Self driving buses, trains, trucks etc

magicbastarder

'my phone can't understand my voice, therefore self drive cars cannot work'.

have you given up debating, and are just making up nonsense now? whatever legitimate argument you're trying to make, you're doing a gross disservice to it.

devnull

Stephen15 wrote: »

Why is everyone here so pro driverless vehicles at the end of the day thousands of people are going to be left unemployed and mostly working class people who have no other formal qualifications other their trade or indeed their driving licence. These people are our truck drivers, taxi drivers, train drivers, chauffeurs, bus drivers and our mehanics all these will more than likely join the dole queue why is everyone so anti the people I mentioned are they not entitled to make a living for what they do and do well.

Times change and progress is made and the workforce has to change to take account of that, there are people who used to work as book binders and also worked in telephone exchanges, manually connecting all calls because of the fact there was no automation.

If it wasn't for progress and using machines and automation to do things that were previously done manually you wouldn't be typing your message right now on an internet message board beause the internet wouldn't exist and we'd all be using pen and paper to keep all the postmen in a job.

Since society began there have always been jobs which have been replaced by machines, this is not something new it's been going on since time begun, things progress and it means some jobs are no longer in high demand and other jobs are created.

We'd also have conductors on every bus and we'd have someone writing out a ticket for every passenger that comes on we'd have no ticket machines at train stations because we're doing ticket staff out of a job, we'd have no barriers as we're doing station staff out of a job, we'd have no internet sites as we're doing customer service clerks out of a job and we'd have no online banking, because we'd be doing bank clerks out of a job etc. It can go on and on.

Stephen15

devnull wrote: »

Times change and progress is made and the workforce has to change to take account of that, there are people who used to work as book binders and also worked in telephone exchanges, manually connecting all calls because of the fact there was no automation.

If it wasn't for progress and using machines and automation to do things that were previously done manually you wouldn't be typing your message right now on an internet message board beause the internet wouldn't exist and we'd all be using pen and paper to keep all the postmen in a job.

Since society began there have always been jobs which have been replaced by machines, this is not something new it's been going on since time begun, things progress and it means some jobs are no longer in high demand and other jobs are created.

We'd also have conductors on every bus and we'd have someone writing out a ticket for every passenger that comes on we'd have no ticket machines at train stations because we're doing ticket staff out of a job, we'd have no barriers as we're doing station staff out of a job, we'd have no internet sites as we're doing customer service clerks out of a job and we'd have no online banking, because we'd be doing bank clerks out of a job etc. It can go on and on.

Before it was niche jobs being done away with such as switchboard operators and book binders but now it is a very broad group of people who drive or work with vehicles in their current form its a long list of people that would make millions worldwide and ten of thousands nationally.

As regards to what you said about bus conductors the truth is they should be done away with now with leap cards when everyone was paying in cash to the driver ten years they would have come in handy. It wasn't technology that got rid of them it was cutbacks.

eeguy

Stephen15 wrote: »

And who are controlling the technology behind these autonomous humans. Technology can only be as itelligent as the humans who create it all humans make errors no matter how inteligent they are. There is no such thing as AI as humans are behind it so it is not artificial intelligence, electronic itelligence would be a more accurate name for it.

This isn't true anymore. If you look at the recent AI that beat theGo masters, the AI used strategies that no human has ever used before.
It wasn't programmed in. The AI learned it by playing millions of games with itself.

Stephen15 wrote: »

Why is everyone here so pro driverless vehicles at the end of the day thousands of people are going to be left unemployed and mostly working class people who have no other formal qualifications other their trade or indeed their driving licence. These people are our truck drivers, taxi drivers, train drivers, chauffeurs, bus drivers and our mehanics all these will more than likely join the dole queue why is everyone so anti the people I mentioned are they not entitled to make a living for what they do and do well.

The way technology is going or the way some people here think it is will just replace all mehanical jobs. This will only end up leading to a working class revolt.

