To the surprise of no one who’s paying attention, Tesla is going to have to initiate an over-the-air update to more than 2 million of its vehicles to address concerns over its “Autopilot” system. Specifically, federal safety regulators are worried it’s too easy to abuse.
I wish Jason were here to take this one because he’s the best at describing the faults with Tesla’s thinking — faults that are more marketing than technology-related, but I’ll do my best for this installment of The Morning Dump.
While we’re talking about Tesla, did you know that more than 40% of all luxury cars sold in the United States are EVs or some kind of hybrid? That seems like a big deal. Also a big deal is that the COP28 meeting on global warming has some kind of agreement.
And, finally, the Feds are letting Jeep off the hook for Compasses that are randomly shutting off.
Tesla’s Big Autopilot Recall
I’m going to note right off the bat that Tesla is only recalling its cars after a National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) investigation determined that “[i]n certain circumstances when Autosteer is engaged, and the driver does not maintain responsibility for vehicle operation and is unprepared to intervene as necessary or fails to recognize when Autosteer is canceled or not engaged, there may be an increased risk of a crash.”
Specifically, NHTSA stated that the agency believes it’s too easy to use “Autopilot” as if the car were a self-driving car and not a regular car with SAE Level 2 advanced driver-assistance feature, which it is.
As an SAE Level 2 system, Autopilot can assist “in steering within a clearly marked lane, and uses traffic-aware cruise control” to match the speed of surrounding cars. This is a great feature and, while I agree with Consumer Reports that GM’s SuperCruise is better (and better named), these systems aren’t designed to entirely replace the driver.
Tesla’s response to NHTSA’s investigation was to say it didn’t concur with the agency’s analysis but, to resolve the investigation, it would implement an over-the-air software update.
What’s that update do?
The remedy will incorporate additional controls and alerts to those already existing on affected vehicles to further encourage the driver to adhere to their continuous driving responsibility whenever Autosteer is engaged, which includes keeping their hands on the steering wheel and paying attention to the roadway. Depending on vehicle hardware, the additional controls will include, among others, increasing the prominence of visual alerts on the user interface, simplifying engagement and disengagement of Autosteer, additional checks upon engaging Autosteer and while using the feature outside controlled access highways and when approaching traffic controls, and eventual suspension from Autosteer use if the driver repeatedly fails to demonstrate continuous and sustained driving responsibility while the feature is engaged.
In some ways, it’s a lot more nagging, but the eventual suspension from Autosteer (underlined by moi) is interesting. This system already exists within Tesla’s Full Self-Driving beta (also not really full self-driving) and the consensus seems to be that the bans are 1-2 weeks long, though it’s not yet clear how long there will be for Autopilot. My guess is we’ll find out soon.
Here are two reactions from the r/TeslaMotors subreddit I’d like to highlight:
I believe that CEO Elon Musk and the company have gone out of their way to imply abilities the car doesn’t have, and I’ve personally heard from Tesla owners who seem to overestimate the car’s capabilities. I agree that this constant reminder that it’s the responsibility to pay attention to the road in a car that owners think is self-driving is indeed probably not going to be popular.
And then here’s a reply almost directly under it that describes the problem. This person seems to be saying that their older Model S lacks an interior camera and thus they think they can get away with non-compliance, though it’s likely under the recall and is already FSD, so some of these controls may already be in place.
It’ll be fun to watch the next few weeks to see if there’s a huge increase in suspensions. Even if this was done begrudgingly, this does seem like a step in the right direction if the warnings and suspensions are done seriously enough.
NHTSA also seems to be watching as the agency didn’t close the investigation, saying it “remains open to support an evaluation of the effectiveness of the remedies deployed by Tesla across the recall scope.”
We’ll see.
We’re Getting Closer To Half Of All Luxury Cars Being Electrified
To re-clarify, an electric car contains no gas motor either to power the wheels or to act as a generator. An “electrified” car is any car that has an electric motor, so that includes electric cars (BEVs) as well as plug-in hybrids (PHEVs) and regular gas-electric hybrids.
Right now, it looks like electrified sales are beginning to conquer the luxury space. During September 2023, a record 42.4% of all luxury registrations were some form of electrified vehicle according to S&P Global Mobility’s analysis.
Is a lot of that Tesla? Yes, a lot of that is Tesla.
This is up from 15% in September 2019 - with “electrified” registrations including battery-electric vehicles, plug-in hybrids, and gas-electric hybrid vehicles.
However, if Tesla is removed from the equation, the remaining brands account for a mere 14% of luxury vehicle retail registrations in September – with a split of 9% for BEVs and 5% for hybrids. But luxury BEVs have been growing, while hybrid and PHEV share of luxury vehicle registrations have been stable at roughly 4% to 6% for several years.
This is pretty interesting to me. Given that EVs have been more luxury-priced, it makes sense that buyers in that space are able to (and choose to) opt for the pricier BEV models over PHEVs. It seems like hybrids are going to increasingly become a better option for people in the middle and lower third of the price range.
