this post was submitted on 17 Aug 2026
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But take that to the next step. Let’s say it reaches the point where it drives better than humans. The problem is it’s not perfect, and has different weaknesses than humans. Even after self-driving is statistically safer, there will be accidents where a human could have done better. Would we accept it under those circumstances? Because those are the circumstances
I think "could have" is doing a lot of heavy lifting here and it's making the question seem more complicated than it is. You can't make decisions based on hindsight from specific examples. If, hypothetically, self driving cars are statistically safer, then they're safer, regardless of any specific anecdote that suggests otherwise.
Maybe I'm not grasping what you're saying?
By “statistically safer” I mean as an overall metric. However there will still be specific scenarios where self-driving is less safe, or even just people believe they could have done better. People will naturally focus on those specific scenarios and reject self-driving even when it is overall safer
Can you give me a hypothetical example? I'm not understanding the scenario you're referring to.
As a fake example, let’s say Tesla full self-driving is overall safer than humans, however it doesn’t recognize traffic poles and will try to drive through them. People would probably reject FSD as not yet ready despite the evidence that it was safer than humans
I appreciate the clarification, but I doubt there will be a way for both scenarios to exist simultaneously; that is to say, I think any sufficiently common "exception" would result in self driving cars not being statistically safer than human drivers.
It would have to be something sufficiently obscure, like, I dunno, going down a eastern-facing switchback road in the fog at sunrise. (Maybe too obscure.)
That being said, I remember reading an article or maybe watching a video about the challenges for making a self driving car feel safer for people. Stuff like turn speed on main roads vs in residential neighborhoods. The forces being felt are exactly the same, and the safety is exactly the same, but (apparently) people feel like one is acceptable but the other is dangerous.
If your ultimate question was along these lines, then yes, I agree there is more than just statistics that will be necessary before people are comfortable with mass adoption of self driving cars. And not for nothing but that tool Musk isn't helping anything by putting out "self driving" cars before they're actually ready.
Without judging the effectiveness, Tesla has made great progress on this. If you read through recent FSD reviews you’ll see many claim things like “the car drives more confidently”