I haven’t had the experience of driving in proximity to a Waymo vehicle like you have. Your statement could be viewed as taking a conservative approach to that automation is in itself a shortcut. That of course is speculation; I feel confident that when it comes to automated driving by virtue of the infancy of the technology, there are things we don’t know that we don’t know yet.
I’m thinking the conservative approach in this context is a shortcut to solving all of the problems. For example, hitting the brakes at any unrecognized object keeps the passengers safe, and is a shortcut in that the recognition models for that particular object don’t have to be ironed out. Or, selecting a test city like Chandler, approx 60 years old, having the signal pole and crosswalks positioned at the same offset from every intersection is in itself a shortcut. That tech will never work in The Hollywood Hills, for example.
