Mercedes-Benz debuts turquoise exterior lights to indicate the car is self-driving | A visual indicator for other drivers::undefined
If we need warning lights for self driving cars, the technology is not ready.
Eh, it’s probably good to have regardless?
It’s less about being careful around the car and more about how you might interact with it. For example, honking the horn or flashing your beams wouldn’t have the same effect. On that note, it might be nice to have some way of telling a self driving car to temporarily use elevated sensors or something, the same way a horn tells a driver that something is wrong. As long as there’s a way to prevent abuse of the system
I don’t know much about these lights, but we COULD use some new standards in general with how many things have changed with cars in recent years. Brake lights on electric vehicles being another thing to consider.
That “gentle horn” everyone wants being another
“Gentle horn” sounds like a 80s romantic pop song.
Here you go
A markedly less successful ripoff of Tubular Bells
You’re still the driver in the self-driving car. If someone honks, you have pedals and a wheel in front of you. It always comes down to driver neglect. It’s like blaming the cruise control for speeding, but giving cruise control more responsibilities.
The standard should endure past this stage. It’s not necessary now, but it would be good to start getting used to some kind of a symbol now
Eventually when cars move past this stage, then we’ll need it
Today, sure.
But in 20-50 years, switching to manual driving may be a whole process. It may even be illegal in a full self driving car. In an environment of mixed automated and manual driving, having indicator lights for the autos makes a lot of sense.
As a Level 3 system, the driver is permitted to take their hands off the wheel, their feet off the pedals, and divert their attention away from the road. […]
The turquoise markers will alert other drivers to the fact that your vehicle is driving itself, so hopefully they won’t be alarmed if they see you doing other things while behind the wheel.
Okay that is the first argument for it I’ve read that actually makes sense
To play the devil’s advocate: early cars needed a guy with a flag im front of them because people were used to horses and carriages and not automobiles. After a while that stopped being a thing.
But yeah, self driving cars are not really ready.
Id argue that motorized carriages back then werent ready for the public.
warning lights
Lol, this is like calling the turn signals warning lights. Letting others know something about your driving isn’t a warning, it’s just an indicator.
If we need signs saying student driver, the driver is not ready
If we need signs saying “Baby on Board”, the driver isn’t ready
There are warning signs to indicate people learning to drive in ex-Soviet countries (such yellow triangles to put behind the glass), even though they are driving with an instructor.
Now when I think about it, it’s been some time since I’ve seen that sign.
Somewhat similarly in the Netherlands, in case you fail your practical driving exam three times you still get a license but you can only drive cars marked with special yellow number plates.
Omg that’s gotta be embarrassing lol
All cars in NL have yellow plates. The guy before you made a joke.
They’re pretty common in the US as well, but it’s just a sign that says “student driver”.
I’ve also seen orange triangles used in vehicles like horse-drawn carriages that can’t go as fast as regular traffic, mostly in connection to Amish people.
The technology will never be ready if you don’t test it.
And I would argue we DON’T need warning lights since, while imperfect, most self-driving tech is already vastly better than your average driver. We should have warning lights for cars that DON’T have self-driving.
This is ultimately why we will NEVER have self-driving cars en masse, because society isn’t willing to take the necessary risks to improve the safety of everyone on the road.
How about we:
- Don’t let random customers test it and instead use heavily trained, specialized test drivers
- Require permitting and, e.g., an obstacle course before letting a company’s software be randomly updated and thrown on the road?
Why is there this constant false dichotomy implying that the only way to test self driving cars is a wild west of no regulation?
And also who said that self driving cars are safer than humans? Tesla’s numbers are all statistical lies (in fact Teslas were recently shown to have the most accidents), Cruise just shutdown in SF because they were a liability, and Waymo is heavily limited in its time/weather/areas for driving.
Don’t let random customers test it and instead use heavily trained, specialized test drivers
At some point you need to test it on a large scale. Cruise was even running small-scale and was shut down in short order.
Require permitting and, e.g., an obstacle course before letting a company’s software be randomly updated and thrown on the road?
