It's fair to say that a vast majority of all industries are progressing towards increased automation as the practical availability of reliable technology increases. And that's not necessarily a bad thing. Increased automation usually lends increased efficiency, safety and allows the operator(s) to conduct more tasks in the same window of time. When it comes to air transportation, I think it's quite safe to say that automation has come as a great benefit. In initial training (private, instrument), however, as you guys have said, that can led to the development of unsafe reliance on automation.

Even training in glass aircraft can be viewed as a crutch in itself. While it's understood that your basic six instruments will relay the same information no matter what the form they're presented in, it's clear that student pilots learning on a glass aircraft will not be proficient in a 6-pack configured aircraft, and vice versa for that matter. Then add the automation element into that, and you can see a huge difference between a student that learned to fly with an integrated autopilot/flight director and one who didn't even have an autopilot.

I'd tend to agree that basic training should be accomplished in a manner that provides proficiency single-pilot without dependence on automation (e.g., instrument training without an autopilot). However, at the same time, these student pilots do need the automation exposure and, quite frankly, automation proficiency because we do know they're going into an industry that does rely heavily on automation.