For the majority of your points, I'll say "I disagree." Not all mass transit is loathed, if it's done comfortably and successfully. I hear Japan's subway mass transit is pretty fucking nifty, for example. If mass transit is adopted as a major solution, customer demand for positive experiences will probably be enough for people to figure out how to do things well. I think price point will also be a sticking point as well. I further my argument with my response to goobster here . . . To which I'll also add that in answer to part of the reason buses are so expensive for cities to purchase as well as your complaint about airlines and economy class, that's a drawback of captive markets. Once again, if there's more competition, there will be better options for the consumers. All of that fucking said, today on my drive home, I realized there's a good chance we might all end up right because who's to say that the automated transportation market won't be tiered just like the transportation market today is tiered. Bougie trust fund kiddies will have their private cars while the ditch digging plebians will have to learn to make do with mass transit.
You're not really making great counterarguments when you are pointing to Wikipedia articles and saying "hey so Japan is kinda lewd so you're wrong" - it borders on insulting. What makes you think I don't know that already? I've been studying transportation for the past few years, and that includes the transport economics that you're only scratching the surface of. I spent 59.5 hours in the best PT system outside of Japan this month alone. By all means disagree or challenge my assumptions - I don't know everything - but don't misinterpret my argument and then point me to Wikipedia when you're on my turf. I wasn't saying mass transit was loathed by everyone (although there is plenty of evidence that people prefer driving most of the time). I was talking about transfers. Grouped transportation (PT, airlines) offer little to no door-to-door routes because there are incredible economies of scale when you group people that sorta go in the same direction. Look at the airline industry: what routes don't they fly? Well, there's no route from Amsterdam to, say, Huntsville Alamaba. But there are plenty of planes going across the Atlantic and already planes going from Huntsville to Atlanta, so with a stop in Atlanta you can just join the crowd and get there for a reasonable price. Hub-and-spoke is incredibly efficient, because it can reduce the number of routes you service by more than an order of magnitude while still serving everyone. And this hub-and-spoke model increases the number of passengers on the links you do serve, which means you have enough people to not lose all your money flying planes. BUT it entails transfers, which are systematically disliked by everyone (yes, even in Japan). And the routes are almost always indirect and meandering. My internship is south from where I live. But instead of going south, I bike 10 minutes west to the train station, take a train that goes south but also to the east, and then take a subway that goes southwest to end up at my destination. If I would drive directly I'd always be faster, simply because it would be a more direct route. Which is what I was trying to argue: a taxi-service is small scale and direct and will beat out a fixed-line PT system from a service point of view, AV or not. We're not all in taxis and Ubers though, because as you point out, the cost also matters. Here's a fun fact: on average, owning a car in the US costs $0.40 per kilometer, including taxes and maintenance but excluding parking. AV's, when they aren't owned by individuals but can be summoned like an Uber, are expected to cost one-fifth of that. Yes, in no small part because of large scale vehicle production and maintenance. But even if that is only achieved partially, the business case for AV-based taxi service is enormous because the largest expense (the humans) gets thrown out of the window. Imagine if you can get anywhere in your city for a dollar or two, faster and with more comfort than public transportation or driving. That is what efficiency is really about: reductions in cost, labor, energy and time that add up to such a significant change from what we have now that it's worth looking out for. Maybe it will pick up a few people along the way, maybe you pay extra to be left alone, who knows. A lot of the talking points in here are clouded by uncertainties, including what I just said. For example, it is very likely that automated driving in complex urban environments (as opposed to the much easier problem of highway driving) is decades away. If that's the case, fixed long-distance highway drives might be the largest benefit in the short term: automated freight trucking and automated Greyhound / Flixbus instead of automated Uber. As I said to wasoxygen earlier this week...it depends. It all depends on a lot of factors.
