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PaperclipPerfector  2d ago (text post)   1748 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for September 27, 2026

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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One obvious argument is that self-driving cars are safer than manual cars. Okay, but how much safer? Remember, they have to take on approximately triple of what is currently paid out in insurance and lawsuit settlements for accidents based in the US. Reduce that number by 50%, or 80%, and it's still huge. And it underestimates how safe cars actually are. The 6 million+ reportable accidents a year sounds like a lot. But that's in a country that drives over 3.3 trillion miles annually. It's one accident for more than a half a million miles driven. If you drive 15,000 miles per year every year between ages 18 and 85, you can expect to be involved in two reportable accidents in your lifetime. Any assumptions about the relative safety of Tesla's current offerings versus normal cars is based on a woefully inadequate sample size. I'm sure the thing is impressive, but how many miles have you driven it so far? 10,000? 20,000? I'm guessing fewer than even that, but even if you drove it 50,000 you'd still have to drive it more than 10 times as far before we'd expect even one accident.

You don't have to speculate. You can just look at the numbers. 82% fewer crashes. Hundreds of millions of miles driven. Sure, a few hundred million is a lot less than a trillion, but this isn't untested technology and we have some idea of what kind of safety improvements are possible. Now, keep in mind:

  1. Not all of the remaining 18% crashes are Waymo's fault.

  2. Tripling the payout per accident and then reducing the rate of payouts by 82% means total payouts are 50% lower even assuming all those crashes are Waymo's fault.

That's Waymo, not Tesla. Their vehicles aren't available for consumer purchase, but even if they were, they would be prohibitively expensive, and they're only designed to operate in geofenced areas that have been extensively mapped with a team of supervisors on hand to navigate tricky situations. But that's orthogonal to the main point, which is that they put their money where their mouth is; if you get hit by a Waymo, the company isn't going to blame the accident on the passenger. Of course, the reason they are able to do this is they have the most advanced cars currently possible and exercise a high degree of control over them. I don't think the situations are comparable to a company like Tesla that is manufacturing cars and selling them.

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