the convenience of living close to amenities. Inner cities are being gentrified, more people are choosing apartment living, because convenience beats everything. Being within walking distance to everything means never having to worry about a car, self-driven or not.

  13. Re:A self driving taxi with a little knockout gas by dave420 · · Score: 2

    Just like now, with a taxi driver and a kosh. You are really, really clutching at straws. Seriously - you sound like you need help.

  14. Re:Bulls... since when will self driving cars have by burtosis · · Score: 2

    As someone who worked in a robotics lab for nearly 8 years and who knows the technology - no we are no where near being able to do as well as the worst humans comparing apples to apples. In 30-50 years we may have them until then maybe dedicated lanes on highways or something may be possible in 10-20 years.