Pilot? Where We're Going, We Don't Need Pilots!
from the another-job-taken-over-by-technology dept
Unmanned drones are now popular for military uses, and appear to do a pretty good job flying around without a pilot. So, what about the concept of a pilotless commercial airliner full of passengers? Lots of people say it's possible - but the real question is whether or not anyone would actually fly the pilotless skies. From a publicity standpoint, it would be pretty damaging, as I imagine it would scare an awful lot of people who would not feel comfortable being on such a plane. At this point, it seems this fear, rather than any technological hurdle is the main reason why no one is seriously talking about it. Even though human pilots make mistakes, I imagine most people still feel a lot more comfortable knowing that a human can make split-second decisions should something go wrong with the computer systems.
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
Pilotless Skies
However, just because they currently fly by autopilot most of the time doesn't mean that I'd get on a plane flown by computer without having someone experienced in flying the plane in the front monitoring things, who can take over if something goes wrong (which it will, especially if they are using WindowsCE to control the plane.)
[ link to this | view in thread ]
What if someone brings a beehive?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Pilotless Skies
If ALL computers on board a plane stops working suddenly - well, I imagine that it dosn't really matter what the pilot does. It's going to crash. Most military fighter planes for instance can't possibly be controlled without the aid of computers. I speculate that most of the really big commercial planes are a little like that as well.
So we are already depending on the computer. I'd like to see some statistics for how many accidents are caused by human error and how many are caused by computational errors. Afterall, if you are going to die in a plane crash its not going to be more pleasant just becuase you were killed by a human error rather than a malfunction in a circuit.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
What about neither?
[ link to this | view in thread ]