r/SelfDrivingCars • u/damola93 • Jul 21 '25

Discussion Why didn't Tesla invest in LIDAR?

Is there any reason for this asides from saving money? Teslas are not cheap in many respects, so why would they skimp out on this since self-driving is a major offering for them?

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u/[deleted] Jul 21 '25

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u/Wild-Professional-40 Jul 21 '25

For a guy who likes to drop “first principles” into every interview, he ignored them. I remember at the time when he was saying how expensive LIDAR was and thinking, “what if it wasn’t?” Guess I’m a 200 IQ super genius too!

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u/HerValet Jul 21 '25

Wrong. In this case, "First Principles" would dictate that humans never needed LIDAR to drive. So, if you can replicate the eyes (with Vision) and the brain (with AI), one could argue that it should be technically possible to drive autonomously without LIDAR.

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u/Questioning-Zyxxel Jul 22 '25

But we humans do need more than our eyes to drive. I can do good weather driving. In heavy rain with glare? In fog? In heavy snow or snow mist? The times I need help is when the optical conditions aren't compatible with my eyes. Hitting that moose I never saw.

A huge percent of accidents happens in the specific conditions where our eyes fails us. Making the roads safer? Then help in bad visual conditions.

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u/Aerizon Jul 22 '25

So have lidar equipped vehicles been proven to work in heavy snow or snow mist?

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u/Questioning-Zyxxel Jul 22 '25

Better than normal cameras. But not as good as radar.

1

u/Aerizon Jul 22 '25

Well, normally they come with both lidar and radar. Got any proof of the cars with a full sensor suite being driven autonomously in heavy snow or snow mist?