We do.
Why is there this constant false dichotomy implying that the only way to test self driving cars is a wild west of no regulation?
There isn’t.
And also who said that self driving cars are safer than humans?
…everyone?
https://arstechnica.com/cars/2023/12/human-drivers-crash-a-lot-more-than-waymos-software-data-shows/
Tesla’s numbers are all statistical lies (in fact Teslas were recently shown to have the most accidents)
[Citation needed]
Cruise just shutdown in SF because they were a liability
This is actually a great example of exactly what I’m talking about: GM will shut down Cruise permanently because they’ve discovered what I just said: society has zero tolerance for literally anyone getting hurt by autonomous vehicles, whereas the tens of thousands of people who are killed on our roads every year by individuals is considered acceptable.
The teslas having the most crashes I did see pass by on my news feed too. It doesn’t mean that because teslas have self driving and teslas crash the most that this means the self driving tech is the reason for it though. Correlation does not imply causation.
You literally just presented that false dichotomy in a previous comment. Don’t try to gaslight us.
Sure. But we’re jumping into the deep end by legally allowing the driver to be exempt from distracted driving laws. There’s a big difference between testing the technology and relying on the technology.
Well, theirs probably isn’t.
🤦
if we need warning lights for ANYTHING, the humanity is just not ready.
One could argue that brake lights are a warning light 🤔.
Turn signals are literally called warning lights in my language.
No, they literally are warning lights, warning you the car is slowing down. It has no other purpose than to provide information (warning) to others about what you are doing.
Best keep away from rail crossings then.
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So we aren’t ready for anything. Got it. 🚨🚦🚒🚑🚓🚧
Same purpose as warning labels: to keep ding dongs alive so they can spend more money
Jesus Christ that’s the most pointlessly cynical thing I’ve read in a long time.
That’s actually a fantastic idea
Aye, credit where it’s due; this is a great way to differentiate between human and machine controlled devices. It’s detectable by both, and can help in cases where people blame the autodrive, or car companies claim human error.
tells me what cars i need to be extra careful around.
yes i know people are horrible at driving, but at least the average person is predictable.
Rule #1: constant foresight and respect to other drivers
Rule #2: Expect mistakes, illegal u-turns, and people taking right of way
I for one would like to know when another car isn’t being driven by a human.
Eventually the reverse will be equally important. So this will be a good idea for decades at least.
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because the’re mostly tested under extremely safe conditions, and current self driving regularly asks you to take back over (you also have to still pay attention and have your hands on the wheel) which makes it level 2. by definition, the human is driving.
I’ll just stick some turquoise lights on my car
Good idea I think, but these could be mistaken for reversing lights
On that note, can we talk about how shit a lot of reverse lights are? In addition to indicating that you’re backing up, they’re also supposed to function as a sort of rear-facing headlight so you can see what your backing up towards, but their size, placement, and brightness on a lot of cars makes them pretty much useless for that in a lot of cases.
I’m not saying they need to be as bright as your regular headlights, that would be serious overkill, but they should probably be noticeably brighter than a turquoise self-driving indicator light would ever need to be.
Found Alec’s Lemmy account
Whacking on the hazard lights can be helpful when reversing, for light.
Maybe light placement is more important?
How about next to the brake lights?
Turquoise is also a shade of blue so I think that may make them illegal in the US since blue lights are only legal on emergency vehicles.
Bruh, the whole article is about the fact that they got permits for them
Fair enough… It didn’t really seem interesting enough to actually read the article but that answers that.
Even if this would be a good idea, you can’t just put some non regulated lights on a car. This would need a law change in Germany to be approved and would probably take years of burocrazy until she get beards figured out the exact hue these lights need to emit. But I guess Mercedes already wrote that law for our government to copy. How convenient.
Since it’s Mercedes-Benz doing it, they’ll just write the new law themselves and tell the German minister of traffic to push it through.
I dont understand, does benz have leverage in the german government?
Yes, the German economy still heavily relies on the car industry.
