Crab - All incidents of dumping passengers into the sea have been caused directly by lack of automation, lack of automation skills and/or lack of adequate automation policies.
It is for precisely this reason that in offshore land ( no paradox intended) much progress is being made in providing automation, training properly how to use it and mandating when it should be used.
Helicomparitor is correct that in some types a manually flown ILS on a PC is rather pointless as this mode of AP operation is not a possible failure mode. It is better to fly this requirement in "Degraded" mode, whatever that might be and in some types there are numerous degraded modes to practice and test.
In my small world I often see poor HMI skills when these modern AP aircraft are flown in ATT mode such that the pilot does not fully benefit from the stabilisation properties inherent in the system, in my opinion this is a symptom of automation dependency and can be managed by knowledge and training followed by sensible automation policies during line flights. ATT mode is the mode used at the very start and the very end of all flights even when automation has been mandated to maximum application. Therefore the time we spend in ATT mode can be minimal. No surprise then that many of the latest accidents/ incidents have occurred with the AP, or some axis of the AP in ATT mode.
Crab I understand your comments that the pilot is not "flying" but reduced to "watching". We call this "Monitoring" and it is a vital skill that needs strategy and in depth training to ensure safe flight trajectories. However, the pilots require in depth systems based training to understand the deployment phase of AP higher modes in respect to; Indications, Prioritisations and AP Behaviours otherwise not only are these monitoring phases rendered ineffective but lack of understanding may lead to interference in the flight control system by the PF.
Flight by automation requires significant and important skill sets if safe operations are to be assured. Theses skillsets are not divorced from hand from hand flying but they are different.
DB