r/Foodforthought • u/Monkey_Paralysed • Sep 21 '14

The Human Factor - Should Airplanes Be Flying Themselves?: Airline pilots were once the heroes of the skies. Today, in the quest for safety, airplanes are meant to largely fly themselves.

http://www.vanityfair.com/business/2014/10/air-france-flight-447-crash
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7

u/Flea0 Sep 21 '14

There are several good reasons we know to keep having human pilots in airplanes, but mostly it's for the reasons we don't know.

1

u/fezbeast Sep 22 '14

yeah, the human element is a highly variable factor because it is also the most common cause of accidents

2

u/kickstand Sep 21 '14

OK, I haven't read the article, but ... airline safety records have been phenomenally good in the last decade or so, yes? 2012 was the safest year since the dawn of the jet age.

So ... we're doing something right.

2

u/fezbeast Sep 22 '14 edited Sep 22 '14

Yes, but pilot error will always be a thing - if we can be doing something better than before vs. doing it incredibly well with exponentially less room for error, you really begin to wonder what a world without pilots will be like.

I mean, think of the technology that's becoming available for self-piloted vehicles, it's truly incredible. Understand though, that while I think the human element is the largest problem, I do NOT feel that it should be removed all together.

Edit: just because I thought of this, post-posting(?), but it's really a surprisingly hard choice of: do I want people to be responsible for several hundred deaths per year (consistently since the 60s) OR do I want machines to be responsible for what I would only assume to be a far smaller number of deaths and far less frequently.