But these "near-pilots" DID love aviation like we do

Well, empirically this is not supported.

and something spooked them to the point where they walked away.

This is a hypothesis, supported by one anecdote.

If we are to replace all the World War II and Korean War-era pilots who are
dying in droves, we've got to get people into aviation, NOW.

Be careful that the desire to believe something doesn't interfere with a
dispassionate evaluation of whether or not it is in fact true.

hope that we (as pilots) can come up with better ways to
train newbies...

Always a good thing.

Jose
--
Quantum Mechanics is like this: God =does= play dice with the universe,
except there's no God, and there's no dice. And maybe there's no universe.
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.