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Is that how you learned to walk? You observed other kids failing and falling constantly? Adults not falling? And you watched them until you got it and then you

Is that how you learned to walk? You observed other kids failing and falling constantly? Adults not falling? And you watched them until you got it and then you got up and have been walking flawlessly ever since? Or were you thinking that you are uniquely brilliant, just tried it yourself for a while, falling and getting up, with an encouraging pat on the back by your parents every time you did, until you had figured it out?

tialaramex 6y ago
You have correctly observed that children learning to walk is a frustrating process of trial and error. But weirdly, you seem to think this is an admirable property to be imitated. How many say aeroplanes do you think the average airline pilot crashes during training? A few dozen? Maybe only a handful of big jets with passengers on them because presumably you'd practice stuff like "Not smashing an airliner full of people into a mountain" last? No. We don't learn to fly aeroplanes this way because it'd be stupid. Aeroplane pilots learn from other people's mistakes instead. Even when they have an accident and they personally learn from that, every effort is made to also teach other pilots who didn't have the accident the same lessons. A guy will stand up and lecture other pilots about the time he did an Impossible Turn† and his point won't be "I'm fucking amazing" or "You should go do this and get yourself killed" but "Here's what I did wrong. Learn from my mistake don't make your own". †Despite its name the Impossible Turn isn't actually impossible, it's just probably a bad idea and you almost certainly already did at least two things wrong if you're attempting it. It's an attempt to return to your takeoff runway by doing a 180° turn after engine failure in climb out. It probably won't work because you will consume too much of your residual energy. But sometimes people get lucky.
- tmhrtly 6y ago
  I believe that airline pilots also fly in simulators a fair amount, and that this gives them the opportunity to test their skills in a safe environment where failure is not penalised to the same degree.
- ufmace 6y ago
  I don't really know that much about flying planes or learning to fly them, but I'm pretty sure that learning to fly planes involves lots of hands-on trial and error, mostly in small planes with an instructor next to them with another set of controls, and in simulators, in addition to reading about and listening to lectures on the theory of flight and past mistakes that have been made. They're still learning by doing, just in a structured environment where their mistakes don't actually lead to real disasters. I don't think anybody would want to fly on a big passenger jet piloted by somebody who had never actually touched flight controls, just read books and listened to talks.

tialaramex 6y ago

You have correctly observed that children learning to walk is a frustrating process of trial and error. But weirdly, you seem to think this is an admirable property to be imitated. How many say aeroplanes do you think the average airline pilot crashes during training? A few dozen? Maybe only a handful of big jets with passengers on them because presumably you'd practice stuff like "Not smashing an airliner full of people into a mountain" last? No. We don't learn to fly aeroplanes this way because it'd be stupid. Aeroplane pilots learn from other people's mistakes instead. Even when they have an accident and they personally learn from that, every effort is made to also teach other pilots who didn't have the accident the same lessons. A guy will stand up and lecture other pilots about the time he did an Impossible Turn† and his point won't be "I'm fucking amazing" or "You should go do this and get yourself killed" but "Here's what I did wrong. Learn from my mistake don't make your own". †Despite its name the Impossible Turn isn't actually impossible, it's just probably a bad idea and you almost certainly already did at least two things wrong if you're attempting it. It's an attempt to return to your takeoff runway by doing a 180° turn after engine failure in climb out. It probably won't work because you will consume too much of your residual energy. But sometimes people get lucky.

tmhrtly 6y ago
I believe that airline pilots also fly in simulators a fair amount, and that this gives them the opportunity to test their skills in a safe environment where failure is not penalised to the same degree.
ufmace 6y ago
I don't really know that much about flying planes or learning to fly them, but I'm pretty sure that learning to fly planes involves lots of hands-on trial and error, mostly in small planes with an instructor next to them with another set of controls, and in simulators, in addition to reading about and listening to lectures on the theory of flight and past mistakes that have been made. They're still learning by doing, just in a structured environment where their mistakes don't actually lead to real disasters. I don't think anybody would want to fly on a big passenger jet piloted by somebody who had never actually touched flight controls, just read books and listened to talks.