[CottonBall]

Take human pilots out of the cockpit? So your average 12 year old with a PSII can fight our wars on the internet?

I think if robotics was at that level yet, we'd see it on the ground first. We'd have unmanned busses and trains first. Robotics is making great strides, but I don't think we're anywhere near using it safely yet. Avionics is getting more computer-driven all the time - mission control software, mission planning software, IR technology, etc - but we still need the human element to make a decision when the software isn't set up to do so. And that happens more frequently than someone might think not involved in the industry.

[Mr Rogers]

We'd have unmanned busses and trains first.

Excellent point. The military is pushing for unmanned aircraft as hard as possible, but it isn't as easy as the armchair engineers seem to think.