Will robots/AI replace human pilots?

nj-pilot

nj-pilot

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Reading through another post about someone who aspires to be a commercial pilot, and I have to wonder whether that will even be a profession in 15 or 20 years. If you think about driverless car technology and our already-high utilization of the auto-pilot in commercial aviation, am I insane to think that it's foreseeable in our lives that human pilots will become obsolete?

Related story here, though I'm sure there are many others.
I know that trucking and shipping carriers are exploring this as well.
 
http://www.airlinepilotforums.com/hangar-talk/88495-unmanned-airliners-future.html

This post about sums it up if you don't have time to read it all...

"
The technology exists now.

The question is cost effectiveness vs safety.

Unmanned a/c have a terrible safety record right now and they're not necessarily any cheaper than manned a/c. Especially an airliner that already has to have all the life support equipment in it. How is it incrementally too expensive to put a couple guys in it to make it about 1000x safer.

Even when this technology happens, there will still be human oversight and as pilots we are most qualified to do those jobs and I think those jobs will pay just as much as the jobs we do now."
 
No.

Never happen, based on what I've seen advanced autopilots do, UAS systems do, very impressive, but still they have their weaknesses, flying IS NOT paint by numbers, most modern schools teach you to fly like a robot, which works until something goes sideways, in which case you need a human with a real mind and common sense and gut.

I would not let my dog fly on a unmanned plane.
 
10 years from now cargo jets will be single pilot with a autoland capable autopilot that can be remotely operated from the manufacturers emergency backup center. The system will have redundant datalinks through both satcom and terrestial stations at the major airports. 20 years from now new regional jets will be single pilot using the same by then proven, technology. At that point, parcel freight will go unmanned.
 
Well by 2000 we were all sposed to be in flying cars too.

It's not a lack of tech, it's the nature of people and the chaos of life outside of a lab.
 
The question is: "Will humans be allowed to control vehicles for recreation in an automated driving and/or airspace environment?"
 
Back when Honeywell was designing the flight control system for the triple seven, one of the big questions was what they should have the pilots doing because, basically, they didn't need the pilots to do anything. But it was clear that the pilots had to be at least somewhat engaged in flying the airplane, doing something beyond the PA announcements, so that they were mentally on board if something unexpected happened. Probably this question has been asked on every cockpit design or redesign since then.
 
If you fly for recreation, the question is how long will the activity be allowed by the FAA/The government ? If you fly (pilot) commercial aircraft, how soon (not if, but when) will it be safer NOT to have a human pilot in the cockpit. Cost effectiveness is, also, not a matter of if but when.

Cheers
 
ralarcon said:
Cost effectiveness is, also, not a matter of if but when.
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That's true of all industries. None of us are immune from progress. I just hope to be retired before it affects mine.
 
airdale said:
Back when Honeywell was designing the flight control system for the triple seven, one of the big questions was what they should have the pilots doing because, basically, they didn't need the pilots to do anything. But it was clear that the pilots had to be at least somewhat engaged in flying the airplane, doing something beyond the PA announcements, so that they were mentally on board if something unexpected happened. Probably this question has been asked on every cockpit design or redesign since then.
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Yeah well I can tell you from experience that the autothrottles on the 777 ain't all that great. If you get into mountain wave or moderate to severe turbulence those autothrottles will launch you right on past Mmo !
 
weilke said:
10 years from now cargo jets will be single pilot with a autoland capable autopilot that can be remotely operated from the manufacturers emergency backup center. The system will have redundant datalinks through both satcom and terrestial stations at the major airports. 20 years from now new regional jets will be single pilot using the same by then proven, technology. At that point, parcel freight will go unmanned.
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Doubt it. This is a solution looking for a problem. The human element accident is such a small percentage that you are going to spend a lot of money to try to eliminate that small percentage error, and introduce a whole other slew of problems. Ain't going to happen.
 
One word answer: Sully.

A few more words to the same point. It is not moving the levers and twisting the knobs. It is the decision making when nothing in your training or the computer's database applies to provide a sucessful outcome.