I can't believe you'd say that! Quite frankly, I'm insulted that you're insulted! I kid of course. Don't be insulted man, seriously. If anything, I'm tickled pink to be talking to you about this because you know so much. Fucking ask kleinbl00 about me and him and economics and shit. I've probably annoyed the crap out of him with our discussions a dozen times over but I enjoy them because they are insightful, his words help me explore things, and I enjoy his feedback. In all honesty, if this is bugging you, just say "You know, this isn't really the discussion I wanna have with you, so let's cut it" and I'm fine with that. But you're frustrated now and I don't want you to be frustrated, so let's just table this conversation and maybe down the road, when the subject comes up again (cause we both know it will), we can talk about it some more. For what it's worth, my disagreeing with you isn't me being dismissive of your experience, my disagreeing with you is my seeing things differently and wanting to talk to you to get your perspective. Which you've offered and I appreciate. But once again, you're frustrated and I don't want that, so let's just cut it here for now. Edit: Also, I use Wikipedia a lot. It's a crutch of mine. Sorry.it borders on insulting.
I'm not insulted or frustrated! Mildly bugged at most. It's just that it comes off as disrespectful when I carefully build my argument and then you say "Nope!" without saying why you disagree. A discussion is a two way street, IMO. Not that that should stop you from buggin' me, but it might make more sense to ask more, like what you want me to opine about. :) Protip: read more nonfiction! Makes you sound smart as hell.my disagreeing with you isn't me being dismissive of your experience, my disagreeing with you is my seeing things differently and wanting to talk to you to get your perspective.
Edit: Also, I use Wikipedia a lot. It's a crutch of mine. Sorry.
Want a bit of a different discussion? You're gonna love this, cause it's meta as shit. In order for me to explain why I disagree I'd first have to know why I disagree myself and that's just not how I roll bro. Firstly, I'm not a very smart man. Like, at all. Which is fine by me because A) that makes absolutely everything I expose myself to the most fascinating shit in the world and B) when I do figure shit out, it's exciting as balls. Secondly, you gotta understand that my discussion style compared you, kleinbl00, and pretty much half the people on Hubski is very different. When you guys all talk, it's all FACTS! FIGURES! CHARTS! CITATION! CROSS REFERENCES! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! Stick that shit in your debate pipe and smoke it! Which, don't get me wrong, is awesome as shit. You guys have the memory retention of lore masters and the Google-Fu of fucking cyber ninjas and that's amazing. My discussion style? It's nothing like that. It's all, personal experiences, emotional recollection, anecdotes, general observation, inquiry. I'm less facts, facts, facts, and more general idea. I'm not stepping up to the debate podium and throwing down with you guys, cause unless we're debating philosophics, I'm not gonna have a leg to stand on because I don't even know where the legs are let alone what foundation is beneath them. (And on the occasions when I do step up to the podium, I'm all like "Mother fuckers, come fact check me.") Not that I'd want that anyway because that's contentious and disharmonious and honestly, more often than not, the more people actually debate shit the more people tend to not get along. Which, don't get me wrong, cause it's fun in the short term, but honestly? My relationship with some users gets strained from time to time because we debate shit. So don't think of me as a debate opponent, think of me as the guy who invites you to sit on my back patio to listen to the summer cicadas with me while I ask you to talk about what you find fascinating. That said, when I say "I disagree blah blah blah blah" what I'm actually doing is saying "please, continue" but just responding "please continue" is A) rude and B) doesn't give you much to go on. Where if I throw anything that I think is remotely relevent out there, you can be all "I'm glad you brought that up cause check the magic shit I'm about to tell you now!" Wikipedia is my non-fiction. I'm literally addicted. :(Mildly bugged at most. It's just that it comes off as disrespectful when I carefully build my argument and then you say "Nope!" without saying why you disagree.
Protip: read more nonfiction! Makes you sound smart as hell.
That's fine 'n'all and it's duly noted. All I want to say is that when you want to achieve this: that there is a better way that doesn't raise anyone's ruffles. If you say 'well I disagree because X', then my only response can be to rebut your X or agree with your X. It puts me or goob in a defensive position: we'll put our shields up and rebut. My point is: it doesn't leave a lot of room to talk about anything else. But if instead you were to ask questions or to build upon what goobster or kleinbl00 or I write in our wall'o'texts, the conversation can go all different places! You can get a lot more and different responses if you go "hey, what do you mean by this part?", "how does X and Y relate?", "oh! that reminds me of the time I...", etc., etc. Think of it this way: "please continue!" is never rude if it's formulated as a question. Does that make sense? :)My discussion style? It's nothing like that.
what I'm actually doing is saying "please, continue" but just responding "please continue" is A) rude and B) doesn't give you much to go on. Where if I throw anything that I think is remotely relevent out there, you can be all "I'm glad you brought that up cause check the magic shit I'm about to tell you now!"
