Tesla Autopilot drove into Wile E. Coyote-style fake road wall in the middle of the road in a camera versus lidar test.
While most companies developing self-driving technologies have been using a mix of sensors (cameras, radar, lidar, and ultrasonic), Tesla insists on only using cameras.
The automaker removed radars from its vehicle lineup and even deactivated radars already installed in existing vehicles.
The strategy has yet to pay off as Tesla’s systems are still stuck at level 2 driver assist systems.
CEO Elon Musk claims that Tesla’s advantage is that once it solves autonomy, it will be able to scale faster than competitors because its vision plus neural net system is designed to work like a human driver and, therefore, will be able to adapt to any road.
Critics have pushed back against those claims, especially since Musk mentioned Tesla achieving “level 5 autonomy”, which means “in any conditions,” and cameras have limitations on that front that are fixed by lidar sensors.
A new video by engineering Youtuber Mark Rober
13 Comments
Mo3
Aside of all the other obvious reasons to not get a Tesla these days this is #1 imo. Camera feeds and a neural network are not enough for self driving, no matter how much they're training. Never ever.
mordymoop
I don’t live near a lot of Wild E. Coyote fake road walls. I get the sense it’s more of a Midwest thing.
anotherboffin
Oh but no worries, FSD is a “solved problem” and should be done in 18 months or so…
eldaisfish
Here is the original Mark Rober video – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IQJL3htsDyQ
I dislike the fact that Mark's videos appear to increasingly borrow from the Mr Beast style, which is very distracting. There's also the fact that half the video has nothing to do with cars in the first place.
The main result here is not surprising – Tesla's vehicles are plagued by a litany of poor engineering decisions, many at a fundamental level. Not using Lidar for depth detection is beyond stupid.
sitkack
We already knew this to be true by the clusters of Tesla fatalities around certain bay area off ramps.
desixavryn
I am a massive fan of Mark Roeper. Unfortunately he completely f**d up this one.
He tested using Autopilot, not the latest FSD on HW4, which is worlds apart in capabilities.
It is possible that the latest FSD would also crash, but that would be a valid test of FSD capabilities.
Testing using Autopilot and calling it "FSD crashes" is a HUGE misrepresentation of facts.
I am hoping Mark will post an update to the video.
deedubaya
Where can I buy the alternative lidar based car?
wnevets
Tesla also drives into tractor trailers because they think they're clouds
TrackerFF
But seriously, how much more would Tesla have to spend on each unit, if they were to include a LIDAR sensor? why not optical and LIDAR?
rocauc
I wonder how long until techniques like Depth Anything (https://depth-anything-v2.github.io/) provide parity with human depth perception. In Mark Rober's tests, I'm not sure even a human would have passed the fog scenario, however.
ricardobeat
Shouldn’t they have tested a human driver too? I have the feeling a majority of drivers would also go right through it if unaware of the setup, as it’s such an inconceivable scenario.
modeless
Adding to the weirdness of this video, it appears Mark Rober faked his footage to make it look like he was using a Google Pixel to record screen video, but he was actually using an iPhone as can be seen in the screen reflection. And he put the "G" logo in the wrong orientation in the faked shot.
Also it's weird that he's acting like he's so special for having seen the inside of Space Mountain as if it's some kind of secret. Millions have seen it all lit up. Back when the PeopleMover/Rocket Rods attractions were running it was a common sight, as the track ran through Space Mountain and sometimes it would be under maintenance with the lights on. And of course in emergency situations they turn the lights on as well.
Another one: he claims they use thin curtains to project ghosts on in the Haunted Mansion which is true, but while he's talking about it he shows footage of a part of the ride that uses Pepper's ghost which is a completely different (and more interesting) technique. Some of the ghosts shown while he is talking about it could not be achieved with the curtain method.
Come to think of it, Pepper's ghost could fool lidar. Maybe that's why he didn't talk about it even though it would have been more interesting. It would have been inconvenient for his sponsor. Someone setting up a reflective surface across a road is probably about as likely in the real world as a Wile E. Coyote-style fake road wall.
riehwvfbk
> The last scenario of a Wile E. Coyote-style wall with a fake road painted on it was obviously not realistic
…shows a photorealistic road on said wall. Last I checked, human drivers didn't have organs capable of LIDAR. Most would have crashed into this ridiculous obstacle.