Tesla Full Self Driving Is Terrifying & Exciting

I don’t mind admitting that I was recently taken for a ride — by a robot car.  Tesla Full Self Driving (Supervised) has arrived in Australia, and it took me for a spin.

I also don’t mind admitting it was pretty amazing.  Sitting behind the wheel of a car that drove itself was exciting and frightening.  It didn’t just drive like a dream; it was like three dreams, one after the other.  First off, it was one of those dreams where you’re terrified for no good reason.  Then it became a lovely dream as I overcame my apprehension.  Finally, it was like one of those dreams I had as a kid after seeing The Terminator movie.

Is Tesla Full Self Driving Available In Australia?

Tesla Full Self Driving (Supervised) is now available in Australia and also Australia’s eastern bracket, New Zealand.  These are the only countries it’s offered where people drive on the right side of the road, which is the left.  If you want it, all you have to do is pay $10,100 extra when you buy a new Tesla.

The ability of some Tesla cars to drive themselves is often called Full Self Driving, but that’s not its real name.  The correct term is Full Self Driving (Supervised), and yes, Tesla puts the word “supervised” in brackets like that.  But because it can’t actually full self drive, it would have been more accurate to call it Full Self Driving (Not).

If it was full self driving, you’d be able to read a book, take a nap, play Fallout 4, eat lunch, or do whatever while the car drove itself without any need for intervention.  But with Full Self Driving (Supervised), you have to pay attention at all times and be prepared to take over at any and every point.  You are legally in control of the vehicle and there’s no getting out of traffic tickets or manslaughter charges by saying, “But my car did it!”

Even though it doesn’t live up to its name, the fact it can drive itself is still impressive.

I Had Reservations

When my boss Finn Peacock (an avid Tesla Full Self Driving enthusiast) told me the technology had arrived in Australia and asked if I wanted to give it a go, I immediately said, “Sure!” But this was because I didn’t want to show weakness (Finns can smell fear).  I had to struggle to overcome some internal reluctance.

My main issue was Tesla seems way behind Waymo — the major North American company working with robo-cars.  They’ve had nearly fully autonomous taxis operating in a limited areas for 5 years.  Since they can remotely receive human assistance, perhaps they should be called Waymo Autonomous Taxis (Almost).  From what I can tell, Waymo’s Full Self Driving (Almost) seems much more advanced than Tesla’s Full Self Driving (Not Really).

One of Waymo’s advantages is their cars use a combination of cameras and LiDAR, which is a type of short wavelength radar, while most Teslas get by with just 8 cameras to detect what’s around them.  Teslas used to have radar, but they got rid of it.  I know humans can drive without having radar or LiDAR, but that’s like saying bats fly without seat belts, so we shouldn’t put seat belts in planes.  I know if I had the option of being able to blast radar waves out of my head, I’d definitely take it.  I’m actually surprised Tesla hasn’t decided ditching radar was a mistake. My guess is they haven’t gone back to it because it would make Elon Musk look stupid.  Or as I refer to him, CEO of Tesla (Stupider).

My final hesitation about trying Tesla Full Self Driving (Pull The Other One) was the car might not appreciate some of the things I’ve said about its name or Elon Musk and might hold it against me.

The App Was Crap

With Teslas, you can use a mobile phone app like a car key.  The last time I drove Finn’s Tesla, it took us a while to get it going, but when it does work, it’s very convenient.  But it didn’t work at all this time.  Somehow, it entered a death loop, and nothing we tried got it going, so I ended up using Finn’s Tesla keycard.

To start with, I sat in the passenger seat while Finn got behind the wheel to show me how Full Self Driving (Not Really) worked.  He had to back out himself because, unlike in the video that plays if you click on Full Self Driving (Supervised) on the Australian Tesla Site, when I was in the car, it always refused to robo-drive in or out of nose-in parking.

After that, the full self driving was engaged and it was amazing.  Or at least, I could see that it was amazing, but on an emotional level, I couldn’t really accept that he wasn’t controlling the car.  I felt like he must have been doing some kind of magic trick.

We went around a couple of blocks and arrived back at his place, where he got out and left me to my own devices, along with his big robo-car device.  I was now in full control of letting the car take control.

