this post was submitted on 16 Mar 2025
1724 points (99.2% liked)

Not The Onion

15098 readers
1138 users here now

Welcome

We're not The Onion! Not affiliated with them in any way! Not operated by them in any way! All the news here is real!

The Rules

Posts must be:

  1. Links to news stories from...
  2. ...credible sources, with...
  3. ...their original headlines, that...
  4. ...would make people who see the headline think, “That has got to be a story from The Onion, America’s Finest News Source.”

Please also avoid duplicates.

Comments and post content must abide by the server rules for Lemmy.world and generally abstain from trollish, bigoted, or otherwise disruptive behavior that makes this community less fun for everyone.

And that’s basically it!

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
 

Mark Rober just set up one of the most interesting self-driving tests of 2025, and he did it by imitating Looney Tunes. The former NASA engineer and current YouTube mad scientist recreated the classic gag where Wile E. Coyote paints a tunnel onto a wall to fool the Road Runner.

Only this time, the test subject wasn’t a cartoon bird… it was a self-driving Tesla Model Y.

The result? A full-speed, 40 MPH impact straight into the wall. Watch the video and tell us what you think!

(page 2) 50 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] [email protected] 142 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (12 children)
[–] [email protected] 109 points 3 days ago (29 children)

"But humans can do it with their eyes!" - says the man not selling a human brain to go with the optical sensors

load more comments (29 replies)
load more comments (11 replies)
[–] [email protected] 46 points 2 days ago (1 children)

This is like the crash on a San Francisco bridge that happened because of a Tesla that went into a tunnel and it wasn’t sure what to do since it went from bright daylight to darkness. In this case the Tesla just suddenly merged lanes and then immediately stopped and caused a multi car pile up.

[–] [email protected] 29 points 2 days ago (2 children)

You'd think they have cameras with higher dynamic range and faster auto exposure in their cars by now. Nope, still penny pinching.

[–] [email protected] 25 points 2 days ago (12 children)

If only elon hadn't insisted on not using lidar or anything other than just visible light cameras

load more comments (12 replies)
load more comments (1 replies)
[–] [email protected] 113 points 3 days ago (10 children)

I saw the video pop up in my Youtube recommended, but didn't bother watching because I just assumed that any cars tested would be using LIDAR and thus would ignore the fake road just fine. I had no idea Tesla a) was still using basic cameras for this and b) actually had sophisticated enough "self driving" capabilities that this could be tested on them safely.

[–] [email protected] 155 points 3 days ago (11 children)

They are not still using cameras but removed LIDAR and radar from their cars during the chip shortage 2020/21. The story they were telling was "humans don't have LIDAR but can drive cars as well, so the cars also only need 'eyes' like humans".

[–] [email protected] 101 points 3 days ago (6 children)

Humans cannot, in fact, drive cars well. Humans kill tens of thousands of other humans with cars every year in the US alone.

[–] [email protected] 84 points 3 days ago (16 children)

Yup, cameras and humans share various exploits. Self-driving is going to work better than humans once every car has it and communicates with each other, allowing for minimal gaps even at high speeds, once roads are all very standardized and in a database, and-

Wait, that's trains

Fucking build more electrified high-speed rail and forget tech bros' shitty promises

load more comments (16 replies)
load more comments (5 replies)
[–] Tar_alcaran 104 points 3 days ago (2 children)

And let me just add, Musk ordered the LIDAR removed against the engineers better judgement.

load more comments (2 replies)
load more comments (9 replies)
[–] [email protected] 64 points 3 days ago (1 children)

They tested a LiDAR rigged car, and it stopped just like you predicted. As of 2021, Tesla uses only cameras for FSD, and not even radar (which my stupid fine Toyota truck has).

They tested the idea safely by building the wall out of styrofoam, or at least that's what it looks like when it blows apart :)

load more comments (1 replies)
load more comments (8 replies)
[–] [email protected] 78 points 3 days ago

TIL Mark Rober is a domestic terrorist

[–] [email protected] 47 points 2 days ago (15 children)

There's a very simple solution to autonomous driving vehicles plowing into walls, cars, or people:

Congress will pass a law that makes NOBODY liable -- as long as a human wasn't involved in the decision making process during the incident.

This will be backed by car makers, software providers, and insurance companies, who will lobby hard for it. After all, no SINGLE person or company made the decision to swerve into oncoming traffic. Surely they can't be held liable. 🤷🏻‍♂️

Once that happens, Level 4 driving will come standard and likely be the default mode on most cars. Best of luck everyone else!

load more comments (15 replies)
[–] [email protected] 25 points 2 days ago
[–] [email protected] 38 points 2 days ago (2 children)
load more comments (2 replies)
[–] [email protected] 78 points 3 days ago (1 children)
load more comments (1 replies)
[–] [email protected] 12 points 2 days ago

Yep, I could see someone placing a billboard like that with a cliff behind it.

[–] [email protected] 39 points 3 days ago

To be fair, the roadrunner it was following somehow successfully ran into the painting.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 2 days ago (5 children)

Suddenly, there are more Yellow Brick Road murals everywhere.

load more comments (5 replies)
[–] [email protected] 25 points 2 days ago (2 children)

Mark Rober is about to be listed as FBI public enemy #1 :(

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] blackluster117 55 points 3 days ago (3 children)

Still think LIDAR is inferior to computer vision, Elon?

load more comments (3 replies)
load more comments
view more: ‹ prev next ›