tyro: " growing army of little machines relentlessly making inroads into the decision-making prerogative of the pilot"
name one
actually ,excepting the tcas, there is no other system on a plane which will decide for the pilots or atc.Human authority prevails over all system on board.
There are some warning systems,but their destination is to improve the safety,alerting you of some erors you can do (for ex CFIT)
No system will decide instead of capt how to fly,plan a flight,solve an emergency (we have the QRH,but even there says ' checklists are not intended to replace good judgement.In some cases ,deviation from checklists may,at captain's discretion,be necessary.')
All systems will give inputs to the pilots,they decide what to do,based on sop's ,experience,good judgement,finally airmanship.Even on airbuses.
As I said before,even Enterprise,or Andromeda have pilots.Not to mention the 'positronic,...' brain.
My guess is that ,in some form or another,there will always be pilots on board of a plane.By our nature we like to be in control of our life.Not some 'friendly' machine,machine,ine,ine...
Brgds Alex