An observation, since I've been shouted out like three times here: goobster, rd95, veen but directed entirely at rd95: - You may be fascinated by all this and use it as a means to knowledge, but if your counterpart isn't enjoying it, you lose. When your style of discussion revolves around "here's a counterargument to what you just said" the conversation will necessarily focus on shutting down, not opening up. - You may browse Wikipedia to find answers but the people you're talking to just know shit. So while you getting an argument countermanded reads as "I guess I didn't understand the argument" to you, to your counterparts it reads as "you don't know shit, here let me pull something tangential off of Wikipedia to shut you down." - You may think that "please continue" is rude but "I'm going to attempt to close off other avenues of discussion" is ruder. This discussion is likely relevant to your interests. Veen and I get along really well and damn near came to blows over the concept of "mapping." This is due because he's neck-deep into the theory of mapping and my experience has been with the practice of mapping and we were talking across each other for entirely too long. Here's a great highlight: NASA scientist sick of debunking Planet X doomsday theories Word to the wise: when you start to suspect that you're talking to an expert, start to respect the expert's expertise. It isn't just you and Wikipedia making conversation, it's "how can I continue this discussion without being one of those assholes that drives expertise off the internet." Wanna see what it looks like when a skunk raises its tail? I work for Continental Corporation, and Daimler Trucks North America. That's a cat with it's hair up, a pufferfish puffed, a dog growling around a hambone. The Internet think that it's the "appeal to authority fallacy" because Reddit et. al. have created a world where having expertise is somehow a losing proposition but in the non-internet world, knowing shit still counts for something. And I know you didn't mean to discount the knowledge of the people you were talking to. That's totally not you. But it doesn't take much. Everybody I know who knows audio avoids the shit out of gearslutz... and they'd perish the thought of visiting Reddit. I among them. It's no fun being told you're full of shit by someone who is clearly, plainly, demonstrably full of shit. And if you're the expert and they're not, they know you're full of shit long before you do.The "arrogant" engineers are the ones that know they know more than you and are sick of having to explain it. They're the ones whose knowledge is called into question because somebody just did a study somewhere. They're the ones being forced to (temporarily) rewrite their entire code of behavior because some expert somewhere in another unrelated field has better PR.
This is not true at any scale.
goobster, veen, for some reason I let myself get dogged on this and I chose the worse time to be dogged on something because my head is fuzzy and it obviously shows and while that's a reason it's not a good excuse because this all turned into a big mess and I can't help but feel guilty for making you guys angry and so I'm really, really sorry. kleinbl00, sorry for shouting out to you if you thought I was trying to drag you into this. I wasn't. I just always use the "@" symbol when mentioning a specific user on here because I don't want people to think I'm talking about them behind their back. I really and truly feel bad about getting out of hand and I feel really childish and I'm incredibly embarrassed and I respect the hell out of the three of you and I'm honestly so truly sorry and if there's anything I can do to make it up to any of you just let me know and I'll see what I can figure. Edit: And sorry to Hubski as a whole for making a shit show to witness to begin with.
Hey man... THANK YOU. That's a truly generous thing to say, and I appreciate it. I haven't logged into Hubski all weekend because I was fully expecting to be either blocked (again), or have some real nastiness to address when I got here. I didn't want to argue any more, and didn't know how to unwind where we had gotten to... Thanks for getting BOTH of us out of this unpleasantness, with grace and style. I really appreciate it.
The tiered point is the one I want to make. I think there will be 2 seaters for most of the middle class and very nice two seaters for higher levels of society. But the current technical changes don't address social issues like stratification - and so some lesser option will exist. Even if it's for no other reason than to make the two seater seem better, some kind of mass people mover will be the affordable option. It feels like that aspect of purchasing status is deeply sowed in our system and won't be solved by automation.