ernestkgann writes:
The esteemed owners of this site may have to make an appropriate venue on these boards for UAV people. You will find that part of the psychology of pilots is the actual flying, remove that and there isn't much desire in that group to participate.
I'm apt to reply with the same snide aire and ask "participate in what?"
In most cases, by the time a pilot gets to sit in the left-hand seat of any aircraft with pax aboard, that person has "participated" in many hundreds of hours of training - in flying a plane, in calculating weights and balances, in understanding weather, in learning literally thousands of minutia regulations.
And I'll guess here, about 85% of them do it because they love flight and want to spend their working careers aloft.
There are many working pilots who participate in these forums, as well as many who are hopeful of becoming pilots and some who gave the idea up long ago when they discovered they didn't have the right mentality for it. I'm in that last group, by the way.
... and writes again:
No doubt the advent of remotely piloted aircraft fits in there somewhere and as a group we are nearing the cross roads of the benefits of automation versus human/manual flying.
SN3, thank you for making this clear for everyone to see:
Clearly when you entered into the conversation, you did so with an agenda. You finally outed yourself, that's all.
I'll throw my $0.02 in. Automation has to go a long, long way to replace the human element in piloting an aircraft. There is a notion amongst smug programmers that all they need is a "concept" and enough "examples" in order to successfully mimic the advanced decision-making process even the least smart of humans use on a daily basis to sh*t and then wipe the backside.
It's utter hogwash. Artificial intelligence is difficult to do with supercomputers, let alone the limited amount of processing you can loft into the air and/or reliably link to on the ground.
Lastly, ernestkgann, I have to comment on your choice of screenname here. The *real* Mr. Gann passed away nearly 20 years ago but if he were alive, he would certainly not appreciate the type of posts you commit using his moniker.
RR