Words have consequences, especially when uttered by someone who has an enormous public following. For almost ten years, regulators have been wrangling with Elon Musk over his claims that Tesla automobiles can drive themselves with little to no input from human drivers. The name “Autopilot” has been controversial from the start, as many contend it lulls drivers into a false sense of security.
Musk, in his own inimitable fashion, has refused to consider changing the name to something less controversial. Full Self Driving implies the system is capable of Level 4 autonomous driving, which it clearly is not. It may be good, it may even be very good, but it is at best a Level 2+ system.
Even Tesla admits drivers must “supervise” it, which confuses the situation even more. A year ago, the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration (NHTSA) issued a directive that required Tesla to “recall” all of its cars sold in the US that had the “Autosteer on City Streets” feature installed (“recall” in this case meant that it had to roll out a software update). NHTSA describes the defect as follows: “FSD Beta is an SAE Level 2 driver support feature that can provide steering and braking/acceleration support to the driver under certain operating limitations.
With FSD Beta, as with all SAE Level 2 driver support features, the driver is responsible for operation of the vehicle whenever the feature is engaged and must constantly supervise the feature and intervene (e.