-Skip
 
Skip Miller said:
One word answer: Sully.

A few more words to the same point. It is not moving the levers and twisting the knobs. It is the decision making when nothing in your training or the computer's database applies to provide a sucessful outcome.

-Skip
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That's a great point. I didn't even think about that, I think we are all thinking about the routine stuff: taxi, takeoff, cruise, descend, land, taxi, park.
 
nj-pilot said:
Reading through another post about someone who aspires to be a commercial pilot, and I have to wonder whether that will even be a profession in 15 or 20 years. If you think about driverless car technology and our already-high utilization of the auto-pilot in commercial aviation, am I insane to think that it's foreseeable in our lives that human pilots will become obsolete
Click to expand...

I think the answer will come down to: "Will humans (Especially ones who are afraid of flying) pay for a flight without a pilot on board in case something goes wrong."

kayoh190 said:
That's true of all industries. None of us are immune from progress. I just hope to be retired before it affects mine.
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IMO the word "Progress" is debatable here. Automation makes us even more lazy to not improve our skills. Why would we have to? Computers are doing it for us...The computer is getting better and we are getting worse. This is coming from a computer guy...lol
 
I don't think human pilots will be replaced anytime soon for many reasons...however...

I think there is a lack of knowledge/appreciation when it comes to the engineering that goes into any airplane, especially the big ones. I have been lucky enough to see a little bit into the engineering, testing, etc that goes into these things and it is mind blowing. Most people truly have no concept of the complexity and the engineering that goes into aircraft design. My buddy who flies for Southwest as a Captain always jokes about how easy it is to fly the 737 because the Boeing engineers did such a great job designing it (along with all the subcontractors that contribute). With that being said I think it is so easy for pilots to sit back and criticize when most of them don't have a clue about the work that went into that particular design, system, etc. Sure everything can use constructive criticism and there are always things that can be improved, but it irks me a bit when some pilots complain about new technology. Lets not forget your operating an aircraft that weighs TONS and is comprised of hundreds of thousands of parts. The fact that the damn thing flies in the first place is incredible.

One of my engineering professors said something that has stuck with me to this day. He said, "Engineers are always the first to be blamed when there is a failure, but are often the last to be thanked when there is success."

Anyways...a bit off topic, but I often see a negative spin on any sort of technology (anything newer than a slide rule and plastic E6B). Don't get me wrong...I wouldn't want to fly on an airplane that was solely operated by "robots" either!
 
weilke said:
Three word answer: Wei Too Lo.

For every plane that was rescued by heroic crew intervention theere are two that got smashed up due to crew screwup.
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Maybe, but here's the question I always pose. How many aircraft are rescued by non-heroic intervention? How many times is the automation screwed up and the human fixed it and it just ends up as a write up in the logbook at the end of the flight? Every once in a while, I'll have an autopilot just disconnect. I'll grab the yoke with my human hands, silence the warning, turn the autopilot back on and look at the other guy and say "that was weird." How do those events end without me there? Or anomalies in the FMS where the plane just turns 90° to the magneta line and I put it in heading, go direct the the fix and put the plane back in LNAV. Or the countless times I've lost all datalink services over the Pacific or in Asia. There are a multitude of ways automation fails and it's saved by humans sitting up front. It just doesn't make national news. But I'll bet that if I wasn't up there, it sure would.
 
As I was growing up in the 60s, we as kids were convinced that by the year 2000 we would all own flying cars, and that there would be settlements on the moon, and space travel would be as common as airline travel is right now.

But my 4th grade history book didn't even have how WW II ended.
 
The only reason why anybody is employed here in the US is because they haven't found a cheaper way to automate what you do....yet. It will happen.
 
Machines replacing pilots? Unlikely.

A coke machine replacing stews considering that handing out drinks is practically all they do anymore? Possibly.
 
