Wiley;
Yes, I think we are metamorphizing but I don't think it is such changes which result in accidents.
I think separating technique (know-how) from intelligence, (knowing) is one way to answer your question.
By know-how I mean the way an enterprise is carried out. By oar, by sail, by propeller by stream of turbine-driven water, with bulbous-nosed hulls to catamaran designs.
By "intelligence" I don't mean high brain power, I mean comprehension through experience.
The ocean requires experienced knowledge of how hulls, propulsion, long tracts of water and large weather systems, tides, fresh and salt water all interact.
The "character of physical law" as Feynman put it, doesn't change so failure means failure to take into account physical law.
Success, even uninterrupted, long success with fancy powerpoints trying to convince others that the right thing is being done, is still descriptive, not predictive.
We can imagine something similar for airplanes. The stuff of "how", changes, as we obviously understand. The stuff of "what", doesn't change.
Most of us are familiar with the old saying attributed to Captain Lamplugh:
"Aviation in itself is not inherently dangerous. But to an even greater degree than the sea, it is terribly unforgiving of any carelessness, incapacity or neglect."
I think a far, far better view, again by Richard Feynman may add something to the conversation. He stated the following in his contribution to the investigation into the Challenger accident:
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled."
Automation uses natural laws but is wholly unanticipatory. Like all algorithms, software and computers are totally blind and can be wrong billions of times per second. So far, the only intervention is the "tuned-receivers" in the cockpit seats who know the real difference between know-how and knowing.
I doubt if a single airline manager can say the same thing, not because I think less of them but because they are so narrowly focussed on staying alive in this industry that they can't stop to really manage and instead can only see the cost equations until nature catches up.
But none of this filosophickal stuff makes money, right?
PJ2