COP28 Has Come To A Conclusion
I invite you to read my whole long treatise on COP28 that I hope explains the stakes of the UN-backed global meeting of leaders talking about global climate change.
It was unclear what the result would be, but there’s been an agreement (called a “stocktake”) to do the following:
The stocktake recognizes the science that indicates global greenhouse gas emissions need to be cut 43% by 2030, compared to 2019 levels, to limit global warming to 1.5°C. But it notes Parties are off track when it comes to meeting their Paris Agreement goals.
The stocktake calls on Parties to take actions towards achieving, at a global scale, a tripling of renewable energy capacity and doubling energy efficiency improvements by 2030. The list also includes accelerating efforts towards the phase-down of unabated coal power, phasing out inefficient fossil fuel subsidies, and other measures that drive the transition away from fossil fuels in energy systems, in a just, orderly and equitable manner, with developed countries continuing to take the lead.
That’s not nothing. All of these are important steps. However, as with many UN-backed agreements, it’s on the individual nations to create their own enforcement and rules.
This reminded me of a weird fact I learned recently, which was that when the original agreement to create the United Nations was finally drafted it had to be sent to the United States Senate to be ratified (every country had to ratify it). The person whose job it was to supervise the safe transfer of the document was Alger Hiss.
NHTSA To Jeep: It’s Cool
There was an investigation into Jeep Compass models of the 2019 and 2020 model years over the habit of some of those vehicles to randomly shut off their engines while driving.
Here’s some good news for Jeep, via The Detroit News:
The agency opened the probe in December of last year after getting 15 complaints that drivers have gotten dashboard messages saying their coolant temperature is too high, followed by an immediate engine shutdown.
But an investigation found that the failure rate was low and that the SUVs can normally be restarted immediately after the engine shuts down. The agency found only one allegation of a crash and no injuries.
Pobody’s Nerfect!
The Big Question
How many Tesla owners are going to get suspended from FSD in the first week? A few, a ton, all of them?
If they say this system is for use only on highways or limited access roads, why don’t they just block activation on roads where it will not function? Everything about these ‘automated’ systems seems to rely quite a bit on the driver.
I have made several 700+mile one-day trips this year going to and from my kids house for various reasons. While my vehicle has adaptive cruise control, and I use it a lot, there are many stretches of highway where it should be relatively easy to implement autodrive. If the system can be simplified to recognize where it would work safely and onloy then allow it to be enabled, that would be fabuluous. Any situation where is it would not be entirely safe would be locked out. That is how this should be rolled out, not everywhere all at once. As the system gets feedback and “learns”, more types of roadway can be included in the enable category.
I believe that’s how the GM Supercruise system works. Roadways are analyzed and if suitable they are added.
So, in a nutshell, the Tesla “recall” is about the possible increased risk of accident if drivers don’t pay attention. Why isn’t the NHTSA addressing other manufacturers for not having sufficient driver monitoring systems?
Well instead of going after Tesla or assessing each manufacturer, the NHTSA should be creating a standard all have to follow, which they should of done way back when Tesla created their first beta.
All lawsuits should be directed at the NHTSA for negligence perhaps.
I believe it’s the fact that they market the systems as ‘Autopilot’ or ‘Full Self Driving.’
If Toyota renamed the Corolla as the ‘Floats in Water Awesome Boat Car,’ they would face some problems when people started driving them down boat ramps.
Unfortunately thanks to the great job the agencies do on this, they may not have to face those problems for the better part of a decade.
I believe that is what Corolla means when translated from the original Latin.
Flotius McBotius
We don’t know that NHTSA isn’t. This isn’t a hit piece on Tesla.
I feel like the whole issue could be “fixed” simply by changing the name to something other than “Autopilot”.
It’s NOT autopilot, so calling it that is false advertising and tricking the consumer of thinking it’s capable of things that it’s not.
The problem is that they cannot un-sell vehicles that were sold while Tesla was using those marketing terms. If they change the name now it’s an admission that the old names were misleading. That could open them to lawsuits from current owners and especially from people injured by Teslas while using those mislabeled features.
And they probably got all the advantages from the lie that it wouldn’t hurt them
It sounds like the NHTSA thing and the OTA update specify Autopilot, not FSD.
I’m interested in seeing how this update actually affects autopilot which currently doesn’t require the interior cam to work. How do I know? Because mine has had a sticker on it since it came out that Tesla employees were abusing the interior videos. Autopilot function hasn’t changed.
That said, FSD does require that camera and with it blocked, FSD won’t engage, which is fine by me because it’s a terrifying death trap.
“Autopilot” and “FSD” are scams the way they are named, advertised and implemented and IMHO Musk&Co should be held responsible for all the deaths they have caused by irresponsibly unleashing these systems on open roads without any reasonable or effective controls. There’s an excellent article on this in the Washington Post from a few days ago:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2023/12/10/tesla-autopilot-crash/
DUDE!!!! Welcome back. Where TF have you been? Hope all is well. Get back on Discord!!!
