Originally Posted by rickair7777

They're not doing single-pilot airliners, they're just coming up with mitigation to give the other pilot 60-90 seconds to into the seat. Big difference. BTW that's for cruise flight only.



AI can win dogfights because of better G tolerance and precise energy management... that's physical, not mental. But dogfights are not the main game anymore, the air battle is mostly going to be stand off... AI can be programmed to weight sensor inputs to try to distinguish countermeasures from real targets, but an experienced human has an intuitive sense for how the human enemy laid out his forces. AI in this context has a lot more in common with an autopilot than with a general. To win battles or wars, you need creative, critical thinking, not a script.

Automation is coming for sure, but it has inherent limits which we don't know how to get around without a generalized AI, which nobody has the slightest idea how to build. Without that, there's still a niche for humans in most jobs.


And if we could create such an AI, there are huge ethical and safety concerns since you're building an intelligent entity which will likely be self-aware...

1. Is it cool to enslave such a being?
2. Is it cool to make most humans obsolete in the economy? You'd end up with the techy ultra-elite protected from the starving, huddled masses by killer AI robots.
3. Is it safe to create a totally non-human entity which likely could figure out how to upgrade itself? If you could add a few hundred terabites of photographic memory to your mind, would you do it?

The people who are considered among the very smartest in tech and also fields like physics are pretty much unanimously concerned about these issues.

Not saying it will never happen, but our jobs are in a grey area where a script likely isn't good enough, so you'd need general AI. Scripts can obviously reduce requirements for relief crews... assuming it's not a hectic flight and you'll actually be able to sleep during your break. But they can't replace a redundant pilot.

Once general AI is actually available it will take a looooong time to certify since it cannot be mapped out or analyzed... the only way for a regulator to evaluate it will be with years of real-world operational experience, with human pilots as a back-stop. Even worse, if it flunks out, you cannot just tweak the gain on a non-deterministic system, you'd have to start all over with the trials. Don't hold your breath. Although cargo has a lower bar than pax.

* script => deterministic algorithm
* general AI => non-deterministic cognition