AuxBatOn wrote:Would locking yourself into a cockpit and crashing into a mountain range be considered a form of "hacking"?
NASA is funding research on a “Single Pilot Operation” program, which envisions replacing the human co-pilot in the cockpit with one on the ground. In this project, which is so far confined to virtual cockpits at NASA’s Ames Research Center, autopilot would serve the role of the co-pilot for up to 12 planes, all of them overseen by a trained pilot known as a “super dispatcher” on the ground.
The super dispatcher would only step into the role of the co-pilot if the real human pilot didn’t respond to check-in calls, or if the plane flight path suddenly diverted — a scenario similar to the Germanwings crash, in which altitude precipitously dropped from 38,000 to 11,000 feet minutes before the crash.
Would locking yourself into a control room and remotely crashing 12 planes be considered an improvement?
Bonus: you don't even have to die, yourself. Ahhh...technology!
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complexintentions wrote:
Would locking yourself into a control room and remotely crashing 12 planes be considered an improvement?
Bonus: you don't even have to die, yourself. Ahhh...technology!
The difference is the inherent segregation of pilots flying in an airplane: they are shielded from any co-worker interference. It would be much more difficult doing so from a ground station where dozens of co-workers surround you.
My point to Takeoff Ok was that hijacking is indeed a form of hacking, and hacking is not limited to computers.
AuxBatOn wrote:There is nothing a pilot does in an airliner cockpit that a computer cannot do.
Well, except use judgement, make decisions and exercise command based on countless tangible and intangible factors, determine which automation mode is appropriate and fly the plane manually when conditions exceed the automation's limitations or when it's just doing a lousy job, etc. etc. etc. But you're right about one thing, a computer will hold a heading like there's no tomorrow right until it hits the ground.
AuxBatOn wrote: And it even does it more efficiently and with no "judgement" errors:
Of course there are no judgement errors...there is no judgement to begin with. Did you know exercising good judgement is a requirement of the job and necessary to ensure the safety of a flight? Do you exercise judgement when leading a 4-plane around?
AuxBatOn wrote:the computers knows its limits and will not bust them.
Computers don't "know" anything much less their limits. They are stupid machines programmed to do certain extremely limited functions regardless of their effects or consequences.
AuxBatOn wrote:And for the odd thing that the computer cannot do, you have a secure datalink to a flight center where someone takes control from the ground.
I know it is the future and I don't bury my head in the sand thinking it won't. Most things I do are not for personal gain, but for what i believe is right. And I believe automated flight is right.
Reading this thread, and the other, ridiculously distended one that was eventually locked, I can honestly say I have so far developed no opinion about whether there will still be flight controls installed in airliners 50 years from now.
I believe it's technologically possible to produce a drone airliner. I also believe however that the question is more of a social one than a technological one. On the table is public perception of what the pilots are actually doing up there. We all know it's largely people who can not fly at all, I suspect mostly "business"-type people, who are responsible for the currently-held perception that airliners "fly themselves".
We are not under attack in the technological sphere. We are under attack in the social sphere. In my opinion people who study such bullshit pseudo-sciences as "management science" could totally be replaced by machines. I have never seen a more paint-by-numbers field of endeavour nor a more self-aggrandizing group of people, but nevertheless they are most commonly the most vocal proponents of cockpit automation, because that's how they are trained to think about the human equation.
It requires among other things an analysis of what it means "to fly". I have spent so much of my life hand-flying aircraft of different sizes and configurations that I can honestly tell you it takes no more or less skill on my part to command a manoeuvre on the MCP, or by manipulating the column and pedals. No difference at all. It's still me who decides what the plane will do next, it's still me who decides which approach we'll be doing, it's still me who identifies hazards and mitigates risks. So "to fly" an aeroplane must mean something different. It must mean the things that a human brings to the table. We need to identify and clarify and communicate what, if anything, these qualities are. Statistics on the subject of accidents caused by human error are very common knowledge. But what about human accomplishments? The leadership and judgement? The times a pilot disengages the auto-flight stuff and manoeuvres the plane out of harm's way without even realizing or making note of what the consequences would have been had she not taken that specific action at that specific time?
These questions have not been answered to my satisfaction. But I intend to be more transparent about what I spend my day doing, how hard I worked, the decisions I made, the leadership I provided, the advice and experience I disseminated... the mistakes I made...and we must let society decide whether they need us anymore.
On another note, can anyone think of a more dreary and soul-destroying job than sitting alone in a "single-pilot airliner"? Most single pilot aircraft are at least doing something interesting... I think I'd rather retire than go single-pilot in some semi-drone long-haul liner.
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If I'd known I was going to live this long, I'd have taken better care of myself
