Ref: seat of the pants. I take this to mean being sensitive to the g sensation of flying. I'm still amazed by pilots who can't sense this. You're looking out of the window on finals and you hit a thermal and feel the a/c ballooning. By instinct you correct the attitude to stop the balloon and adjust thrust to maintain speed, just a tad. Now one thing is pretty certain is that if you fly into a thermal, and it's not too close to TDZ, i.e. you are at some height on finals, then you are going to fly out of it and the a/c will sink there after. Not only are you fore-warned, but you should feel the world falling out of your a/c and 'adjust' attitude and thrust just a tad to resist mother nature.
It doesn't happen that good. If the automatics are in it is masked, if they are disconnected their bum is not connected to the a/c not their brain. They follow the speed loss/gain rather than pre-empt it.
Solution: Change the selection criteria for todays pilots, perhaps? Are the correct senses and skills being assessed?