It's the way of the world now that people are required to keep learning.
40 years ago you were snapped up by an bank or the civil service if you had a leaving cert. Now you'd be hard pressed to get a job in McDonalds with it.

If your job is routine or procedural then it'll be automated within 20 years.

Stephen15

eeguy wrote: »

It's the way of the world now that people are required to keep learning.
40 years ago you were snapped up by an bank or the civil service if you had a leaving cert. Now you'd be hard pressed to get a job in McDonalds with it.

If your job is routine or procedural then it'll be automated within 20 years.

So according to you most of the country who aren't tech wizkids like yourself are going to be out of work in 20 years time. The majority of jobs are routine and procedural so most will be on the dole in 20 years time if they have no other qualifications.

The world is currently in the best way it has been for a long. I believe there should be progression but only to keep us where we are currently ie reduce our carbon footprint improve healthcare to eliminate certain illnesses so people will live longer, make the world more substainable. I fail to how complete automation will do any of the above.

jackofalltrades

It's very easy to criticise human pilots for failing at a job that a computer can't do.

the_syco

bk wrote: »

Sure, I agree on the first point, but on the later point, nothing stopping freight companies from using rail today, yet rail freight continues to be less then 1% of all freight carried in Ireland today.

The reality is even having a driver in the cab today is quiet a good bit cheaper then rail freight in Ireland for a variety of reasons.

Road freight companies would be looking to reduce this cost even further from their already lower cost base.

Another strong possibility is remotely operated trucks. A "driver" sitting in an office somewhere, remotely controls the truck when it is in the docks, remotely drives it out through the city onto the motorway and then leaves it go into self driving mode until it hits the next city where he takes over control again. Obviously the one remote driver would be switching between multiple trucks.

The way I see it is that major roads will become the railways; you join the motorway, and your truck goes into a lane at the maximum economical safe speed, and you stay in that lane until you get to the destination that you selected. Likewise with cars. Cheaper than laying down physical track, and it allows cars to use the other lanes. This could also minimize accidents on major roads.

eeguy

Stephen15 wrote: »

So according to you most of the country who aren't tech wizkids like yourself are going to be out of work in 20 years time. The majority of jobs are routine and procedural so most will be on the dole in 20 years time if they have no other qualifications.

The world is currently in the best way it has been for a long. I believe there should be progression but only to keep us where we are currently ie reduce our carbon footprint improve healthcare to eliminate certain illnesses so people will live longer, make the world more substainable. I fail to how complete automation will do any of the above.

Not according to me. According to anyone who deals with the topic.
https://www.google.ie/amp/bigthink.com/philip-perry/47-of-jobs-in-the-next-25-years-will-disappear-according-to-oxford-university.amp

mickoneill31

This article is interesting in relation to driverless vehicles putting people out of jobs.
http://www.economicshelp.org/blog/6717/economics/the-luddite-fallacy/

According to that, every advance so far hasn't caused unemployment numbers to grow. I suppose if you don't change skills (e.g. miners in the last 30 years) and your job goes away you will be unemployed but other jobs spring up to replace them. Thats obviously of no use to the miner that only knows how to mine.

In my lifetime, when I was a kid my dad used to come home telling me that computers were putting people out of jobs. And they were but the jobs that have sprung up since then hugely outnumber the jobs that were lost and have made a huge impact on how we live our lives. It was probably the same of the industrial revolution (I wasn't around then) and whatever other major advances have been in between.

I've some small idea of the efficiencies that driverless vehicles will bring but I'd imagine that we've only scratched the surface and in 20 years we will be doing stuff that we had no idea was viable or possible today.

mickoneill31

Stephen15 wrote: »

The world is currently in the best way it has been for a long. I believe there should be progression but only to keep us where we are currently

I'd say if you'd said that 10 or 20 or 30 ...... or 100 years ago (well maybe not exactly 100 with the war) it would have been an argument that some people would have believed. And I'd say in 20 years from now you could use the same argument.

That's not the way the world works though. If any country or bloc thought like that, they'd be left behind or more reliant on the countries that were advancing.

