Historically the primary requirement to become a helicopter pilot has been the ability to 'fly'. In other words be able to manipulate the controls to achieve the required flight path etc. Over the years aviating has become more and more sophisticated in a way that makes intellectual demands upon the pilot far beyond the 'simple?' task of wiggling the poles.
From where I sit at the coal face of type training and recurrent training pilots from around the world we will need to ramp-up the quality of pilot licensing if we are going to make the pilot's working environment more sophisticated. At the moment there are too many pilots out there who simply cannot deal with the recent step change in complexity in the cockpit.
Advanced nations that also have a measure of 'rigor' embedded in their culture do well, but where rigor is lacking and in particular where basic training is weak then the overall capabilities of a pilot population in those areas are compromised. If you make the operating environment more complex then it may work in North America and parts of Europe but elsewhere it would create a chaotic situation that may well be counter productive. Moving from a VFR world to the current IFR world has created financial and capability hurdles that are of serious concern but to go further and turn the whole world into an IFR environment would be a trifle unrealistic, certainly today and in the foreseeable future. You would simply be forcing those without the necessary skills to do what the recent Brazilian 'wedding' pilot did and overstep his abilities.
Nice idea Nick, conceptually sound but the practicalities are more than challenging.
G.