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Comment by LeoPanthera | Hacker News Reader

I'm not a pilot, but I have had flying lessons. Airplane autopilots are extremely simple. They can basically fly you in a straight line, at a fixed altitude. Tesla's autopilot is actually way more advanced than those found in airplanes.

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I think you're forgetting (more than a few) important functions that an airliner autopilot can do. Off the top of my head there's auto-throttle, auto-trim, and of course, if the runway is equipped, land the plane.

Also, if the pilots input a heading change, the plane will execute a 1G turn using all control surfaces so it's almost imperceptible to the passengers.

I think you're oversimplifying airliner autopilot.. by a lot.

I think that the comparison of an aircraft autopilot to a car autopilot is just apples to oranges. They both operate in completely different environments, with different amounts and types of noise, are designed at a high level to do totally different things (yes they both "steer", but the problems they solve have no overlap), and are functionally completely different. I see this comparison a lot, and it doesn't add anything to the conversation, other than pointless bickering.

"autopilot" covers everything from a wing leveler to what you're describing. GP's description is entirely accurate for a general aviation airplane.

It's accurate but misleading when the training for general aviation costs a significant fraction of the car in question in 1 on 1 training alone. That Tesla is using a term easily misinterpreted by anyone who hasn't read an avionics manual stinks real bad.

>and of course, if the runway is equipped, land the plane.

There is certainly no such thing as an auto-land system in which the pilots are not required to be ready to take full control of the aircraft at a moment's notice. It is Level 2 in the strictest sense.

My Tesla (or at least the one from my colleague I occasionally get to drive) blaring out "MINIMUMS" would definitely get my attention quicker than the soft chimes they have now when autopilot disengages.

Autopilots run the gamut from simple wing-levelers to fully automated departures, en route navigation, arrival procedures, landings, and runway rollouts. You'd be amazed what even a light piston single-engine can pack. Just today I flew a light single with an autopilot that can do climbs, descents, level-offs, en route nav, and precision approaches (lateral nav + glideslope) down to 200' AGL. That leaves maybe two minutes of the entire flight that require hand-flying, in a box the size of a small car stereo. Pretty good stuff.

A commercial airliner autopilot (the kind people think of when you say autopilot) can perform evasive maneuvers and land the plane.

What are they evading?

Other airplanes.

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

If you are interested to read more

Other airplanes. Also the ground.

But the simple autopilots (think an old Cessna) don't even try to avoid the ground for you. If you set it and forget it, you may find yourself dead on a mountainside.

You can absolutely crash a modern plane by entering altitude 0. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-32063587

There are runways below sea level.

And low pressure zones.

With a recent software update, Tesla cars now perform evasive maneuvers when necessary even when autopilot is turned off.

There is a growing body of videos from dashcams (a feature enabled by another software update) on youtube showing Teslas avoiding collisions that would have been caused by other drivers being negligent.

Landing a plane is fairly trivial considering that autopilot simply guides the aircraft down a radio beam, cuts throttle and raises its nose a bit when on-board radio altimeter crosses below 50 feet. First fully automated landing in revenue service predates the first microprocessor, which should give an idea of the tech used.

The difficult part is decision-making in non-standard situations like Sully landing on the Hudson with his A320.

Don't you need a special landing system for the system to automatically land the plane?

Can you say more about evasive maneuvers? TCAS provides only advisory information, but doesn't control a plane, I thought.

What do you conclude about Tesla autopilot from this?

By that argument, every car with cruise control (i.e. almost all of them) has autopilot.

Clearly, with their naming of their system as autopilot rather than cruise control, Tesla is trying to imply that autopilot means something more. Namely, it means the driver / pilot can offload the work of routine driving / flying to the computer, only intervening in certain times (e.g. off0highway or takeoff / landing) or in the event of failures / extreme conditions.

Do you understand the difference between going in a straight line and going at a consistent speed?

Cruise control only enables the latter.

To go straight in a car, just release the steering wheel.

Straight isn’t everything. Autopilot keeps you in your lane even as the road curves. With caveats. It’s beta after all.

It its "in beta" as you say, keep it on private roads until out of beta. Sincerely, everyone else.

No way. Even in beta, I’d much rather put up with roads full of autopilot Teslas than a road full of human drivers. Have you seen how people drive?

In beta it’s probably still better than most humans, so that stance makes no sense. We’d do better to get human drivers off the roads.

Given that the answer to your "question" is obviously going to be yes, why did you choose that tone? Do you think there's a virtue to being dismissive and rude? Does it accomplish some worthwhile goal?

You're probably right. I wasn't trying to be dismissive, I just naturally matched OP's energy without giving it much thought. But with a little forethought I could have presented my argument with a more neutral tone.

So Tesla autopilot is superior to cruise control because it keeps you going in a straight line, and that's totally a feature car consumers need?

It's not about what the autopilot does, but what the driver/pilot has to do while it's on. In a plane, you don't need to be ready to take over instantly at any moment with autopilot on, right?

I think the pilot absolutely has to be ready to take over at any moment. I know that at least on general aviation aircraft the autopilot can automatically disconnect for any number of reasons, including various weather conditions. When that happens the pilot has to immediately resume hand-flying.

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