This topic advanced far beyond my expertise long ago ( I just drive the things), therefore I ceased commentary. I still have nothing to add to the technical aspects some have discussed, but would like to add this for your consideration: Airbus training is focused on the wrong targets when considering aircraft control. One is judged by his/her knowledge of the protections - with little an no emphasis placed on degraded modes. I would be willing to make a wager that this ill fated crew could do a quite nice job of describing the limits of protection, but had little idea of the capabilities of degraded flight laws and had little training on abnormal ops pertaining to degraded flight laws. If any person of influence is reading, I would like to request that the training focus be changed from "it protects you and flies like any other airplane" to "you need to know how to deal with it when the automation fails you". I would also suggest that the regulators include UAS procedures on type rating checks. They could just remove one of the numerous instrument approaches and replace it with the UAS drill. (on type rides and PC's, we spend hours droning around watching the autoflight system perform redundant approaches - which proves little more than our ability to push the approach button)