Self-driving cars ii

[Dangerous Doug]

Anyone read the Dec/Jan Road&Track article "Man vs. Machine"? Pretty interesting piece pitting an Audi-prepared self-driving car against an Indycar driver (J.R. Hildebrand) on the Sonoma Infinion Raceway.

The cars are equally-equipped Audi RS7's, and they take full-speed comparison laps, man vs. machine. Riveting.

I'm not going to spoil the outcome. But, here's a thought from the article:

"A computer may be a safer driver than a human, bit if it glitches at 100mph, doe it have the capacity to experience terror?"

DD

[Dangerous Doug]

Jay Leno had the opportunity to drive the Audi RS7 against the self-driving version at Infineon Raceway in the latest Jay Leno's Garage. He beat the SDC by about 0.8 sec.

Read an article about Volvo also jumping into the SDC development fray. It also appears that Ford has opened a SDC development center here in Silicon Valley near Tesla's corporate offices.

The race is on for the lead in SDC development.

On the horse/buggy versus the automobile there was utility: more people could travel further and faster in an automobile. SDC's seem to be more about convenience than utility.

DD

[Buzz]

Originally Posted by Dangerous Doug

Jay Leno had the opportunity to drive the Audi RS7 against the self-driving version at Infineon Raceway in the latest Jay Leno's Garage. He beat the SDC by about 0.8 sec.
DD

Pretty darn amazing for a relatively fledgling technology, I'd say! Imagine when they get it ironed out!

Originally Posted by Dangerous Doug

On the horse/buggy versus the automobile there was utility: more people could travel further and faster in an automobile. SDC's seem to be more about convenience than utility.

DD

When you factor in networking and auto traffic control in heavy traffic areas, I would bet that the end goal is for more people to be able to travel safer, faster and more efficiently than they can now.

I'm sure horses used to beat on the rickety, wheezing, unreliable cars consistently in closed course races in the very early stages of their development; much to the satisfaction of new-technology skeptics back in the day.

[ct clint]

Might not b a bad idea been to a parking lot on a Sat lol. I've seen so crazy things full on right offs.

[Dangerous Doug]

Gleeful tech-skeptics beware: the cars driven by Jay Leno and J. R. Hildebrand were outfitted with GPS tracking systems that will undoubtedly provide data for the software engineers to improve the line of the self-driving car.

DD