A Heart Full Of Fear!

I will not hesitate to admit, when I sat alone behind that wheel, my heart was suffused with fear.  There was only me and the robot and the certainty that at the end of this drive, only one of us would be alive.  On account of how only one of us was alive in the first place.

As I prepared to place my health and safety in a robot’s cold steel hands, my body was one big ball of fear.  (I know it looks like a big ball of lard in the picture at the top of this page, but trust me, it was all fear.)  I was breathing hard, my nerves were on edge, and my muscles tense.  I’m sure my heart rate was high, but I couldn’t hear it beating because all my attention was focused like a laser on the road around us.  Focused like the laser detection system I was acutely aware the car lacked.

I told the car navigation system I wanted to go to IKEA — a Swedish restaurant with far too much furniture.  I figured that was far enough away to be a decent test.  My thumb hovered above the self drive button for several seconds before I was able to force it against the touch screen and we were off!

Once the robo-car and I were underway, I was shocked by how quickly my fear faded.  I was recovering within minutes.  My fear disappeared so fast it scared me.  To show how quickly my fear faded, and how fast it came back at times, I’ll give each stage of my journey a terror level out of 10.

Note this terror level is simply a measure of how personally close I came to laying bricks and has nothing to do with politics.  I know that 7 journalists, a few middle-aged protestors, and a guy in a chicken suit count as a full-blown terror alert to the current President of the United States, but this isn’t related to that.

First 5 Minutes: Terror Level 10/10

At first, it seemed wrong and unnatural.  Surely the car couldn’t actually be driving itself!  I had to fight the urge to grab the wheel and take control.  I was painfully aware I would be held responsible for anything that went wrong and worried my reflexes wouldn’t be fast enough to take over if necessary.  If I have to go to prison, I want it to be for crimes I commit and not as a robot’s patsy!

But the car didn’t do anything wrong.  It indicated and drove away from the side of the road, heading down the street as smoothly and easily as if I was in full control.  It wasn’t slow to accelerate, but not fast enough to be alarming.  Then it came to a T-intersection and paused, waiting for a suitable gap in traffic to present itself.  When one arrived, it pulled out without problem, and my tension began to drain away.

The Car Shows Caution: Terror Level 6/10

I don’t mean to boast, but I’m capable of remaining in a state of full panic for anything up to 20 minutes before I either relax (talking to people I don’t know) or go catatonic (quarterly meeting).  But my extended panic capability wasn’t required, as I started to calm down within the first 5 minutes.  By the 10 minute mark, the car had shown itself to be an effective driver.  Not only did it refrain from doing anything dangerous, it took sensible precautions to avoid potential problems.

An example occurred when we were in the middle of three lanes, and the human driver on our right started drifting towards us.  A fault human drivers often have is a tendency to move towards the lane they want to enter before they even indicate, often entirely subconsciously.  As it drew closer, the Tesla indicated and moved into the lane on our left to get out of its way.  If I had been driving, I wouldn’t have bothered.  I would have simply relied on the driver of the other car being smart enough not to collide with us.  The fact the robo-car was more cautious than I would have been was reassuring.

Robo-car Refrains From Peeling Out: Terror Level 4/10

Because the car displayed caution and changed lanes, we were now stuck behind a bus.  I was interested to see what the car would do, and it did nothing.  Or at least, nothing dangerous.  I knew the Tesla had more than enough acceleration to pull out into the faster moving lane on our right, but it would have to really move to pull it off.  To my relief, the car didn’t try anything — even though it could have — and we remained behind the bus, travelling at a sedate pace for a few minutes until it turned off.  This was more reassuring evidence that the car was cautious and unlikely to do anything that would get me killed.

At one point, the cars in front of us stopped at an intersection, but instead of pulling up behind the car in front, the Tesla robo-car left enough space to leave the side street open so vehicles could get in and out.  I appreciated it being a thoughtful driver.