Stephen15

mickoneill31 wrote: »

This article is interesting in relation to driverless vehicles putting people out of jobs.
http://www.economicshelp.org/blog/6717/economics/the-luddite-fallacy/

According to that, every advance so far hasn't caused unemployment numbers to grow. I suppose if you don't change skills (e.g. miners in the last 30 years) and your job goes away you will be unemployed but other jobs spring up to replace them. Thats obviously of no use to the miner that only knows how to mine.

You see most people who do these jobs are not tech literate. I personally haven't a clue about computers or how they the only thing I know about computers is how to use the internet I don't know anything about coding for example and have no interest in learning as it bore the hell out of me and no for fact it would bore the hell out of a lot of people. Its grand if you have been taught it from when you were 5 years old but most haven't and many would struggle to learn.

The way we seem to want to go is have all jobs that are somewhat involve physical labour replaced by tech jobs.

fly_agaric

mickoneill31 wrote: »

This article is interesting in relation to driverless vehicles putting people out of jobs.
http://www.economicshelp.org/blog/6717/economics/the-luddite-fallacy/

According to that, every advance so far hasn't caused unemployment numbers to grow. I suppose if you don't change skills (e.g. miners in the last 30 years) and your job goes away you will be unemployed but other jobs spring up to replace them. Thats obviously of no use to the miner that only knows how to mine.

Have said this before on another thread about it, but I think what is happening now is a bit different and people are right to be somewhat nervous of it. Before, most improvements in technology were a multiplier of effort. Take a tunnelling machine. I'm not an expert, but these machines must replace effort of hundreds if not thousands of labourers with shovels, picks (or even excavators, powered drills + explosives if you want to be less archaic) and destroys their jobs. You still need the people operating the machine, the people maintaining the machine etc, as well as all the other people overseeing the tunnelling project.

Reasonably good ai that can be applied to automate alot of the human reasoning/decision tasks in combination with sensors, and robotics to observe and then take action in the world (things which are all starting to come together in the area self-driving vehicles) can take humans out of the loop for a class of work; not just replace/multiply human physical effort and then shift human input more to the "thinking"/"directing" side of the job.

There will be new jobs related to developing and then maintaining these systems, and there could even be more "people-person"/human interaction type jobs such as sales/marketing/customer support but I just can't see how these will add up to equal the jobs lost due to automation.

One other poster said about why people would be "happy" about this? I think the advance of this technology is a good thing in itself, which is why I find it hard to take a luddite view of it.
It should be liberating, but with the political and economic systems we have it has a good chance of generating misery if not handled correctly and I don't have much faith in governments in this. The companies who are the driver behind most of this feel it is not their job to worry about all that (at least the big US technology companies anyway - the Chinese ones working in similar areas will be reigned in very quickly if the Communist party does not approve of their efforts). The companies just know that there will be a large amount of profit available for the winners, and don't want to be destroyed by competitors who get to take advantage of the technologies before them.

plodder

Stephen15 wrote: »

And who are controlling the technology behind these autonomous humans. Technology can only be as itelligent as the humans who create it all humans make errors no matter how inteligent they are. There is no such thing as AI as humans are behind it so it is not artificial intelligence, electronic itelligence would be a more accurate name for it.

Why is everyone here so pro driverless vehicles at the end of the day thousands of people are going to be left unemployed and mostly working class people who have no other formal qualifications other their trade or indeed their driving licence. These people are our truck drivers, taxi drivers, train drivers, chauffeurs, bus drivers and our mehanics all these will more than likely join the dole queue why is everyone so anti the people I mentioned are they not entitled to make a living for what they do and do well.

The way technology is going or the way some people here think it is will just replace all mehanical jobs. This will only end up leading to a working class revolt.

My OH is a professional translator. I'd say it's more likely her job will be made redundant before the jobs you mention above will be. google translate and other systems do a passable (or vaguely understandable) job now, and certain kinds of casual work she might have got in the past are probably already gone.