Well, that’s what one expects from a place named Discord.
I understand. Keep on keepin on.
Probably exactly like that. Soon, Musk will be putting up polls asking if he should reinstate autopilot for people who abused the system for the memes.
We have missed your byline. Welcome back.
Hopefully all usesers will be suspended from “autopilot” and “full self driving”
Ideally they’d be suspended from “talking” as well.
This reads as if its some arbitrary set of circumstances that allows Tesla/Musk to determine who is banned and for how long.
And as we all know, that goes so well
Why focus on just those two? Twitter is the Baskin-Robbins of whackadoos.
Two quick things:
During September 2023, 100% of M&M store sales were M&Ms! I think the main numbers to look at is not the number of electric luxury cars registered, but how many total luxury car options are offered as electric, and then input the 42.4%. This gives a better idea of demand.
2 The Paris Agreement doesn’t mean all that much, as Countries can pretty much dip in and out of it when they want to. As far as the UN as a whole, it’s pretty useless anyway. Just look at the very recent vote to enact a ceasefire in the Middle East where the whole world agreed except for our money laundering asses. But, I’m sure the catering during the vote was top notch…
They also removed a call to phase out fossil fuels that was in the draft, because, well, whoever decided to hold a climate conference in an OPEC state sure got their bribes 🙂
No doubt about it, lol. That and trying to eliminate fossil fuels ain’t happening in our lifetimes or the lifetimes of our grandkids either.
Why are they even holding a climate conference iN person? Do this thing over zoom saves time, money and carbon emissions.
Breaking: (North Pole, AK 12/13/23)
Tesla announces acquisition of Santa Claus and North Pole Limited for 24 billion billions. Tesla released a statement after, “ He sees when you are sleeping, now that includes behind the yoke of your Model S. All parties moved to that naughty Autopilot list will receive one 55-gallon drum of 93 premium Shell gasoline delivered into their living room.” Tesla co-founder Elon Musk has proposed on his X account, a permanent renaming of Christmas to X-mas. Stating that “What if we, just like changed it?”.
I struggle to use Autopilot as it is. The system wants you to keep light turning pressure on the wheel. But the area between ‘enough pressure’ and ‘driver steering override’ is so narrow, I struggle to get it right.
When I want to change lanes (I refuse to pay for automatic lane changing), the system is too stupid to recognize that I have the blinker on and allow a brief manual steering input for a lane change. Instead, it fights me to prevent me from changing lanes for a second until it disengages. That causes a lot of unnecessary side to side head bobbing from everyone in the car.
I just use adaptive cruise and manually steer. It sounds like Autopilot may be getting worse after this update.
I guess I don’t understand the point. If you have to have your hands on the wheel and your eyes on the road…isn’t it just as easy to drive? I’ve only ever had plain ol’ cruise control, so no experience with this stuff.
Speaking for myself in Pennsylvania where I do plenty of highway driving, at least with cruise control I can move my feet around a bit.
Adaptive cruise control would be even nicer, and I’ve experienced it a few times in other cars.
But if steering is automated too…yeah, I think that falls too much into the monitoring problem.
It would seem that way — but on longer drives (as well as slow traffic driving) in particular, it becomes pretty clear that the driver is much better able to relax and not feel much of that long drive / traffic exhaustion that often happens. I think regular cruise control gives some of that, but a decent level 2 system goes further, even when having to have hands on the wheel / eyes on the road.
Agree. My Mercedes has this, and for longer drives it’s nice. I still need to keep my hands on the wheel and eyes on the road (it has cameras) but it does let you relax a bit. It also gets better milage than I do (no surprise there).
I agree, there really isn’t a point to Autopilot anymore. Too many people treated it like it was capable of self driving and got into wrecks, some fatal. Then lawyers and regulators got involved and Tesla added nannies to make sure people were being attentive. Drivers found workarounds and the programming became more strict. It’s becoming a cycle that will probably nerf Autopilot all together.
Why is there a photo of a Somalian two-mouthed suckerfish for the item about luxury hybrids?
Oh, wait, I got it wrong. It’s a Guatemalan two-mouthed suckerfish.
I’d never own a BMW for several reasons, but the hate for their two-grille thing truly impresses and confuses me. I think they look fine
While I think their current models with the massive, massive grilles (like this iX and all the 4 series variants) look a little ridiculous and aren’t to my taste, I also don’t get why people are still screaming into the void about them. Most of them are already halfway through their cycle at this point. They’re not going anywhere anytime soon, so I’m not sure why as enthusiasts we’re collectively still Big Mad about them.
I think it’s turned into blind fury at BMW in general and:
1). I think it’s misplaced because there are still some very appealing enthusiast products in their lineup.
