Mxsmanic wrote:

:
:Unfortunately, this implies either severe restrictions on small GA aircraft,
r extremely expensive upgrades to those aircraft to make them compatible with
:automated aircraft. The other option--making autonomous unmanned aircraft
:capable of maintaining visual separation--is probably not feasible technically
:and economically.

I would not expect it to be THAT technically difficult. The question
is trusting the technology that does it and what happens when you take
a casualty. Oddly, we insist on having a fragile human as a backup to
technology when it's the human that is the most failure prone part of
the overall system.

:There may come a time when the only real flying that pilots will be permitted
:to do is private GA. All commercial aviation will be handled by robots, and
:if human "pilots" are present at all it will only be as emergency attendants.

It's largely that way now for large modern airliners. Driving them
around on taxiways still requires a human being, but the airplane can
pretty much do everything else by itself.

It's my understanding that F/A-18s can take off and land all by
themselves (and this from an aircraft carrier, which is a bit more
difficult than using one of those big concrete ribbons on solid
ground). I gather that the automated cat sequence is used but the
automated trap sequence is typically not. Fighter pilots are not a
particularly trusting lot... :-)

:In some ways, this is easier for aviation than for road vehicles, although
:it's easier still for trains, I think.

I believe we still have a requirement for trains that they have a
'dead man' throttle. Somebody has to be holding the control or the
train will stop itself.

--
"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable
man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore,
all progress depends on the unreasonable man."
--George Bernard Shaw