In the piece — titled “Can You Fool a Self Driving Car?” — Rober found that a Tesla car on Autopilot was fooled by a Wile E. Coyote-style wall painted to look like the road ahead of it, with the electric vehicle plowing right through it instead of stopping.

The footage was damning enough, with slow-motion clips showing the car not only crashing through the styrofoam wall but also a mannequin of a child. The Tesla was also fooled by simulated rain and fog.

  • Banana
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    412 days ago

    And the president is driving one of these?

    Maybe we should be purchasing lots of paint and cement blockades…

    • @LeninOnAPrayer@lemm.ee
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      2 days ago

      When he was in the Tesla asking if he should go for a ride I was screaming “Yes! Yes Mr. President! Please! Elon, show him full self driving on the interstate! Show him full self driving mode!”

    • @Chewget@lemm.ee
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      212 days ago

      The president can’t drive by law unless on the grounds of the White House and maybe Camp David. At least while in office. They might be allowed to drive after leaving office…

      • FuglyDuck
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        2 days ago

        This isn’t true at all. I can’t tell if you’re being serious or incredibly sarcastic, though.

        The reason presidents (and generally ex presidents, too) don’t drive themselves is because the kind of driving to escape an assassination attempt is a higher level of driving and training than what the vast majority of people ever have. There’s no law saying presidents are forbidden from driving.

        In any case, I would be perfectly happy if they let him drive a CT and it caught fire. I’d do a little jib, and I wouldn’t care who sees that.

        • @pseudo@jlai.lu
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          01 day ago

          I never that proud of a french president than when I read this comment 😎

          • FuglyDuck
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            72 days ago

            you’re gonna have to drop a source for that.

            because, no, they’re not. the Secret Service provides a driver specially trained for the risks a president might face, and very strongly insists, but they’re not “prohibited” from driving simply because they’re presidents.

            to be clear, the secret service cannot prohibit the president from doing anything they really want to do. Even if it’s totally stupid for them to do that. (This includes, for example, Trump’s routine weekend round of golf at Turd-o-Lardo)

            • @ITGuyLevi@programming.dev
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              124 hours ago

              You’re technically correct, there is no law prohibiting a current or former president from driving, but there is a policy preventing it and it is enforced by the secret service (who follow them around for the rest of their life). Many former presidents have gone on the record that the lose of their driving privileges really sucks (Bush 43, Clinton, and Obama have all discussed it on camera during various interviews). It’s been a policy since Kennedy was assassinated, lots of other policy changes too, but one was the no driving bit.

              Random sources: https://www.smh.com.au/world/us-presidents-can-have-everything--except-the-car-keys-20140506-zr5we.html

              https://www.cnbc.com/2017/06/28/presidents-arent-allowed-to-drive.html

              And one just about some times they drove anyway:

              https://www.motorbiscuit.com/3-u-s-presidents-got-around-no-driving-rule/

              • FuglyDuck
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                120 hours ago

                Policy can be changed. Quite easily.

                Especially by the president, when it’s about the president.

                Obama, Clinton, others, they don’t really lose their driving privileges. Effectively, they do, sure. But that’s because they’re not utter morons.

                Even trump has yet to prove himself that stupid. He probably is that stupid, but he likes the pomp and circumstance, don’t get me wrong.

                Other policies include screening people for firearms at rallies- trump over ruled that one, that day, too.

            • @alcoholicorn@lemmy.ml
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              1 day ago

              to be clear, the secret service cannot prohibit the president from doing anything they really want to do

              Was Trump lying when he said the SS wouldn’t take him back to the capital on Jan 6?

              I could definitely see him lying about that so he doesn’t look like he abandoned his supporters during the coup, but I could also see the driver being like “I can’t endanger you, mr president” and ignoring his requests.

              • FuglyDuck
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                41 day ago

                Was Trump lying when he said the SS wouldn’t take him back to the capital on Jan 6?

                Definitely not. There is no way in hell the secret service would have taken the president to that shit show. Doesn’t mean that they would have physically arrested him if he insisted going on his own, however.

      • @rumba@lemmy.zip
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        32 days ago

        The real question is, in a truly self-driving car, (not a tesla) are you actually driving?