And
2). This is exactly why BMW did this. In the age of social media there’s no such thing as bad press. The goal was to get people talking about the cars…and they’re still talking about them! It’s effective marketing.
Anyway, the company is doing really well right now so it seems like all of this has worked. They also bet big on electrification early and are reaping some of the rewards…slash they’re still making a manual M2, V8 powered sedans and SUVs, they’ve given us what might be the best overall ICE engine still in production in the B58 and it gets such good fuel economy it’ll live in its 6 cylinder form for another decade, they’re now offering a manual in the Z4 M40i which makes it way, way more interesting, the list ain’t short.
The way I look at it is the iX and its ilk allow them to keep making ICE enthusiast cars. In that context they don’t bother me as much…and if $60,000 were to magically show up on my desk that manual Z4 M40i would be pretty high on my shopping list.
I mean…technically they did on Twitter. X on the other hand…
So the punishment for not paying attention while “driving” is to be told to not sit in the corner. I hope they still have to wear dunce caps. Honestly, just treat these idiots like drunk drivers and upload an ignition interlock that disables their car for a week or so every time they snooze cruise.
This FSD/Autopilot thing ties in nicely with the increased push to add drunk driving tech in cars. I have my own opinions on both matters, but it is fascinating to see the spectrum of “Big Brother (1984) to complete anarchy” contract. We continue to use technology as a way to enhance safety and reduce deaths, but fail to realize that education is often way more effective and drastically undervalued.
My two cents dimwitted opinion of the day is:
I’ve driven a go kart before and if they could add climate control to something that simple, I’d drive one again.
If the drunk driving check thing could be truly unobtrusive, I wouldn’t give a shit. But how that could technologically (and biologically/medically!) be feasible is unknown to me.
Not to mention, I’m sure drunk driving’s root cause is far more (albeit not entirely) “lack of viable alternative transportation” than “I want to have some fucked-up version of fun”….by which I mean, ignition interlock is treating the symptom, not the cause.
Even if it’s unobtrusive, there’s probably plenty of false positives.
One way to fail a breathalyzer without drinking a drop is to be a diabetic who runs very hyperglycemic far too often. Once you’re in ketosis, those ketones have a composition very similar to isopropyl alcohol, and bam, you’ve blown over 0.08. I’ve met the people who’d run into this. Yes, they need to get their blood sugar under control, but that’s just one situation people would fail a test on.
I’m not a doctor so forgive my ignorance – why would this particular false positive be an issue? Doesn’t ketoacidosis come with it’s own set of impairments? Sure it is technically different than drunk driving, but it seems to this uninformed person that frequently it is functionally equivalent.
For me this would be my diabetic onset (I’m Type 1, sugar ~125mg/dL) about 22 years ago. I was 19, drank a lot of soda, etc. Trim (5’8”, 145lbs), but a lot of sugar in my diet, especially once I moved out.
The signs for me would be feeling very tired (constant yawning), distended bladder and constantly feeling the need to urinate, extremely dry mouth and eyes, feeling dehydrated (where I drank more soda!), high blood pressure (blood becoming thicker like syrup!), general achiness, etc. It was a hellish 2 weeks which culminated in me passing out periodically in which I then headed to an urgent care to read past 500mg/dL.
That sounds awful, but the first… 7-9 days I was surprisingly functional, just really tired and feeling dehydrated. I’ve since met several people who really don’t take care of their (usually Type 2) diabetes. Elevated ketones absolutely can be a thing for periods of time, and you can tell from the smell of their breath alone. You don’t always need to be on the verge of a diabetic coma to have elevated ketones. 500+ is super emergency, but there’s a lot of people who kick around in the 300s for a long time before they get crushed by some real effects like organ damage, retinopathy, etc.
Thanks for the answer. I guess I spend too much time on YouTube – you see a video of a semi going the wrong way and find out the driver wasn’t drunk but they were having a diabetic emergency and you start to think that all cases are the same.
I’d still argue that passing out isn’t a great thing to do if you happen to be behind the wheel, but I also want to make it clear that I don’t think that people with diabetes should be banned from driving. I also don’t think that my car should be a medical device, even if cutting down on impaired driving is ostensibly a good thing. It’s a quandary…
So the “drunk driver” case is low blood sugar (hypoglycemia) and not high blood sugar (hyperglycemia). It’s also almost always Type 1 diabetics, not Type 2 (where symptoms can be eliminated) diabetics. You can end up hypo very quickly if not careful.
Hypoglycemia is super scary, and trivial to get yourself into as a Type 1 diabetic. As a Type 1, you can’t regulate your blood sugar in *either* direction, where’s in Type 2 you’re just insulin-resistant. The problem is when you get to 80mg/dL, you lose a lot of your cognitive ability. If you’re down to 50mg/dL, you’re going to behave like a drunk. Below that you’re functionally a blackout drunk.