And it’s not just leverage, they literally employ “consultants” (lobbyists) who draft bills which are then introduced into the legislative process and voted on by members of parlament who have neither the time nor the technical know-how to understand them. German car makers effectively write their own regulations.It’s a bit of a meme because german politics is so heavily lobbied by our car industry.
But I guess Mercedes already wrote that law for our government to copy. How convenient.
How dare a company try to work with governments to create a new safety feature!
How is this a safety feature though? Are they saying we have to be extra careful around self-driving cars? If so then the car shouldn’t be considered to be self-driving. If not, then what’s the use?
I see a lot of people in this thread saying a car that needs any kind of indication of self-driving isn’t safe enough to be on the road, but that implies a single answer to questions like “is it safe enough?” In reality, different people will answer that question differently and their answer will change over time. I see it as a good thing to try to accommodate people who view self-driving cars as unsafe even when they are street-legal. So it’s not really a safety feature from all perspectives, but it is from the perspective of people who want to be extra cautious around those cars.
Personally I see an argument for self-driving cars that aren’t as safe as a average human driver. It’s basically the same reason you sometimes see cars with warning signs about student drivers: we wouldn’t consider student drivers safe enough to drive except that it’s a necessary part of producing safe drivers. Self-driving cars are the same, except that instead of individual drivers, its self-driving technology that we expect to improve and eventually become safer than human drivers.
Another way to to look at it is that there are a lot of drivers who are below-average in their driving safety for a variety of reasons, but we still consider them safe enough to drive. Think of people who are tired, emotional, distracted, ill, etc. It would be nice to have the same warning lights for those drivers, but since that’s not practical, having them only for self-driving cars is better than nothing.
Different regulations apply for the driver when the car is autonomous vs controlled by a driver.
These lights do not indicate driving assists like Tesla’s autopilot but full level 3 and above autonomy. In level 3 for example, Mercedes is responsible for any damages due to accidents - not the driver.
Also in level 3 the driver may legally use their phone, which is illegal for a car driver normally and give them a ticket.
So there IS a legal requirement to find out about the autonomy level of a car from outside.
Either way, it’s a useful starting point for the conversation to be had I guess.
Better for some proactivity then nobody ever progressing anything, right?
So should companies not try to innovate or invent things until the German government tells them it’s ok?
The point is that innovation should always come with regulations. This is not the wild west over here. We like to be alive and companies usually don’t care about that but only care about profits. So it’s a good idea that they can’t just do whatever they want. If they invent something actually new I’m quite happy that a third party will have a look at it before it’s mounted to a vehicle that kills me. I know that in the us this is handled the other way around but I guess the statistics for car accidents agrees with me.
If Mercedes only cared about profits why would they be putting this light on their cars?
No law change needed, the StZVO is a mere decree. Also EU law takes precedence Mercedes probably isn’t even going to bother getting it through German bureaucracy but will go straight to Brussels.
Ever see neons?
Not on German roads certainly not.
I’ve heard a lot about how Germans are strict with their driving laws, but I never expected them to be straight boring for no good reason.
It’s about traffic safety. Also rest assured German tuners have plenty of fun overtaking stock Porsches with their tuned Golfs on the Autobahn.
Yeah I suppose neon lights is marginally less safe than chugging my drink too fast.
They are illegal in most European countires
Gosh how could the world function without legislature having long sessions to decide which color some safety lights should emit.
Seems like a bad idea - you know someone is going to figure out how to take advantage of that.
- Scofflaw - ai has no pride or ego so I can cut them off at will and they will always back down
- scammer - manufacturer has deep pockets - where’s my neck brace?
I’m sorry, but I can’t actually imagine that happening where I live.
Do people who cut others off care who’s driving?He’s referring to a group of people they intentionally cut others off and slam on the brakes to induce an accident that they can sue over. And it happens a lot. Dash cams are saviors.
I sure don’t
I’m sure some people take age, gender, and/or race into consideration when deciding who they can cut off
You might be giving them too much credit for thinking about what they’re doing.
