Bob, I remember raising the question at Enstone a while back (it would have to be
). Most folks felt that left foot for left stick was natural, indeed as do i now. The odd thing is that when i had my first go in an R22 (not so long ago BTW) i had to reprogram my reflexes when MR torque tried to rotate A/C. Also when thinking about some of the stuff in Prouty i have to think about pedals more carefully than i would expect. It just makes me wonder if convention is not intuitive.
What i really mean is you move stick/cyclic in way which you want A/C to go. You move cyclic or throttle in the way you want aircraft to go. On gliders you even move airbrake in direction you would expect, rearward to cause more drag. It is only pedals where you are pushing the aircraft way from the current ref.
I have the odd feeling that if you put someone in an A/C but didn't explain what the pedals did, they would guess left down pulled the aircraft right rather than pushed aircraft left. I suspect most pilots accept it the way it is because TR or rudder is behind them - rear wheel steering if you like.
Mart