The big problem, it seems to me ( regardless of experience) is the trend toward 'unflying' pilots - Primarily highlighted by Airbus and their vaunted fly-by-wire schemes but also many airlines SOP's not only demanding automation for just about everything, but penalizing any hand flying as well.
Look at some of recent latest accidents - where the right action is taken- but too late. Many involve a frantic flipping through checklists, manuals, rebooting systems, trying to source flashing lights.. all but what should be instinctive maintaining attitude,speed and altitude.
I understand the wish for automation, it reduces fatigue and over 100's of miles of flying the incremental handling differences at cruise even at 1/2 of a percent in increased efficiency, translate to bottom line savings. But longer periods of -and a greater degree of of 'operator disconnection' with the aircraft make it more difficult for the pilot to 'reconnect' when the aircraft gets startled and throws the controls back in his lap with a 'here, YOU fly it!'; (along with one or more hamstrung 'law modes' which may or may not be immediately obvious in a turbulent situation).
The pilot 'monitoring the systems' means you dont have a pilot anymore, and repetitively watching an input stream for hiccups is a job for a computer -not a human! What I'd like to see is a total flip of the equation, where instead of extended auto-pilot mode, you have instead, 'auto-captain' /'AP monitor' mode.
The pilot is hand flying the plane, but the AP-System, is monitoring the inputs and if they vary from what the AP would have done, give feedback with a physical buzz and an auditory tone (like a force feedback joystick on a game).
This basically 'teaches' the pilot to 'fly like an autopilot', ie. very fuel efficient. This also means that there is no 'hand over' - that deadzone when control is passed from one system to another, the pilot is ALREADY flying the plane!
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