Lead Ballon,
"But there will never be an aircraft structure or systems that are 100% reliable. Never."
Correct, and where does he even suggest anything like that? What I'd suggest he is arguing is the difference between what a C/B analysis and what a science / stats based view is, I don't believe they are the same, I'd go as far as to say that a C/B analysis is pretty subjective.
"Any idiot can come up with the idea that it would be great if aircraft structures and systems were 100% reliable and that it's an outcome 'worth' pursuing."
Can you name the idiot who has claimed the above? No, and he hasn't made any such claims either, these are strawman arguments. There is NO 100% reliable ANYTHING!
As to your comments on the ATSB findings on the Community Service Flight accident rate I'd like to see a counter argument on their stats, using statistical analysis, not just someone in a senate hearing claiming they got it wrong. By saying this I'm not making judgement on it, but it would be pretty stupid of them to just randomly make statements like that when it would be easy enough to get a statistician to review it. I would add I think CASA and the ATSB are way too close for my comfort.
"It's about the fact that the number of beans will always be finite, and that all day - every day - decisions must be made about how many of those finite beans will be allocated to mitigate what risks among the infinite number of risks we all face."
Sure, but it's amazing that pilots on Prune lambaste bean counters all the time about the way they count the beans and allocate them. Because it's so subjective. Work for a company that cut up an aircraft which the Flight & Eng depts loved as it was in good condition, except the bean counters said is wasn't as cheap to run! This is what I believe he's arguing against, not a blanket "it must be accident proof", ****, he's an engineer (tertiary trained, not a LAME and by saying that I'm not putting them below pilots) and he'd know ALL about what you are railing against.
I'd suggest he's also against your "The contemporary 'High Priest' in airworthiness in CASA........" for the same reasons.
Btw, I haven't bothered to read anything other than the quoted parts of his submission, and don't think I need to otherwise it should have been included in the piece.