Hypoglycemia can be just from a tiny bit too much insulin (2-3 units, or .02-.03 mL), too much physical or mental exertion, etc. Hyperglycemia with high ketones takes like a week of high sugar. Hyperglycemia with full ketoacidosis can take weeks of high blood sugar or sugar at extreme levels. Hypoglycemia? I could go give myself 2 units of insulin right now and be in the beginning stages in 90 minutes. Increase that to 0.2mL (20 units) and not eat? If my body burning fat doesn’t bring me back up (what your body tries first), the potential outcomes include brain damage and death depending on what happens and how long before I’m discovered.
Low blood sugar is the short-term danger to diabetics. It’s what ends up killing you sometimes within hours or in your sleep if you end up face down in a pillow. You won’t blow a false positive on a breathalyzer with low blood sugar, which is a situation where you could actually kill someone. You might blow a false positive on a breathalyzer if you’ve high blood sugar for extended periods, where you have zero impairment to your motor or cognitive ability.
Last sentence is the point. Car could say, “you’re drunk” when you’re just someone badly managing your diabetes, and you’re at near 100% of your motor and cognitive ability. That’s just the first “false positive” I can think of off-hand for in-car breathalyzers that have proposed forever, and I’m sure there’s plenty more.
Very tragically it appears we have a very live example in Australia of someone having a medical episode whilst driving that resulted in five deaths.
The issue will be the culpability of the person in knowing and having received warnings about the issue and still driving.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-12-11/driver-daylesford-pub-crash-charged-by-police/103213184
The outcome will be interesting, but sadly won’t bring back the people who died.
If he’s getting constantly pinged by a continuous glucose monitor (CGM) or an insulin pump, and not tapping his emergency food that’s potentially a problem. However, the number of people with Type 1 diabetes is significant enough that I think a judge would be reticent to set legal precedent over it. Damages in a civil suit? Sure. I can absolutely see it being pursued.
I don’t have a pump (for a lot of reasons), but part of the issue with even a CGM is if your sugar drops quickly enough — typically through administering too much insulin, often referred to as an insulin reaction — your cognitive ability falls off a cliff so quickly that by the time you get the alert, you’ve possibly already lost your ability to do anything but focus on your immediate task.
Even if you have enough scraps of remaining cognitive function to be aware that you’re hypoglycemic, your mental state of confusion is so great that even though you can barely piece together the thought that you’re hypoglycemic, you’re so tunnel visioned on trying to piece that thought together, that the next step of pulling out and chomping on some glucose tablets (fancy SweeTarts of mostly dextrose) is absurdly difficult. From experience, I’ve recognized that I was low while tunnel visioned on something like work, and it took probably an hour to walk 30 feet to the kitchen, and then another hour to just pour a glass of fruit juice to drink, or eat some emergency candy I keep handy.
Ketosis, if controlled, is great for lots of things (plenty of peer-reviewed papers on this). Except your your breath, which smells like a bear den 6 hours after the bear woke up from hibernation.
DKA, on the other hand, is a life-threatening condition and the only driving you should do is straight to the ER.
There’s already a simple cheap unobtrusive solution to drunk driving. Just post the patrols that are sitting at speed traps with a radar gun outside of bars instead. Fixed.
And they know it. But we don’t do it.
If the tech were truly unobtrusive you should still be opposed to it. You shouldn’t be treated as a suspect for a crime you didn’t commit every time you want to drive. Especially when the consequences of a false positive are so life changing.
I’m confused. Ideally, the result of a “false positive” of this system would be that the car won’t move. Which could be bad or problematic, but I don’t see that as “life changing”.
Ideally. But it could also call the cops and give them a chance to ticket you, or plant evidence of a crime in your glove box, or seize your vehicle, or beat your brain into porridge, or shoot you 47 times.
You know, regular cop stuff.
But more realistically the result of a false positive will be a persistent record of you having “attempted to drive drunk”. Maybe just in the NVRAM of your car to be discovered later…. or more likely transmitted to your insurance company as part of your “discount” program. Or included with the telemetry that you’ve already agreed belongs to the vehicle manufacturer to do with what they will.
However “the car won’t move” should be enough of a possible downside to torpedo this idea for you. Why isn’t it?
Have you never had a car break down before?
A couple years ago I got a flat tire, was too exhausted and didn’t want to put on the donut and drive at 55 on a 70mph highway for 80 miles, so I used my AAA to get towed home. They dropped me off at home and dropped my car at the dealership where I’d bought the tire. The tire was replaced for free since it was under warranty. All the whole adventure cost me was a nominal amount for a Lyft to the dealership.
It’d (yes, understanding “ideally” is doing a lot of heavy lifting here) be the same circumstance if the car had a false positive.
I’ve refused the insurance discount app at every offer.
No crime has been committed if the car hasn’t moved, right?
Yeah, fuck privacy policies on newer cars…I don’t know. Getting it 100% right 100% of the time is unrealistic, but how long should you have to wait between attempts? Some kind of 1 minute wait, then 3, then 5, etc.?
