Indeed, cameras are absolutely necessary for self-driving. They're the only ones that can read lane markings, signs, etc. LIDAR alone is not sufficient - you cannot navigate the roads using nothing but an unlabled 3D scene. It simply does not have the necessary information for you to drive ie, is that hexagonal sign a STOP or a GO, pretty important bit of info.
So the question is: is LIDAR also necessary or are cameras sufficient? IE, can cameras+motion give you an accurate-enough 3D scene the way LIDAR can. And that's a narrow technical question, and it isn't even the most question when you consider self-driving as a whole.
"LIDAR is necessary" is not exclusively a Waymo talking point - it is shared by all companies using LIDAR, suppliers of LIDAR etc. But it is just a talking point, there's no reason to think it's actually true.
It's not necessarily a case of "LIDAR is necessary": it's more a case of how much more difficult it is to extract the necessary information with the necessary reliability from cameras alone (one important aspect I think is that LIDAR + HDmaps is very reliable at telling you 'something is there', even if it's not able to distinguish details. From the point of view of the car operating safely, that's a big deal). As it stands Tesla is behind waymo and making things harder for themselves (fundamentally because they've been trying to make it a consumer product, which constrains costs much more than aiming for robotaxis). It might mean they eventually get a much more cost competitive product, but that won't matter if they're beaten to market by 5-10 years (at the moment you can argue tesla is ahead in the areas their driver assist can operate and number of vehicles, but I think it's going to be much easier for waymo to scale up and to different areas than it is for tesla to progress their tech).
The reasons to think it’s actually true is because:
1. Only companies who have LiDAR in their stack have shown fully autonomous driving i.e. driverless.
2. Better 3D scene construction, which LiDAR, unquestionably provides permeates as an advantage throughout the stack.
I do think “LiDAR or not” is a narrow argument. But the advantages are massive and undeniable, so it becomes necessary especially in light of rapidly falling costs.
So the question is: is LIDAR also necessary or are cameras sufficient? IE, can cameras+motion give you an accurate-enough 3D scene the way LIDAR can. And that's a narrow technical question, and it isn't even the most question when you consider self-driving as a whole.
"LIDAR is necessary" is not exclusively a Waymo talking point - it is shared by all companies using LIDAR, suppliers of LIDAR etc. But it is just a talking point, there's no reason to think it's actually true.