Lyman,
There are three recorded 'data channels' - the ACARS messages, the DFDR data, and the CVR. The DFDR tells us what the pilot did with the controls, and what the airplane did in response. The two have been correlated, and there is no open question about those. The DFDR data, together with the information gathered by BEA, tells us what the automatics were doing. It was extensively discussed on this forum. I'm not aware of any open questions in that area, except the behavior of the flight directors, but that was not recorded. The DFDR also tells us most of the information available to the pilots on their displays and BEA has reconstructed as far as possible the missing parts. Where that was not possible, the information was not recorded.
We do not know what the pilots saw because it was not recorded what they were looking at, nor how their brains processed what they saw. The CVR tells us what they told each other, and what other sounds there were in the cockpit. True, that information is too scarce to enable us to fully understand their mental processes, why they acted the way they did. If they had said more, maybe we would better understand what they did. But, if they said more, how could it be in anybody's interest to hide that?