A lot of people believe that whole swathes of middle class professional jobs will go the same way. So, we're all in this together. Better to be talking about how society needs to adapt to this reality, because it is a reality, rather than making futile efforts to stop it.

bk

magicbastarder wrote: »

anyway, back to the human factor in the technology - one thing i was mulling over was, if this *does* lead to a drop in private car ownership and a greater takeup of car pooling (not in the 'let's all share a car together' sense, but the 'i'll use a car someone else finished using 30 minutes ago' sense); will this lead to a reduction in car sizes in urban areas?

most people buy five seaters for the 10% of times they might have people sitting in the back - but if it's just one person needing to get from stoneybatter to merrion square, why would a car pool company not maintain a fleet of single seaters for this purpose?

Yes, that is exactly what is expected to happen and the motor industry is very concerned about it. Their modelling shows that once full self driving cars become available, there will be a big initial increase in car sales to build out fleets of vehicles for car pooling. But then it will lead to a massive, long term slump in sales.

It is expected that the car pooling companies will keep cars longer, buy cheaper models and brand them as their own and will maintain them with their own mechanics rather then using expensive car dealership mechanics.

This is why traditional car companies have been slow to develop this tech, it will hurt them. This is why it really has been tech companies like Google, Uber and Tesla pushing it instead. However the car industry has now realised that it is coming if they like it or not and they are investing in car rental services like Lyft, MyTaxi, etc.

prinzeugen wrote: »

trucks will still need to be diesel powered, and at the end of the day they would be banned from college green anyway!

No they don't! Tesla are about to announce a fully EV semi truck in just a few weeks time. Other companies are working on it too.

prinzeugen wrote: »

How would AI handle all 4 engines going on a 747?? Reboot while the plane plunges?

Would AI know about a closed airfield?

Would AI be able to glide a plane to flattish strip and land?

One thing to keep in mind, is that currently a world wide network of satellites is currently being built to allow aircrafts to constantly stay connected to the ground. Both for inflight wifi, but also to leave the ground know the position of the aircraft at all times (due to Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, to stop it from happening again).

It would be possible that such satellites systems would allow pilots at bases on the ground to take control of the aircraft if needed.

In fact drone aircraft used by various militaries around the world are already flying millions of hours per year in both fully autonomous and hybrid ground control mode.

Interesting to note that these aircraft have had significantly less accidents per flight hours flown then similar manned aircraft.

magicbastarder wrote: »

again, trying to get this back on track - would be interested to know how many trucks are delivering a complete (20KG? is a 50 ton truck full of gravel the archetypal maximum?) load from A to B, and the full load being onloaded at A, and fully offloaded at B. loads where there's a string of deliveries from a loaded truck would imply someone to manage the load, i guess? e.g. last time i had a truck come to the house, it was a mattress delivery, which required two people - not something which could be skimped on, even if the truck drove itself.

in short - how many truck journeys don't require someone to oversee what's taken off the truck?

Good question, most trucks don't. Think of all those containers that come in off ships and are loaded onto backs of trucks. BTW the biggest ports already use fully unmanned systems to do this and then these trucks drive to various factories or warehouses.

The next biggest category are trucks that go from big warehouses to various shops (e.g. supermarkets) every day. They are usually loaded and unloaded by staff at either end.

You example of two guys delivering a mattress is overall pretty niche and would continue to need people to unload. However the container that contained those mattresses that came off a ship from China, was loaded on the back of a truck and then brought to a local warehouse, doesn't require a driver.

Stephen15 wrote: »

Before it was niche jobs being done away with such as switchboard operators and book binders but now it is a very broad group of people who drive or work with vehicles in their current form its a long list of people that would make millions worldwide and ten of thousands nationally.

There was nothing niche about those jobs! Offices use to be full of literally hundreds of typing pool staff, all replaced by computers now.

Typist use to be one of the biggest employers in the past. Completely gone now.

LeinsterDub

plodder wrote: »

My OH is a professional translator. I'd say it's more likely her job will be made redundant before the jobs you mention above will be. .