Or you might be underestimating the lengths racists would go to just to inconvenience someone who looks like a foreigner
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Scofflaw - Why does the person in the self-driving car care? They’re just chilling. Zooming ahead of other cars doesn’t get you more than a few minutes ahead. If that’s really important to you, you should have left your house a few minutes earlier.
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Scammer - These cars are covered in cameras and radars. These are the opposite of the cars you want to jump in front of (except Tesla, which sucks). They’ll probably just film you launching yourself from the curb and stop before they hit you. I guess you can get on America’s Funniest Home Videos?
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Do the same thing, but hook it up to a camera that detects if your eyes are on the road lol.
Most FSD cars have that. People just ignore the warnings and popups.
The car should pull over then. Lol
Should, but when has that ever stopped businesses from doing what is cheap/easy?
My aftermarket Openpilot setup does this with a camera pointed at the driver. I’m good about paying attention but apparently if it alerts too many times that you’re distracted it will disable itself until you restart the car.
The reason for these lights is that Mercedes has Level 3 autonomy, so the car can self drive without the driver taking attention - for example here in Germany it is illegal (and there are photo traps) to use your phone on while driving. The lights are a solution to the exemption that you are allowed to use your phone while your car is on Level 3 autonomy.
On level 3 you need to be able to take over again within 30 seconds after the car actively asks you to do so.
30 seconds is a LOT of time.
Yeah that last bit. That’s unacceptable for at least another decade. Drivers should be responsible for their vehicles at all times.
Brb, wiring up a set of these so I can blame the car for missing a speed sign
Wow I’ve been thinking about that for a while now. We should be able to tell when someone is driving or an Ai is.
Just seeing a turn signal on a Mercedes or BMW is enough for me to assume the driver isn’t the one in control.
This could be useful as a communication medium where the car transmits data through the light to the neighbours.
If only there was some kind of universal communication technology that didn’t require line of sight, worked over distances out to say 100m and was reasonably inexpensive to implement…then we wouldn’t need to communicate using the modern equivalent of semaphore.
dang, maybe something related with electricity and this crazy magnets we have?
Magnets? How do they work?
But what about the IOT? The 5G! Connect all the things!
Watch this turn into a status thing that starts trending.
Blue bubbles?
And I live in California. Of course we’re going to help rich people avoid all consequences of their actions. Because paying attention to where your 1 ton metal missile is going is too much to ask. But only if you can afford the turquoise lights.
I don’t think I understand how adding safety indicators to elevate awareness of self driving vehicles helps rich people avoid all consequence.
As a poor person, I’d like to know if a car I’m driving by is self driving.
Mercedes is a luxury brand. And as the article states, in California and Nevada drivers will get a legal pass on distracted driving if the system and lights are on.
So the drivers of these luxury cars are no longer responsible for what the car does.
The article says they are allowed to test the new indicators in those States, not that they get a legal pass…
In California, the permit will let Mercedes-Benz trial turquoise lights on test vehicles for two years. In Nevada, the automaker can start adding the feature to 2026 year production vehicles
Do you think it’s a better scenario for less awareness of self driving cars? If self driving is part of the future, this seems like a reasonable step imo.
Go read the article again then. There’s a whole section about distracted driving.
Ive read those 7 paragraphs a couple times now, and I don’t see anything about getting a legal pass. Maybe you could quote it for me?
I have missed things due to ads covering things up on mobile on the past.
As a Level 3 system, the driver is permitted to take their hands off the wheel, their feet off the pedals, and divert their attention away from the road. Most other driving systems require you to keep your hands on the wheel and pay attention. With Drive Pilot engaged, users are free to browse the Internet or watch videos on the vehicle’s central display.
To be fair I’ve had that happen with ads too and it’s infuriating.
That isn’t at all what you were saying buddy
I think it would be also cool to have an indicator if the car in front of you has cruise control on
That would be great for the driver himself. The amount of times I’ve had to play leap frogs with someone only to be given a dirty look when hes the one that constantly slows down and accelerates.