On the other hand, if that can be reset by disconnecting the battery…
Fuck. It’s so easy to identify problems in the world and so hard to come up with workable solutions.
But again, ideally implemented and well-designed, I’d be okay with ignition interlock. But it’d have to be entirely quick and unobtrusive, and accurate.
Without either of those, yeah, wouldn’t want to even give it a second thought.
This is all irrelevant for me since I’m still a long way from new car money anyway.
I’ve driven a go kart before and if they could add climate control to something that simple, I’d drive one again.
Lotus Elise has entered the chat.
If we did like one of the Scandinavian countries and tied fines to income, we’d see a bit of a change. People would think twice about driving drunk if they had to pay 20% of their gross income from all sources (and can’t write it off on taxes) if convicted of drunk driving.
“The list also includes accelerating efforts towards the phase-down of unabated coal power, phasing out inefficient fossil fuel subsidies, and other measures that drive the transition away from fossil fuels in energy systems.”
Unabated coal is a scam. Carbon capture does not work, and the idea that it is included next to slashing fossil fuel subsidies and other measures that slow the transition away from fossil fuels is hilarious (in a black comedy kind of way), since that is exactly what it is.
https://youtu.be/BwP2mSZpe0Q?si=Sq5kK3LoKVdN9401
Sorry, that should say “abated coal” is a scam.
No mention of recent Jeep Compasses is complete without the first 96 seconds of Mr. Regular’s review.
So good Tanya!
Douglas Adams once said: “I’ve come up with a set of rules that describe our reactions to technologies:
1. Anything that is in the world when you’re born is normal and ordinary and is just a natural part of the way the world works.
2. Anything that’s invented between when you’re fifteen and thirty-five is new and exciting and revolutionary and you can probably get a career in it.
3. Anything invented after you’re thirty-five is against the natural order of things.”
At 53 years old, I can absolutely say that FSD/Autopilot/whatever is an abomination and needs to be stopped. The practitioners of these dark arts need to be made to drive a 1980 Tercel without power steering until they have seen the error of their ways.
Absolutely true, and a serious issue when our government is run almost exclusively by people old enough to collect Social Security.
Seconded
Hey now we have some real youthful go-getter energy from the likes of Tom Cotton, Josh Hawley, Matt Gaetz, Lauren Bobert, etc
The average age of Representatives is 58 and cabinet members is 59, that’s like Generation X, older, but not really all that old in the scheme of things.
The oldest Millennials are now 40-41 years old. There are 45 Representatives and 3 Senators from that generation.
The oldest Boomers were 40-41 years old in 1987. There were 76 Reps and 7 Senators from that generation after the ’86 election.
Collect it? Most of them are old enough to have *created* it.
Many of them should have aged-out of that program by now.
Shit, Chuck Grassley was 2 years old when SS was started and Pelosi was born 3 years after
At 40, I’m in the last rule’s age group. While I wouldn’t want a self-driving car in most situations, I can see ways that it might/could work in the future. Current tech probably means you need to do a lot of work not only on the car/computer, but upgrading infrastructure as well.
Just like the push for BEVs, it can be done, but those out there just saying “more will solve the problem” aren’t to be taken seriously. It’s a big problem that needs a lot of work in many different areas, not some CEO trying to get attention on himself via meme culture.
I’d love an actual self-driving car. Unless someday I am wealthy enough to afford first class airline tickets, I’m always looking for an alternative to flying somewhere. Let the car drive, I take a nap. Wake up when I need to refuel or something.
But we are apparently a long way away from that. And it wouldn’t mean I wouldn’t want to take control myself sometimes.
Self-driving is a technology that, by its very nature, will be almost impossible to bring to fruition. In order to become a better driver than a human*, the vehicle will have to be able to adapt as quickly as a human to changing situations. People are unpredictable, whether on a bike, behind the wheel or crossing the street. Driving conditions change constantly and any usable autonomous system will have to be able to handle all of them. Developing this technology will require the sort of real-world testing that is currently proving how far we are away from that goal. Every accident or incident with a self-driving car will generate even more backlash against them. We are angry at a drunk driver or just some random idiot mowing down a pedestrian but a machine? That’s some Skynet-level stuff right there, son. And when autonomous systems fail, it absolutely makes the news. An autonomous system not only has to be better than the average human driver, it has to be so much better as to be nearly perfect.
And that leads to the final word when it comes down to automation of any sort. Trust. It’s easy enough to trust the things that you know won’t kill you or that could probably kill you but you don’t interact with in a meaningful way. But a car? That’s a 4000lb hunk of metal that you’re riding in. You interact with it, and thousands like it, nearly every day of your life. Our whole system of driving, as flawed as it is, is built on a foundation of trust. Building that trust with autonomous systems won’t happen without the technology getting several orders of magnitude better. Which it can’t if nobody really trusts it to learn in a real-world environment. It’s a catch-22.
