Auto•No•Mo’•Us: Addressing the Totality of the Driverless Car. By multiple authors, Car and Driver, November 2017, http://bit.ly/2ASoumr. The feature story of this issue devotes 42 pages to the driverless vehicle. This collection was edited by the iconoclast Malcolm Gladwell, author of The Tipping Point. Seventeen authors contributed to the series with titles such as “How Safe Is Safe Enough?”; “Man Versus Machine: Before Computers Master the Art of Driving, They Need to Become More Human”; and “Can a Connected Car Ever Be Safe From Hacking?” The lead article, “What Happens When We Give Up Control of Our Cars? A History of Unintended Consequences,” by Gladwell, describes how “the new class of electronically directed vehicles is the opposite of autonomous: is a return to the idea that we are better off leaving the task of driving to a third-party.” Autonomous vehicles are not really autonomous but depend on a network of rules, regulations, and expectations. Gladwell views the current generation of high school students as “viewing the automobile trip as a social setting within which mechanical demands become a distraction, a nuisance, and possibly even an embarrassment.” Perhaps reflecting the view of the typical reader of Car and Driver, he concludes with “Heaven help us.” “In How Safe Is Safe Enough?” Tom Vanderbilt uses National Highway Traffic Safety Administration data to demonstrate “that a significant percentage of crashes isn’t caused by human error.” He notes that “driverless vehicles, marketed as a correction to human error, will have to overcome our low threshold for betrayal [by the manufacturer and system developer].”
Navy Crews at Fault in Fatal Collisions, Investigations Find. By D. B. Larter, Navy Times, November 1, 2017, http://bit.ly/2z6oty0. This summer, two unrelated accidents in the Pacific Ocean claimed the lives of 17 sailors and injured dozens aboard the destroyers USS Fitzgerald and USS McCain. The accidents were attributed to breakdowns in standard operating procedure (SOP) and poor decisions by bridge personnel. In neither case was a shipwide collision alarm sounded, as is SOP. Nor were there any attempts at ship-to-ship communications. The accidents were attributed to loss of situation awareness while transiting busy waterways. In the case of the Fitzgerald, the Combat Information Center crew had not tuned their radars to monitor local ship traffic, nor were they using the Automated Identification System, which is similar to an aircraft’s identification friend-or-foe system. Additionally, the lookouts were not watching both sides of the vessel. In the case of the McCain, the commanding officer, who was on the bridge throughout the incident, had less experienced personnel on his bridge. A confused helmsman, thinking there was a mechanical steerage failure, improperly transferred steering control to a new station. Due to the loss of situation awareness, the steering configuration was changed five times in the 3 min before the collision. A formal navy “Comprehensive Review of Recent Surface Force Incidents” (http://bit.ly/2ik78aA) identified the following problem areas and recommended solutions: poor seamanship and failure to follow safe navigational practices; degraded watch team performance; erosion of crew readiness, planning, and safety practices; headquarters processes that inadequately identified, assessed, and managed operational risk; assessments that did not reinforce effective learning; “can-do” culture that undermined basic watch standing and safety standards; and surface ship bridges that were not modernized as an integrated control room. A new navy SOP calls for broadcasting ship coordinates when in busy waterways (http://n.pr/2ikZHjs). Vessel tracks can be viewed at http://bit.ly/2A3bfT1.
Industrial Designers Society of America (IDSA) Annual Design Competition. http://bit.ly/2A2tisf. The annual IDSA design competition provides awards in 34 areas. This year’s recipients include Google’s Daydream View immersive-reality headset, Google Home, Logitech’s Multidevice Wireless Keyboard, Microsoft’s HoloLens, Chromebook, Jamboard, Polaroid Snap Touch, and Tile Mate. This site presents the leading edge of design.
In Pursuit of the Perfect Spacesuit. By Mark Harris, Air and Space, September 2017, http://bit.ly/2zHFG04. Harris describes the multitude of trade-offs considered in the design of spacesuits. He discusses differences between spacesuits designed for ascent-descent, extracurricular activity, and the exploration of planets. The article also describes trade-offs between pressure suits and mechanical counterpressure suits and between flexibility/dexterity and protection. Injuries to astronauts during training requiring spacesuits are also discussed.
Ford Reveals It Was Behind Viral Virginia Stunt That Shocked Residents Last Month With “Driverless” Van Being Controlled by a Man Disguised as a Car Seat. By Sage Lazzaro, Daily Mail, September 15, 2017, http://dailym.ai/2ika9Ys. A video shows the clever strategy for simulating driverless vehicles and studying hand waves and informal communications between pedestrians and these “driverless vehicles.”
Additional Links
“Cozy” Airline Seats May Impede Safe Egress. http://nyti.ms/2huE92U
Super Helmet for the F-35 pilot combines a sensor suite, night vision technology, information-packed display systems, and eye-tracking and targeting capability. http://bit.ly/2hCV47g
PSYBER Security. No, that’s not a spelling error; read how using social influences can increase the use of protective security features. Nancy Cooke, a Human Factors and Ergonomics Society Fellow, is developing techniques for deceiving cyber attackers. http://bit.ly/2zFHsPB
A More Automated Goldmine. By using remote automated tools and monitoring human performance, digging costs have been reduced by 25%. http://bit.ly/2hwCKsI
You Are Not the User: The False-Consensus Effect. http://bit.ly/2zGChih
Trust Between Humans and Autonomous Vehicles. http://ubm.io/2z5I0Pk
Thinking Like Designers. http://n.pr/2zMfRcW
Failure Is an Option. http://n.pr/2z5m9rh
Why Do Complex Systems Thrive on Trial and Error? http://n.pr/2hE7mwd
When a Project Fails, Should the Workers Get a Bonus? Remember Google Glass? http://n.pr/2zOMLKh
Citizens Collecting Data After Disasters (Fukushima nuclear incident). http://n.pr/2zM1C7V
Two Contrasting Views of the South Korea Ferry Accident. A 10-min video describes the loss of 295 lives when an overloaded ferry capsized. http://bit.ly/2zLWjFD
Driving Safer, Diving Longer. Consumer Reports provides information on training older drivers; accident data organized by age; designing for older drivers; imagining a carless future. http://bit.ly/2zFC0vR
Tips to Improve Medical Device Design and Usability. http://bit.ly/2yL9KnX