Sluggo63 said:
Maybe, but here's the question I always pose. How many aircraft are rescued by non-heroic intervention? How many times is the automation screwed up and the human fixed it and it just ends up as a write up in the logbook at the end of the flight? Every once in a while, I'll have an autopilot just disconnect. I'll grab the yoke with my human hands, silence the warning, turn the autopilot back on and look at the other guy and say "that was weird." How do those events end without me there? Or anomalies in the FMS where the plane just turns 90° to the magneta line and I put it in heading, go direct the the fix and put the plane back in LNAV. Or the countless times I've lost all datalink services over the Pacific or in Asia. There are a multitude of ways automation fails and it's saved by humans sitting up front. It just doesn't make national news. But I'll bet that if I wasn't up there, it sure would.
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That's why I don't think it will happen in one shot. First it'll be the parcel haulers who will fly fairly large aircraft single crew.

The only reason your autopilot doesn't automatically re-connect when it regains its control solution is certification paperwork.

Airlines will reduce the size of a pack of sugar to save on weight and cost, they will gladly eliminate an in their mind overpaid and underworked crew-member like the FO. Once the systems are robust enough to allow automatic operation, they will reduce the qualification of the guy sitting there to monitor the computer doing its work.
 
The current generation of autopilots are stupid, no intelligence whatsoever, it wouldn't take that much to creat a smart version. You simply would go thru the NTSB database and look for scenarios for it to be able to handle.
BTW, we dont have AI systems today, we have expert systems, AI learns, expert systems are preprogrammed.
 
Capt. Geoffrey Thorpe said:
The question is: "Will humans be allowed to control vehicles for recreation in an automated driving and/or airspace environment?"
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Only up to 1200 agl. :eek:

I think we will see the copilot position gradually eliminated by automation, much like the flight engineer, over the next few decades.

Fully automated commercial planes will eventually happen, but not anytime soon. I agree with the post above that cargo will be where it starts.
 
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I don't think we'll get to the point of pilots being replaced completely but the level of automation we have today makes them more of a systems manager. I can tell you in helicopters, a lot of non passenger carrying tasks will be replaced by drones. It's getting to the point where even passenger carrying ops, the difficult tasks are being replaced by computers. Really a cost to safety benefit analysis for companies.

When you have aircraft that can do this, there isn't piloting involved, it's just monitoring "George."

 
The challenge is not to get an automated airplane that can complete a flight. The challenge is to get an automated airplane that can't fail at completing a flight. We are a long way away from that.
 
Then you would have this as a POA post:

01000011 01100001 01101110 01001001 01101100 01101111 01100111 01101001 01110100 00111111
 
nj-pilot said:
Reading through another post about someone who aspires to be a commercial pilot, and I have to wonder whether that will even be a profession in 15 or 20 years..
Click to expand...

Will we really need airplanes when all the passengers are replaced by robots?
 
I have a friend involved in this arena, and he has a take on it that hadn't occurred to me - he thinks the need for drone pilots will drop quite a bit, as AI controlled, networked drones become more common. He's talking about commercial and military, not the toys, hobbyists, and people taking real estate pictures. Not so much a reduction in human pilots - just more (improved) automation available to them. . .
 
The pilot of the future will carry a computer and a dog on each flight. The computer will be there to fly the plane. The dog will be there to bite the pilot if he tries to fly the plane.

Jim
 
I can envision something like a single pilot aircraft that is monitored by somebody on the ground that can fly the airplane, much as our drones in far off countries are flown from a little Air Force base in East BF Nevada. The pilot in command is in command; it is only when the pilot becomes incapacitated that the ground takes over. Once the ground takes over the air controls are immobilized. No more hijacked airplanes once the flight controls no longer work.

Just some random thoughts on a lovely Tuesday evening ... marred only by the column of smoke from the U2 out of Beale that took it into the Sutter Buttes down the hill from me.

Jim
 
weirdjim said:
Once the ground takes over the air controls are immobilized. No more hijacked airplanes once the flight controls no longer work.
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What happens when the bad guy takes over the ground station?
 
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