*by “human” I don’t mean the average driver who is simultaneously fumbling with a venti Latte and a cell phone while yelling at the kids as they whack the (unrestrained) dog with a Nerf bat in the back seat. I’m talking Lewis Hamilton-level skill here.
I have no illusions of AV tech being released tomorrow, or even the mythical “2 years away” stuff. There is A LOT that needs figured out before it can be widely accepted and used.
However, to say it’s going to be impossible is not taking a long-term view. You and I may not get much use out of it, but I’d be willing to bet it happens in our lifetimes.
It’s going to need massive infrastructure investment to properly take care of our roads and signage, as well as some tech advancements, especially with LIDAR miniaturization and V2V & V2X communication. That’s a tall order for today, however call me an optimist, I think it can be done if we (the royal kind, because you and I could hash this out over some pints at the pub) ever have the collective will to do so.
> V2X communication
Is that when your car tweets “bro this is lit” while it’s barreling down I-5 while you’re asleep at the wheel?
We can remote control years-old rovers on Mars and get pictures from Voyager billions of miles away. We can image a black hole. Surely we can figure the tech out. Its adoption is more likely a social issue, as you point out–people will reject it until it’s perfect, and every death will set it back (as it should). Maybe level 4 autonomy is Betamax and humans are VHS.
I’ve had to push and steer a disabled R107 with a 5.6L engine that weighs as much as the Tercel alone, with no power steering, and… Oof.
It’s interesting that the reaction of the Teslaphiles upon being told it’s NOT self-driving is “Watch me fool the system” and not “Oh shit, I’ve gotten really lucky so far, better straighten up and fly right.”
Tesla is not a luxury car.
Depends on what you use as the metric. If you just use price as the metric, I’d argue the X and S definitely qualify.
So does a F-350 dually with a work interior if we use price alone.
What is luxury?
Anything I don’t need is a luxury.
I certainly don’t need a Tesla.
I feel like that’s an overstatement, too. Strictly looking at 2023-4 vehicles, I’m sure someone far pickier than I would not find a model that doesn’t have some feature they “don’t need”, even in base form.
Even the GR86 has too much BS for me.
I looked long and hard at a GR86 to replace my GT86, and decided the 11 year old car had everything I needed.
It’s 2023 and you’re in a first world country, all cars should have at least a touch of luxury.
I like this take on a lot of levels.
Word, I have referred to my NA Miata as a “luxury car” before. I don’t need it, it only gets driven when I feel like it. Luxury in its purest form.
My NA Miata was stripped out, had a cage and only one seat. It was definitely a luxury.
Probably a big enough question to merit many articles of its own (and I’m sure it has).
Build quality alone is not enough–nobody would call a 2005 Toyota Corolla a luxury car, right?
And price isn’t necessarily a great singular metric, even if it weighs heavily. Would you call a Corvette a luxury car?
At another angle, the Mercedes-Benz Sprinter is a cargo van. But the badge alone doesn’t make it luxury, does it? (And similarly, don’t many of the usual “luxury brands” have some “cheaper” (e.g., $40,000) cars available these days?)
Meanwhile, some really expensive cars aren’t “comfortable” to drive. For example, even if a McLaren is really fast and handles well, I’ve heard they’re not exactly comfortable.
Build quality is out as a signifier, lots of luxury brands have pretty mediocre materials and finish work, gadgets are out, since lots of lower priced cars are loaded with gobs of tech features now, price is out, since pickup trucks- work vehicles- can easily crack $100k, and comfort is out, because professional car reviewers all convinced automakers that cars shouldn’t be comfortable anymore, so, yeah, the definition is more nebulous than ever. I guess it comes down to both price and public perception of the brand, combined with where the automaker themselves intends to position it. Eg, they say they’re a luxury brand, and most people accept that they’re a luxury brand, then they’re a luxury brand.
I mean, I’d be happy to say a Ford F-150 XL is non-luxury and a Limited trim is luxury. In between is murkier, but I definitely think the higher (~$100k) pickups clearly cross that line to say “I’m not really a work truck anymore, I’m luxury.”
But that also gets us asking whether, say, a low-spec BMW is actually a luxury car, and that is something the luxury brands don’t want us doing.
Of course, the idea that prestige is luxury also includes those pickups these days, if we’re being honest about what indicates status.
There’s so many weird side tangents too…A Ford E-series is not a luxury vehicle, but if it’s a conversion van? Absolutely a luxury vehicle.
I’ve been asking myself that question for a long time whenever I read about “luxury” cars. The concept is nebulous, and I have to go with the Supreme Court answer: “I know it when I see it.”
Mercedes Benz is, without a doubt, a luxury brand and Toyota is not, but I’d argue that a Camry with all the options boxes checked is more luxurious than a stripped base-model Cla.
….”Cla”?
Cla.
Although apparently the Gla starts cheaper, so it may have been a better base model example.
Sorry, the lack of capitalization threw me off. Yeah, definitely.
