Mark Rober, a former NASA engineer turned popular YouTuber, is known for his science-based content, has published his latest video, “Can You Fool a Self-Driving Car?”. The video, which purports to pit Tesla’s Autopilot against Luminar’s LiDAR technology, is anything but scientific, and appears to be intentionally misleading viewers on several fronts.
The first is the title of the video, ‘Can You Fool A Self Driving Car?’ implies Tesla’s FSD system is being tested. But it is quickly apparent that only Tesla’s standard Autopilot, a feature that hasn’t been updated in years and isn’t intended for collision-avoidance, was used.
Rober’s test involved seeing how Autopilot compared to a vehicle equipped with LiDAR from Luminar (more on that later) in a series of tests, punctuated by the final “cartoon wall” test to see if either car would drive through a wall painted to look like a road.
In the video published on YouTube, the Model Y slams through the wall, “without a tap of the brakes,” according to Rober. However, there were several inconsistencies with the video, the biggest of which was that Autopilot was not actually engaged at the time the vehicle collided with the wall.
At least in the version posted on YouTube.
Below are some stills from the video 1 second before impact, and at impact, showing no blue lines and no rainbow road to indicate Autopilot is active.
Once this was pointed out, the backlash only got worse when Rober released what he said was the “raw footage” of the test. Rober said Autopilot disengaged 17 frames before impact, however the video shows inconsistencies in when Autopilot was engaged.
In the video posted on YouTube, it was engaged at 39 mph, and just moments before hitting the wall while in the video posted on X, it was activated at 42 mph, and well before hitting the wall, clearly showing the test was performed multiple times and potentially manipulated for dramatic effect.
Here is the raw footage of my Tesla going through the wall. Not sure why it disengages 17 frames before hitting the wall but my feet weren’t touching the brake or gas. pic.twitter.com/ddmeyqO3ww
— Mark Rober (@MarkRober) March 17, 2025
Another major issue is the extensive promotion of Luminar’s LiDAR technology in the video. Throughout the video we get to see Luminar employees, Luminar branded merchandise, raising questions about the objectivity of the experiments.
Adding fuel to the controversy, Luminar prominently featured Rober’s video on its corporate website, at least until backlash forced them to remove it. This has led many to speculate whether the video was a paid promotion disguised as an impartial test.
Whether FSD would have performed better remains to be seen, but using software that is a decade old but purported to be Tesla’s latest, is misleading at best. That’s also ignoring the fact that the cartoon wall test itself is nothing more than entertainment – when was the last time you were driving and came upon a wall made to look like a road, in the middle of the road?
You can watch the full video below.
