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.
The video does bring up human ability too with the fog test (“Optically, with my own eyes, I can no longer see there’s a kid through this fog. The lidar has no issue.”) But, as they show, this wall is extremely obvious to the driver.
The tesla would lose its shit if it sees this
They already have trouble enough with trucks carrying traffic lights, or with speed limit stickers on them.
and fire trucks. and little kids. and, uh, lots of things really.
I have seen trucks with landscape scenes painted on the side and I’ve never crashed into one of those thinking that it was a portal to a random sunlit field.
see, that’s what you’re supposed to think. because you’re not special. but really, it’s a secret portal to a magical world, a world that’s very exciting for a few seconds.