That’s interesting that “luxury” brand would have a vehicle starting in the high 30s today.
I vaguely remember from college courses the idea that it’s easy to drag a brand down from luxury, but going up in perception is a different story.
Hell, Samsung is one of the only companies that comes to my mind in that respect. The cheap knock-off brand becomes a leader.
LG successfully rebranded themselves in the US as well.
They were initially here as “Goldstar” (LG: Lucky Goldstar). Goldstar was synonymous with junk.
It’s all good. I don’t yell on the internet, and I enjoy pronouncing alphabet soup car names that probably aren’t meant to be pronounceable.
A luxury car is something you aren’t embarrassed to be seen in by your mother-in-law the first time you meet her.
Kidding, sort of.
My in-laws had first met each other at a drag strip so they were both okay with the, ah, “luxury car” I was driving when we met:
https://live.staticflickr.com/7011/6830618645_9c37181365_c.jpg
Ok, maybe that’s not exactly luxury, but it’s certainly classy. And damn sure cool. That upright with the spines…just what is this thing?
-make & model is what I’m asking here
Thanks! That’s a 1937 Plymouth P4. It was almost entirely stock except for the one item you noticed, the aftermarket grille guard. I removed that and kept it when I sold the car, as it had been mounted in a way that had caused no damage to the underlying bumper. It now hangs in my garage as a souvenir, at least until another appropriate vehicle comes along…
You, sir, are a man of taste. Thanks for the reply—and I hope you find a suitable chariot to mount that guard upon someday!
I bet that ’37 Plymouth was more reliable than my ’89 Plymouth.
I was driving a S12 Nissan Silvia Turbo with a welded diff and no interior trim.
I wasn’t embarrassed, I loved that stupid car. It wasn’t luxury though.
A world without Musk.
It’s whatever the marketing department tells you it is.
Dodge Mirada, I’m looking at you. With its “European”-like “sport-tuned” front torsion beam suspension. Wish I was kidding, but yes.
Ah, the days when everything was a, “personal luxury coupe.” Even the Mustang II they attempted to market as a, “personal luxury coupe” for a time!
Never heard of the Dodge Mirada, let alone drive one, but I did own a 1983 Alfetta with front torsion beam suspension. Along with the DeDion rear suspension and rear placement of the transaxle it was quite sporty even in the 90’s when I had it, let alone when they introduced it in 1979.
I’d say don’t knock the front torsion beams just because of what I assume was some horrid implementation by Dodge. I really loved it when it took 30mins to replace the front shocks and didn’t even need alignment afterwards.
QOTD. This certainly needs some definition. We now have something for Jason to think about while high.
IMHO, luxury is defined by comfort, ride, noise, and power. All 4 of those items must be top notch and designed INTO the vehicle from the start, on every model. IOW, the fanciest Ford Focus could NEVER be luxury, regardless of what Ford did to it.
A cheap Mercedes is not luxury, as it does not meet those 4 criteria.
Wait, you conspicuously didn’t include “brand” on that list, so why couldn’t a Focus “no matter what Ford did to it” become a luxury car?
I can broadly agree they’re not luxury as-is, but the RS gives them plenty of power, and my family had a 2005 ZXW (station wagon) one that was plenty comfortable from what I remember.
Even if all four of those are subjective criteria, I don’t see why they couldn’t be achieved somehow or another.
If I ever got the all-around sound isolation done to my Prius v for the quoted $3700 I’d call it a luxury car afterward (especially with all the mods I already did).
In theory anyone could produce a luxury car, but they don’t. And, kinda hence my theory.
Ford is welcome to, but my point was the Focus could never really be. It would become something else, no longer a focus. One could argue the GT40 is? Lincoln, arguable, is.
I drive a Cadillac, and it’s…. not luxury in it’s trim. The CTS-V is luxury, IMHO, as much as any Mercedes is.
And, arguably, none of those are. Luxury would be a Rolls Royce. Or a Bentley. I keep coming back to comfort, ride, noise, and power. I almost think something like a Ferrari is NOT luxury. Now I’m just crazy though.
Oh no, like I said in another comment, I’ve heard (for example) a McLaren might be fast and handle well in corners, while not being comfortable or a good highway cruiser.
So the Venn diagram circles of supercars/hypercars and luxury cars are absolutely distinct circles, and whether there’s any overlap is probably a separate discussion.
But I see your point.
It’s just be a really quiet semi-economy car, not a luxury car. An Olds 88 donk with $5k rims isn’t a luxury car.
All cars are a luxury
I agree. That’s a luxury I wouldn’t mind having:
https://smallcarsclub.com/catalog/all-cars/all-cars-charly-snuggy/
Thanks for the answers. To me luxury is how it makes you feel. It is expensive, prestigious, hard to obtain. For cars its elegant styling roomy comfortable opulent interior, smooth effortless acceleration. So its not limited to brands.
So what vehicles are luxury to you?