Mind Matters Natural and Artificial Intelligence News and Analysis

TagLevels of autonomy (self-driving cars)

smart-cars-with-automatic-sensor-driving-on-metropolis-with-wireless-connection-stockpack-adobe-stock
Smart cars with automatic sensor driving on metropolis with wireless connection

Nissan Develops Autonomous Taxi Service in Japan

Nissan recently chose to advance their pursuit of an autonomous vehicle by developing a taxi service to work in limited locations

One of the quieter players in the development of autonomous technology over the last decade has been Nissan. They originally announced the development of their autonomous technology in 2013, claiming that it would be fully ready to bring to market by 2020.  While Nissan had a more realistic timeline than other companies touting autonomous development, it fell prey to the same failure to realize the actual complications that are inherent in truly autonomous scenarios. A graphic developed by Nissan in 2017 (shown below) shows the naïveté that was rampant during that time period. Nissan imagined that there were four stages to the development of autonomous vehicles— (1) single-lane highway, (2) multi-lane highway, (3) city driving, and then (4) full autonomy. The problem, as we have noted Read More ›

woman-passenger-sitting-in-the-backseat-and-selects-a-route-when-her-self-driving-car-rides-on-the-highway-stockpack-adobe-stock.jpg
Woman passenger sitting in the backseat and  selects a route when her self-driving car rides on the highway.

Tesla Continues to Walk Back Full Self-Driving Claims

In 2016, Tesla (TSLA) couldn’t tell enough people that its cars would soon drive themselves

In 2019, Tesla raised billions of dollars on the prospect of a fleet of a million robotaxis by the next year. However, starting on the Q3 2019 earnings call, CEO Elon Musk started walking back some of those claims. To begin with, in that earnings call, Musk started saying that “feature complete” really just meant that the “City Streets” version would be operable, not that it could actually drive without assistance. A year later, in regulatory filings with the California DMV, Tesla said, “As such, a final release of City Streets will continue to be an SAE Level 2, advanced driver-assistance feature.” In the accepted terminology around levels of self-driving, truly self-driving vehicles are classed as SAE Level 5. Level Read More ›

young-woman-traveling-in-self-driving-car-stockpack-adobe-stock.jpg
Young woman traveling in self driving car

#8 AI 2020 Smash Hit: Big Gains in Practical Self-Driving Cars

The people who have been pursuing Level Five self-driving are nowhere but Level Four is working well

Our Walter Bradley Center director Robert J. Marks is back with Jonathan Bartlett and Eric Holloway, explaining their choices for Top Ten real advances (“Smash Hits”) in AI in 2020. Readers may recall that we offered a fun series during the holidays about the oopses and ums and ers in the discipline (typically hyped by uncritical sources). Now it’s time to celebrate the real achievements and our nerds think that #8 is the big advances in practical self-driving cars, that is Level Four cars. The car industry defines five levels of self-driving. Level Five would be Elon Musk’s robotaxis that earn money all on their own while the owners’ sleep (hasn’t happened). Level Four is the practical approach, as Jonathan Read More ›

smart-car-autonomous-self-driving-concept-stockpack-adobe-stock.jpg
Smart car, Autonomous self-driving concept.

Daimler, Waymo, and GM Make Big Gains in Level 4 Self-Driving

GM has been given a permit to test five driverless cars on streets in San Francisco later this year

The Society for Automotive Engineering (SAE) has identified five levels of self-driving which describe how much a particular vehicle is able to handle its own driving tasks. Level 1 means that the vehicle handles either the speed or the steering, but not both, and it requires supervision. While ordinary cruise control technically falls into this level, most people associate cruise control with adaptive cruise control, which slows down or speeds up with traffic. A Level 2 car can control the speed and the steering but the driver must still maintain full vigilance. At Level 3, the driver need not maintain total vigilance but must still be able to take control upon request. Level 4 is “full self-driving” but limited to Read More ›

vehicle navigation system.jpg
Autopilot self-driving car system with no human intervention. Close up cropped image of hand of African male driver browsing the internet using smartphone and touchscreen in futuristic autonomous car

Self-Driving Cars: Waymo Beats Tesla By Picking the Right Target

Trying to get the human out of the loop, as Musk proposes, becomes increasingly costly as the complexity increases

Full self-driving has been a contentious topic in the last few years. In 2016, Elon Musk started claiming that his cars had all the hardware needed to do full self-driving, and that the software would be there by 2019. You would be able to summon a car from across the United States and it would drive across the country, recharging as needed, to pick you up, no driver needed. He has specifically indicated that he means Level 5 autonomy, which means that no driver is needed at all. The driver can sleep, watch a movie, or just hang out in the back seat. In fact, in 2016, he indicated that drivers were merely there for regulatory purposes. Musk’s claims about Read More ›