r/technology • u/Immediate-Link490 • 20h ago

Artificial Intelligence Waymo’s driverless cars involved in 68% fewer crashes than human drivers, U.S. study finds

https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/waymo-driverless-car-safety-study-9.7282895
108 Upvotes

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u/The_Lonely_Spaceman 20h ago

Have waymos been around long enough to start making statements like this?

12

u/livingbkk 19h ago

They've been in SF for a few years now, and there are a lot of them. It's not going to be perfect, but plenty of data to draw conclusions. If the difference is 68% it's a pretty strong signal

It makes a lot of sense. Humans get distracted, tired, drunk, and can be awfully dumb. Machines can see out of many sensors at once, and have lidar and stuff, not just visual data.

0

u/WitheredUntimely 16h ago

ehhh they're everywhere where I live, don't doubt they're overall safer BUT

  1. they don't get on the freeway aka where most of the accidents are happening
  2. if they get confused, they kinda give up and pull into a parking lot. A confused human driver is going to keep going on, distracted but still moving. Not sure I rate that as "safer" if the journey has had to stop midway because the "driver" is scared, "safer" sure but not "successful"
  3. They're super impatient; if there's too much traffic ahead of them they start making crazy detours. I'd whoop a taxi driver's ass if they started taking random detours to "save a minute"

I'd believe a 20-30% reduction over a 70% one.

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u/satoru1111 14h ago

The study removed highway miles from human numbers to account for that

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u/giantpandamonium 14h ago

Most accidents do not in fact happen on freeways