Close, But No Cigar: Terror Level 5/10

While the car had done a good job of reassuring me it wasn’t in a hurry to get me killed, it did come closer to parked cars by the side of the road than I would have.  This was probably a good thing, as it’s safer to be close to stationary cars that are almost always empty and unlikely to move, than to be close to moving cars containing unpredictable organic drivers with sensory and computing structures composed of fatty quivering jelly.

But each time it got close, it tended to refrazzle my nerves, because I knew there would be no way I could react fast enough to do anything about it in the period of time between, “It looks like we might clip the sideview mirror on that car” and “We’re going to clip the sideview mirror on that car!”

Fortunately, we avoided an encounter of the close kind on every occasion, but these close misses weren’t good for my equilibrium.

No Mercy For Snakes, Road Debris, Or Little Yellow Bumps: Terror Level 4/10

At around 15 minutes into the drive, I was feeling reasonably relaxed.  I saw there was a strip of snake-like rubber on the road, which the car went straight over.  But I would have done exactly the same, so it was no problem. But the vehicle doesn’t appear to have any ability to notice small obstacles on the road.  They don’t even appear on the screen displaying what it “sees” around it.

Here’s a picture of the screen when stopped at an intersection:

While it may look as though the robo-car has a good idea of what’s going on, it’s less reassuring to watch in real time, as the vehicles displayed constantly change form, with sedans transforming into SUVs and trucks turning into buses, and then back again, as the car gathers information and tries to make sense of what’s going on around it.  When it comes to details, it seems like me without my glasses on.  Aware that other vehicles are there, but not too sure what they are.

However, it doesn’t have to “see” as well as a human does.  It just has to avoid accidents as well as a human does.  Or rather, better, since “Superior to human driving” is a far more effective selling point than “About the same as the average idiot on the road”.

The Tesla can see large speed bumps on the road, especially painted ones, and will slow down for them.  But it does go over them faster than I would.  This reduces the comfort of the ride, but I guess it gets you where you’re going a fraction of a second faster per bump.

But what it can’t see are little yellow speed bumps like these:

Or maybe it can see them and hates them so much it wants to hit every single one.  Although it could be altruism that motivates it, and it’s trying to hammer them all into the road surface to protect the rest of us from having to deal with them.

Bus Chicken: Terror Level 8/10

You know how I said the car gets a little close to stationary cars by the side of the road?  Well, the same applies to non-stationary buses coming towards you.  We were at an intersection and turning right, while the oncoming bus was turning to their right, and for a short period, we were directly heading towards each other.  The Tesla didn’t do anything technically wrong or illegal, but it did come closer to that bus than I would have.  There was a brief moment when I was wondering if we were going to have crunchy contact, combined with the horror of knowing my quarter-of-a-second reaction time would be inadequate to prevent it.  But it was fine.  We missed by multiple centimetres.  And the car’s upholstery was glad I took the precaution of eating a low-fibre diet the day before.

Navigation Is Fine: Terror Level 2/10

As we approached our destination, the car turned down a side street and took a route that I wouldn’t have, on account of it being longer.  At the time, I wondered if it was stupid or if these streets were easier to self-drive on.  But I later checked Google Maps, and it recommends going the way the Tesla chose because, while 200m longer, it’s generally quicker.

I’ll continue to take the direct route when I’m in an internal combustion vehicle to reduce fuel consumption and emissions by a tiny amount, but in an electric car charged with rooftop solar, there’s no real point in not taking the quickest way.

Can’t Park: Terror Level 1/10

We made it to IKEA without any impacts, which had a positive impact on my mood.  Rather than park itself, the car slowly moved through the car park until I had to take control because it was about to drive over some low-set concrete marking the parking areas.

I had a brief rest in the car park, but didn’t get out in case the car decided not to let me back in.

Return Trip: Terror Level -1/10

As I headed back, I was way more relaxed.  At first, I thought my fear had faded so fast because I was used to being a passenger, and this was similar.  But, after a little thought, I decided it was because I was already used to driving on autopilot.  But my own internal autopilot, rather than one running on silicon and code.  Most of the time when I’m driving my Hyundai Getz, I have no awareness of what I’m doing.  My body just drives automatically without my conscious attention.  This may be why it took less than half an hour for self-driving to feel natural to me.