Translation is actually one of the things computers really struggle with. Google translate actually does a fairly poor job all it does is match words. Put a some text into Google translate, translate it into a different language and translate it back to English and generally you'll get nonsense

niallb

Unfortunately, if an employer runs a text for translation through Google first, the human being turning it into good quality language is now paid as an editor rather than as a translator.

LeinsterDub

niallb wrote: »

Unfortunately, if an employer runs a text for translation through Google first, the human being turning it into good quality language is now paid as an editor rather than as a translator.

I don't know anyone using Google for serious translation.

niallb

Nobody serious would currently use Google specifically.
I used the term from the previous post to make the point that partial translation by computer which still requires a native speaker to polish could very soon be considered a copy editing job rather than a professional translation job.

niallb

niallb wrote: »

Nobody serious would currently use Google specifically.
I used the term from the previous post to make the point that partial translation by computer which still requires a native speaker to polish could very soon be considered a copy editing job rather than a professional translation job.

Maybe, but that place wouldn't be in business for long as that's an INCREDIBLY inefficient way to do it.

In fact it's the most inefficient way.

magicbastarder

LeinsterDub wrote: »

I don't know anyone using Google for serious translation.

yet.

plodder

LeinsterDub wrote: »

Translation is actually one of the things computers really struggle with. Google translate actually does a fairly poor job all it does is match words. Put a some text into Google translate, translate it into a different language and translate it back to English and generally you'll get nonsense

It does a better job than that. It uses google's own massive data sets to match entire phrases. It also has a feedback mechanism where you can suggest better translations. Sure, translating from A to B and back to A is not going to give a good result. And I agree it's not going to be used for serious professional translation, but some of the work that professional translators get would be more casual stuff that doesn't really need professional level expertise.

jackofalltrades

bk wrote: »

One thing to keep in mind, is that currently a world wide network of satellites is currently being built to allow aircrafts to constantly stay connected to the ground. Both for inflight wifi, but also to leave the ground know the position of the aircraft at all times (due to Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, to stop it from happening again).

It would be possible that such satellites systems would allow pilots at bases on the ground to take control of the aircraft if needed.

Not to go OT but satellite links can be very fragile, you really wouldn't want to be relying on one it an emergency.
That and I don't know how much use pilots on the ground would be.
You'd need a whole load of pilots sitting around on the ground waiting for a problem.
These bored out of their heads pilots would then have to try and resolve the issue using limited sensors.
If you want self-flying planes you're going to need an AI that's on par with a human for solving problems and being creative.
You'd also need to invent a machine that can smell like a human.

Interesting to note that these aircraft have had significantly less accidents per flight hours flown then similar manned aircraft.

What's you source for the above?

bk

niallb wrote: »

Nobody serious would currently use Google specifically.
I used the term from the previous post to make the point that partial translation by computer which still requires a native speaker to polish could very soon be considered a copy editing job rather than a professional translation job.

I use to actually develop systems that do this, like 15 years ago!

It is called translation memory and has already had a big impact on the translation industry. You break down a document at the sentence level and then compare it to translation memory databases of previously translated documents to look for matches, either exact matches or close matches.

It wouldn't be unusual for us even back then to get 90% of a document translated in this way. Now you would still need a translator to review the document and fix the 10%, however doing this was much quicker then a full translation and cost much less.

At this stage, this is very common in the localisation industry.

seamus

jackofalltrades wrote: »

Not to go OT but satellite links can be very fragile, you really wouldn't want to be relying on one it an emergency.

Satellite links are about the most stable you can get. A multi-homed satellite system can approach reliability in the order of a few seconds downtime per year.

This is because "there is no weather in space". The satellite is there and it works, constantly. You build the system so that if one freak outage occurs on a satellite, you still have have five others that can do the same work.

If you're using "fragile" to describe your satellite TV or broadband, then there are several limiting factors there which wouldn't exist on aircraft. And even then the dish on your house is probably still far more reliable than cable or 4G connections.

And you can't say, "A pilot in the cockpit has zero downtime". Because that's not the case.

