Originally Posted by
vilas
Aircraft have crashed, had incidents with one, two or even three pilots in front and for reasons like inability to land fully serviceable aircraft in VMC or executing an improper go around. So the safety theory with more humans in front doesn't hold any water. Piloting errors still remain major cause of accidents. Improved safety is due to more automation. Militant flashing of Human factors doesn't really come to the rescue of the pilot but in fact becomes the worst advertisement for human presence in the cockpit. Humans in front don't provide 100% Safety . So why expect 100% safety from fully automated aircraft? As long as it is better than human operating aircraft and significantly cheaper it will be accepted. It's the March of technology it may be delayed but can't be stayed.
This is a really interesting point. I believe the same to be true of self driving cars at the moment. Humans not providing 100% = automation not having to either does make sense at some level, but there's a bit of a moral / ethical question about a machine being unsafe vs. 'what if there'd been a pilot there'. As you say, time will likely cause us to accept the higher-than-human-safety-stamdards-but-not-100%-either, but I don't believe anyone will accept it in the near future.