Originally Posted by
SkyHigh
On the line most of your time is spent reading Details Magazine while the FMC and AP flies the plane................
Some companies are more lenient about hand flying.
I am sure that cargo companies are the best but many do not allow it as much and most crews are happiest if it remains positively engaged.
As a long haul cargo guy I can't imagine that you get the opportunity to even make many landings a month let alone any real hand flying.
I am sure that if your company tried to dispatch a plane to you for a long trip overseas with an inop AP you would be just fine with it. 
As far as "head work" goes an airline captain must demonstrate that they can remember the proper procedures or know which checklist to use. If that fails they can call dispatch or maintenance control and ask them what to do.
I have experience with CRM. I use to teach it at Horizon Air. I understand that you are comfortable with deluding yourself into the thought that you actually accomplish something but please don't pollute others. I don't wish to damage your self esteem but maybe you should rent a piper seneca and take an IFR flight to remind yourself of how real pilots use to fly planes?
At best the airlines need two pilots to do the job of one, half awake, night piston cargo pilot.
SkyHigh
"On the line most of your time is spent reading Details"
Actually Sky high Reading Magazines is prohibited.........I'll grant you, in cruise I engage the auto pilot. But where is the critical Phase of flight?
Takeoffs/ departures and Approaches/Landings are where the rubber meets the road and 99% of the time they are hand flown. Maybe not in the school house at Horizon..
"I am sure that cargo companies are the best but many do not allow it"
I am not sure what you mean about cargo. I never insinuated anything about cargo pilots being better or worse. Pilots are Pilots. Name an Airline that makes the autopilot use Mandatory......(Monitored apps Cat II or II ops excluded.)
"I am sure that if your company tried to dispatch a plane to you for a long trip overseas with an inop AP you would be just fine with it."
If the MEL says it can go, we generally GO. I'll grant you I would not fly a Long Trans oceanic leg without one (our Ops manual limits it,) but I have flown several domestic legs at night with an inoperable auto pilot. I Prefer not to but we do it.
"I have experience with CRM"..........
By your own admission, you have NO Capt experience. Let me tell you young man, the bulk of an Airline CAPT's duties is making command decisions, not actual flying. The fact that you make such as statement only high lites the fact you have never been an Airline Capt.
"I understand that you are comfortable with deluding yourself into the thought that you actually accomplish something but please don't pollute others. "
I am not sure what you mean. I didn't make the above statements you did.
I simply said I fly Airplanes from point A to Point B and do it safely. Sometimes I use the autopilot,(mostly in cruise and above the transition level) sometimes I don't. I never use it for takeoff and rarely use it for apprach/ landing......However, I am sure during you very short career as an FO flying the 757, that you never landed it by hand. Every approach you flew was automated.
By the way Who is the one who is always trying to pollute others?