Nope. Couldn't care less.
Nope. Couldn't care less.
Human error, and danger, and "red mist" is what makes racing... racing. If it's just bots going around a track, making perfect moves and perfect laps every time... that sounds awful.
pirate said:No, don't see the point. I do like to watch Battle Bots
Battle Bots was the first thing that came to mind here, too. But even those have a human operator, just by remote control. A Battle Bots Super Heavyweight demolition derby would be interesting. A series with autonomous cars that are out of their depth somehow might be fun to watch for a race or two if the robots are making hillarious mistakes. But I don't think it would have much staying power; it would start getting repetative after a while.
Ultimately, a story is about people. Robot racing is not a story about people. You might as well hold a drag race between two cannonballs to see which one gets to the finish line first.
Now, what if you had an event that was Man vs Machine? And you made the robot cars faster but fragile, so they would probably not survive a hit with the cars that carry humans... and no penalty for human-bot crashes? That could be epic.
I'd probably tune in to watch at least a couple races. I really don't watch racing right now anyway, only highlights. I doubt it would be as clinical as everyone thinks. Computers would just be calculating probability of success and I'd imagine it would come down to dev teams skill at modeling real world tire friction, car velocity, mass, etc. And then obviously how big of digital balls you program in (or really, what the lowest probability a car needs to attempt a maneuver)
Crashes would be spectacular.
To answer the original question ... nope.
200 MPH Battle Bots, maybe. Racing would be a hard no.
" Holy E36 M3, Junior, do you think the programmer will be able to race next week after tripping on the empty
Cheetos bag?"
"Boy. I don't know, Jeff. We've had a lot of Cheeto dust problems with the controllers lately, and PASCAR has done their best to get the crew moms to clean up, but this is the first time a basement dweller has actually gotten up from his chair, so the empty bags haven't been a problem yet."
Berkeley no, I wouldn't watch it.
Still need a "Hero Onboard" but since the current crop of race drivers are not far removed, I would be happy to have either of these two chaps step into the job. No helmets, suits or Hands devices needed. Mechanical interaction with the car controls? yes that should be maintained. In other words, the tin dudes need to drive in much the same manner as the current meat sacks. The driver needs to be a separate "entity" from the "car"
This might even re-awaken my dormant interest in racing because it would add a second technical race to the game; the development of AI and pseudo human analogues to do the driver task. It would be interesting to see what forms might emerge that would generate fan-base bonding. Maybe this dude ( but I think he would cheat)
One benefit is that it would now be possible to have direct POV from the driver.
I would not have to endure another celebrity life drama of divorce, bankruptcy or end of career antics.
No more family dynasty drivers.
If worse comes to worse, the "driver" can be re-booted from spare parts.
Just a thought
Pete
Doesn't anyone watch r/c races? I've been watching lots of them, they can be very exciting.
And if you like watching wrecks, even more so for some races!
I've posted some good ones before.
These are kinda creepy what you think?
I hardly watch racing now, so probably not. I like racing when I'm doing it (especially rally) but honestly have little interest in watching others do it. As much as I love rally, I couldn't care less what's going on in WRC or other rally series...
Yes, but only if the cars were weaponized and allowed to kill one another battlebots-style.
As far as im concerned the only benefit of autonomy that i'm really willing to trade anything for is if all the cars start driving twice as fast. If they don't do that I'd rather be driving myself and dealing with the cultural learning disability of our drivers like ive been doing for 20 years already. Having said that, my race watching would go from near-zero to zero if they all became autonomous. Remote control by a human could be ok, though. Drone racing is already pretty intense. I mean, if you look at basically the entire existence of video games, it all revolves around power fantasies about doing things that are likely to get you killed, without the possibility of getting killed doing them. So in that sense remote control racing could appeal broadly in the same way video games do, because people would 'drive' like they couldn't die anyway. But, it would also get farther and farther from reality and in a sense become inhuman.
In reply to RevRico :
Racing, especially NASCAR racing where the cars are one of three makes and models (right?) to me is more about the driver than the car.
In years gone by, I rooted for cars as well as the drivers. The cars in the modern era are so similar, it's hard to care what the bodies look like and that's where you end up hitching your wagon to the person behind the wheel.
Easy answer, no.
NO, NO and HE77 NO
nimblemotorsports said:Doesn't anyone watch r/c races? I've been watching lots of them, they can be very exciting.
And if you like watching wrecks, even more so for some races!
I've posted some good ones before.
These are kinda creepy what you think?
I don't get the driver suits. Since nobody is going to get hurt, lets get some individuality going here, Think of a cross between Barbie and Ratfink for example.
It's a car forum so the assumption that racing=cars makes sense, but 2 wheel racing control systems are a very long way off from being able to be faster than human pilots. But that control difficulty is only because of the inherent instability of 2 wheel vehicles, and at a basic level it begs the question why bother racing 2 wheel vehicles like MotoGP when 4 wheel vehicles like F1 are in a different world of laptime.
Of course this is only on pavement, an autonomous motorcycle capable of doing a full moto in supercross, or running the stages in Baja or Dakar on par with a human is something I doubt anyone is even imagning right now. Actually, something like Baja or Dakar could be the last bastion of human vs AI, as suspension advances have allowed 4 wheel vehicles to more consistently catch up to motorcycles, an AI 4 wheeler vs a human controlled motorcycle might end up pretty evenly matched.
I don't watch racing now, so no. However, I would follow the series. My favorite part of racing is the engineering and strategy. If the cars were autonomous, teams are given latitude about that implementation, I think it would be very interesting. I would not be interested in it if the cars were controlled remotely by a person.
I'm also excited for autonomous cars for the purpose of long distance travel, so anything that expedites that technology is a plus.
I’m in for watching 200mph death battle robot race cars.
At work, we sometimes have shows come in with "robot" follow spots. in essence they are remote controlled spots and the Spot Ops are back stage rather than up in the truss or catwalks. Why not something similar? The only issue would be the "feel" of the car, as we all know visual cues are not enough to get the most from any vehicle, racecar or not. While you could plumb in any number of cameras and microphones to give a 360 degree "experience" the remote drivers would never know how the car is slipping, braking, or even just how smoothly it is going down the track.
So, I do think that RC racecars would work better than fully AI ones, but I am not sure even that is the right step
AI racing? Probably not.
Real drivers in Sim controllers operating the cars? Perhaps.
I'd probably watch autonomous street vehicles go head to head on various tracks.
I think watching a Tesla do laps in 'autopilot' on Laguna Seca while battling with other Tesla's and whatever other manufacturers have come up with would be fun to watch as a one off series. No special preparations to the grid, showroom shape that anyone would purchase and drive off the lot (no better tires, no better suspension etc.)
Sure the power levels may be hugely off from car to car but I think that is what could make it appealing. Maybe a lower powered car has better AI and positions itself better for passing vs a more powerful car with an AI that can't position itself well on the track.
My two cents on the idea.
mad_machine said:The only issue would be the "feel" of the car, as we all know visual cues are not enough to get the most from any vehicle, racecar or not. While you could plumb in any number of cameras and microphones to give a 360 degree "experience" the remote drivers would never know how the car is slipping, braking, or even just how smoothly it is going down the track.
That's what accelerometers and gyroscopes are for, many cars and motorcycles already use them as traction/wheelie control inputs.
Autonomous race already scheduled at Indianapolis for Oct 2021. Googles can give ya all the info about it.
I think I would be more inclined to watch Autonomous cars than human drivered cars right now.
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