Tesla thinks the moon is a traffic light
Tesla in autopilot mode. (Image: Flystock / Shutterstock)
The moon hung low, was very yellow and large. Even the human eye could have mistaken this moon for a yellow traffic light for a split second. This Tesla held it for a minute.
Tesla driver Jordan Nelson has pointed out a strange mistake to Tesla boss Elon Musk via Twitter. He had switched on the “Full Self-Driving” autopilot function and noticed that his vehicle had repeatedly reduced its speed. It quickly became clear that a low hanging moon was the cause of the action. The autopilot thought it was a yellow traffic light and visualized it accordingly on the information display.
Nelson attached the corresponding video to his tweet. In addition to the confusion of the moon and traffic lights, the fact that the Tesla autopilot drives at 65 miles per hour, although the speed limit is 55 miles per hour. This begs the question of what stage of development the autopilot is actually in. Certainly, the misinterpretation of the moon can pass as a so-called edge case, i.e. as an error that is difficult to foresee. This should not apply to “automatic” speeding violations.
Elon Musk recently admitted that in the past he was too optimistic about the self-driving mode of his electric cars. Various accidents related to the autopilot system are currently being investigated by the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTA).
