Originally Posted by
vilas
You are making too many assumptions. Pilots are not blamed straight away. The inquiry says it's purpose is not to assign blame. It takes years two publish inquiry report there was no question of blaming Sully. He was faced with something not in the book nor practiced, he landed in water. Had he gone back he would have been blamed because he wouldn't have made it. When majority of accidents are due to pilot error it is a fact of life. Emirates 521 B777 go around accident pilot didn't know his thrust was at idle who should be blamed? PK8303 Karachi pilot did not do a single thing as per procedure, who will be blamed? We as humans have problems in the air. That's why they are called human factors but not being a bird we done a pretty good job. Don't discuss MAX because it should not have been designed. Yes Boeing trying to blame Pilots was nothing short of criminal. It's a jugglery now between humans and computers. If humans make mistake so will computers but it's matter of which is safer. Naturally it's emotional issue with pilots but technology marches relentlessly. Besides aviation is a business like any other. You sell wine, computers, hotel rooms or aircaft seats it's no different it's done to make profit. What's profitable will decide the future. Poor piloting is a bad advertisement for human presence in the cockpit. Take AF447 unreliable speed accident. How was it solved automation. First came back up speed scale now in A350 it's backup speed itself. Pilot does nothing. Computers do it and inform the pilot we are on alternate speed. This is an endless discussion. Piloting is not the only issue. Humans won't be required for most jobs or at least not in those numbers. It's a serious problem.
There is no determination as to whether computers or humans are safer. Aviation like many endeavors is human-computer interaction based. Self-checkouts are more convenient but more error-prone than a live cashier, MCAS killed a bunch of people due to sensor and systems errors, drivers crash all the time on the road, self-driving cars also crash. There is no statistical technique that can show robustly that more automation will make flying safer in and of itself. Airbuses are a different breed than Boeings, and I like both aviation philosophies but Airbuses malfunction too. There is no way to know if computers will reduce the estimated 75%-85% causal factors of pilot error, if such an estimate is really accurate. Look, I love CS/IT and AI/ML. It is a huge and blossoming field, but I believe it is you making too many assumptions.