As we rolled down the road, in my relaxed state, I briefly pretended I was using psychic powers to control the car.  But I decided that wasn’t a safe thing to do in case I decided to try to brake with my brain if a nun suddenly leapt in front of the car.  Instead, I started to wonder what would happen when this kind of automation spread to all areas of life.  Everyone wonders what it will do to work and human relationships, but what about animals?  Some people think we’ll get robot pets, but I think we will get robots to keep our pets company because humans are weird.  Will people marry robots?  How come you never see a robot with a beard?  If robots can grow beards and learn to tell bad jokes, will I be surplus to society’s requirements?

What The Hell Am I Doing?: Terror Level 11/10

At this point, I panicked, as I realised I had zoned out and had no idea whether or not my own personal autopilot had been monitoring the car’s autopiloting.  I immediately checked the rear view mirror for run-over nuns but saw none.  Either I hadn’t hit any, or I’d been zoned out for so long they were no longer in sight.  While I like to think I was unconsciously paying attention and would have acted to prevent an accident if necessary, I have no way of knowing that.

The car does have a camera that watches you and is supposed to trigger an alert if it appears you’re not paying attention.  But it has no way to know what’s going on behind my eyes.  It can’t tell if I’m daydreaming away and looking at an entirely different world.  And let me tell you, my daydreams can be pretty vivid.  I’m the sort of person who prefers to read the book rather than watch the movie because the book will have better visual effects.

The natural human tendency to lose focus when not in direct control makes Tesla Full Self Driving (Supervised) dangerous, in my opinion.  You might tell me that you always maintain focus in potentially dangerous situations and never let your attention wander, but I’d say that’s hardly relevant, as you’re clearly already a robot.

Final 5 Minutes: No Time For Fear

I didn’t go directly to Finn’s place, but instead parked by the ocean and took some pictures that made it look like a tree was growing out of the car.  I had to do the hard work of exiting from the nose in parking myself, but after that, the car took over without problem.

We were going through some side streets and approached an intersection with a railway crossing directly to the left, which was the direction we wanted to travel.  The boom gate was down while red warning lights flashed and bells rang.  There was no other traffic around as the car came to a full stop and I thought, “Okay, we’re playing this safe.”  Then the car started to move forward and turn to the left.  I was a little surprised because there wasn’t enough room before the crossing for the car to straighten out, but I thought, “Okay, we’re committing ourselves to this turn…”

It was at this point the car tried to drive us under a moving train.

If a voice had come over the car’s speakers saying, “From Hell’s heart, I stab at thee!” I would have at least known it was personal and not something other people need to watch out for.

It’s possible the car would have stopped by itself, but by the time I hit the brakes, it had gone over the line — in more ways than one.  If any police had been there to see it, I certainly could have copped a ticket.

You Can Nap While Your Car Drives – In The Future

As the car tried to commit suicide with me inside it by driving in front of a friend of Thomas the Tank Engine, I’m not entirely comfortable with recommending using Tesla Full Self Driving (Supervised).  Not if you’re fond of living.  As only around one hour passed between first meeting the robo-car and it trying to kill me, I don’t consider that as being safe enough.  It’s particularly disappointing given that, while many humans may want to kill me within an hour, they can generally last at least two before making the attempt.

I realise I’m basing this recommendation on a single data point, but to me, this point of data is very large and personally significant.  I know it’s bad form to allow sentiment to sway me like this, and I should allow the car to try to kill me around 30 times before I draw any firm conclusions, but this sort of behaviour is probably why you so rarely meet anyone who claims to be a statistician.

Unless you’re some sort of attention paying machine, I’d say the risk of losing focus and responding too slowly to danger is too great.  I realise this may not impress those who paid over $10,000 for Tesla Full Self Driving (Supervised), but this doesn’t mean it won’t improve.  In time, it may become safer than not using it.  But I’d want independent confirmation of that.  Don’t go believing what Elon Musk tells you.  On the topic of self-driving cars, his word is about as reliable as that of, well… Elon Musk.

For SolarQuotes founder Finn Peacock’s perspective, read his column on Tesla’s self-driving technology and the backlash against Elon Musk.