There is a lot of discrepancy in this subject, but flying "Solo" according to F.A.R 61.87 applies towards students and does not mention licensed pilots. But it states that you must be the sole occupant of the aircraft to classify being solo, even though your girlfriend or your dog does not know how to fly the airplane.

Does anybody know about this? Can you log solo time if your passenger does not have a clue as to how to fly the airplane?

You must be the sole occupant. It's actually defined in 61.51(d) Logging of solo flight time. "...a pilot may log as solo flight time only that flight time when the pilot is the sole occupant of the aircraft." Your dog doesn't count, but your girlfriend would, even if she doesn't know anything about flying.

Hey my dog is actually pretty good

You can be the only one in the plane. If you're a student pilot, it's illegal to have anyone else in the plane. (and unethical, I think)(and the insurance company wouldn't pay)(and if you were my student, I'd drop you like rock).

There is something about logging solo in a twin even though your CFI is onboard, I think, for insurance reasons.

I have heard a few commercial students as well as a CFI at my school mention that during their commercial training when they were supposed to be on solo cross countries, they stopped and picked up friends/family at small airstrips along the route...is this technically against the rules?

Are you hinting at logging solo even though you have your PPL? The only time to ever log anything in the solo column is solo flight, before you are a licensed pilot. It's not cool to carry folks before you are supposed to. It certainly has been done before but shows a lack of maturity and judgment.

Agreed...only a complete jack-ass would carry passengers as a student pilot...i was referring to folks with at least a PPL picking up people to share the experience of the cross-country flight required for training, and then logging it as a solo flight...

Thanks. I guess I would have found that out if I would have just turned back a few pages

Sorry, I was referring to post # 1. My point being (PhantomAir)if you already have a PPL there's no reason to ever use the solo column to log time in powered fixed wing airplanes.

You can log it as solo (provided you are indeed alone), but like Slice said, it doesn't really have any value.