What has Software Engineering got to do with whether someone knows how the transmission/gearbox (for us Brits) on their car works?
My naive (non software literate) attempt at defining the SE concept of abstraction. Nothing more. But lets face it, even if he/she needed to, what chance has a pilot got at understanding what goes on software wise on one of these a/c?
Unlike understanding the abstraction at work in guages that you describe, which helps me be a better airman (in case of, say, pitot blockage), understanding the voting logic of various computers does nothing for my airmanship.