That and I don't know how much use pilots on the ground would be.
You'd need a whole load of pilots sitting around on the ground waiting for a problem.
These bored out of their heads pilots would then have to try and resolve the issue using limited sensors.

The pilots on the ground for a start would have access to basically the exact same data that a pilot in the cockpit does.

I'm not saying the system is definitely going to happen. But you're describing problems with it that are basically already solved. U.S. military drones for example, are flown by satellite. A local team handles take-off and landing of the aircraft because they need real-time data to do this. But for normal operations a drone in Iraq is being flown by a guy in a non-descript warehouse somewhere in Arizona.

Instead of thinking about bored pilots sitting around waiting for problems, think more of air traffic controllers. You will have one pilot "flying" five or six planes at a time, with local crews who take over for take-off/landing. The only people "doing nothing" will be pilots assigned to take over in the event of an emergency so that a plane in trouble isn't being flown by someone with 4 other aircraft to manage.

To circle this back to self-driving vehicles, this is an example of looking at our current model and then trying to shoehorn automation into it. That's not how automation works - automation works first by changing the processes to discard all of the parts that aren't actually required.

jackofalltrades

seamus wrote: »

Satellite links are about the most stable you can get. A multi-homed satellite system can approach reliability in the order of a few seconds downtime per year.

The US Military with all it resources has communication issues with it's drones.
It's a system that's no way near being ready to working in civil aviation.

This is because "there is no weather in space".

There's weather between planes and satellites.

The pilots on the ground for a start would have access to basically the exact same data that a pilot in the cockpit does.

No they don't.
The data is already old due to the latency involved in sending it.
They also won't be able to hear/see/feel and smell what's going on from a vast variety of locations.

I'm not saying the system is definitely going to happen. But you're describing problems with it that are basically already solved. U.S. military drones for example, are flown by satellite. A local team handles take-off and landing of the aircraft because they need real-time data to do this. But for normal operations a drone in Iraq is being flown by a guy in a non-descript warehouse somewhere in Arizona.

Instead of thinking about bored pilots sitting around waiting for problems, think more of air traffic controllers. You will have one pilot "flying" five or six planes at a time, with local crews who take over for take-off/landing. The only people "doing nothing" will be pilots assigned to take over in the event of an emergency so that a plane in trouble isn't being flown by someone with 4 other aircraft to manage.

This type of system would still require a lot of pilots.
You'd need a lot of local pilots to cover all the airports and different aircraft type that are available.
You'd be better off leaving them in the cockpit in the above example.

Driverless trains on the DLR

https://youtu.be/a52ZSCIAoRk

LXFlyer

Deleted User wrote: »

Driverless trains on the DLR

https://youtu.be/a52ZSCIAoRk

But with a human train operator onboard who controls the doors and drives the trains as well at certain locations.

devnull

LXFlyer wrote: »

But with a human train operator onboard who controls the doors and drives the trains as well at certain locations.

I've been on the DLR probably at least 40-50 times and I've never seen someone driving them but it could just be where I travel it hasn't happened - is there a particular stretch that is always human driven?

I wouldn't really call DLR proper rail though to be honest.

LXFlyer

devnull wrote: »

I've been on the DLR probably at least 40-50 times and I've never seen someone driving them but it could just be where I travel it hasn't happened - is there a particular stretch that is always human driven?

I wouldn't really call DLR proper rail though to be honest.

They all do it randomly.

But heading towards Lewisham was somewhere they nearly always did it.

dr.fuzzenstein

There was a phantastic experiment in Germany in the 70's, the Cabinentaxi.
It would have been a fully automated public transport system where you would go to the station, enter your destination and a small cabin would bring you there without stopping.
Needless to say because it was a groundbreaking, revolutionary idea that would have radically changed urban public transport forever, it became a gigantic flop, because the best way to ensure a failure is to bring out something radically different.
If find it deeply sad that this genius idea never took off.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cabinentaxi

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J8DP50YQ-Tc

And English version

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ERdF0FK-2io