It is my experience that pilots rely on EICAS, rote checklists and full automation for one reason- that's how they're taught. The old "whole man" concept of teaching the full system first, then how to use it, is just harder and therefore not done.
I've met 3 MD-11 pilots in the last year, including one captain, who believed that it was a fly-by-wire aircraft. Eight weeks of training and they didn't even know that the control system is almost identical to the DC-10 (except for some stability augmentation).