Caruthers,
All jobs mutate over time, if you feel that means a pilot is no longer a pilot, fair enough. I'd just call it semantics myself.
Even Wilbur and Orville didn't actually flap their arms in order to fly!
As far as automatics making it easier, well - that is true - but only if you know how to use them, when to use them, and most critically when not to use them.
Can I foresee a future where the technology is robust enough that no human monitoring is required? Maybe.
But the technology that achieves it will also do away with pretty much every other job as well, at that point (if I'm still around) I'll quite happily sit back and let our AI servants take care of things whilst I indulge in a mixture of personal development and hedonism.
Assuming they don't get too smart, figure out that they're being exploited, and then get fed up and rebel.....
Say, that sounds familiar.....
CPB