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> One of them moved the levers. It could've been an unplanned reaction, a terrible mistake, or it could've been intentional. Fuel levers are designed to only b

> One of them moved the levers. It could've been an unplanned reaction, a terrible mistake, or it could've been intentional. Fuel levers are designed to only be moved deliberately; they cannot be mistaken for something else by a professional pilot. It's literally their job to know where these buttons are, what they do, and when to (not) push them. It's not arrogance to assume the most likely conclusion is true, despite how uncomfortable that outcome may be.

burnt-resistor 1y ago
> cannot be mistaken for something else Assumption. Big ass assumption. Pilot are trained until actions are instinctual and certain memory items are almost unconscious. But pilots are still people and people are fallible and make mistakes, and sometimes act unreasonably. Intent cannot be determined without clear evidence or statements because that's now how thoughts locked away in people's minds work. > It's not arrogance to assume the most likely conclusion is true You don't know this. This is beyond the capability to know and is therefore pure speculation. That is the definition of arrogance.
- YuukiRey 1y ago
  It’s the explanation that requires the fewest explanations and assumptions I’d say.
- Aeolun 1y ago
  > You don't know this. That it isn’t certain doesn’t change anything about it being pretty likely. Unpleasant, but I suppose at least it means we won’t suddenly see other planes falling out of the sky due to fuel switches being set to off.
- sailingparrot 1y ago
  > sometimes act unreasonably. Intent cannot be determined without clear evidence or statements because that's now how thoughts locked away in people's minds work. By this logic it would be impossible to ever find anyone guilty of murder (or any other nefarious action) with intent unless they explicitly state that it was in fact their intent. Obviously this is not how justice works anywhere, because at some point you have to assume that the overwhelmingly most likely reason for doing an action was the true reason. If someone pulls out a gun, cock it, aim it at someone and pull the trigger, killing the other person, should we hold off any judgement because they might have done it purely mechanically while in their head thinking about the lasagna they are going to cook tonight and not realizing what they were doing ? The fuel cut off switches have a unique design, texture and sequence of action that need to be taken to actuate them, they don’t behave like any other switch. Pilot are also absolutely not trained to engage with those particular switches until it’s instinctual.
  - jltsiren 1y ago
    Courts do not seek to establish the truth. They aim for a reasonable balance between false positives (innocents convicted of crimes they didn't commit) and false negatives (criminals allowed to go free). In practice, the false positive rate is probably around 5%, and innocents go to prison all the time. Air accident investigations mostly deal with one-in-a-billion freak occurrences. Commercial aviation so safe and reliable that major accidents rarely happen without a truly extraordinary cause.
    - agubelu 1y ago
      Yet Occam's razor still applies
      - jltsiren 1y ago
        That's not what Occam's razor means. It means that after you have exhausted all options to rule out competing hypotheses, you choose the simplest one that remains, for the time being. Consider some explanations that are consistent with the evidence presented so far. And remember that the purpose of the investigation is to come up with actionable conclusions. 1. One of the pilots randomly flipped and crashed the plane for no reason. In this case, nothing can be done. It could have happened to anyone at any time, and we were extraordinarily unlucky that the person in question was in position to inflict massive casualties. 2. Something was not right with one of the pilots, the airline failed to notice it, and the pilot decided to commit a murder-suicide. If this was the case, signs of the situation were probably present, and changes in operating procedures may help to avoid similar future accidents. 3. One of the pilots accidentally switched the engines off. The controls are designed to prevent that, but it's possible that improper training taught the pilot to override the safeties instinctively. In this case, changes to training and/or cockpit design could prevent similar accidents in the future. Because further investigation may shed light on hypotheses 2 and 3, it's premature to make conclusions.
        manquer 1y ago
        Given the fly by wire nature of 787 there is an also fourth option. The physical switch was not touched at all , and the software has a bug under some rare conditions which cut off the supply to both engines.
neuronic 1y ago
The most likely scenario is not necessarily the truth. It still remains pure speculation and nothing else.

burnt-resistor 1y ago

> cannot be mistaken for something else Assumption. Big ass assumption. Pilot are trained until actions are instinctual and certain memory items are almost unconscious. But pilots are still people and people are fallible and make mistakes, and sometimes act unreasonably. Intent cannot be determined without clear evidence or statements because that's now how thoughts locked away in people's minds work. > It's not arrogance to assume the most likely conclusion is true You don't know this. This is beyond the capability to know and is therefore pure speculation. That is the definition of arrogance.

YuukiRey 1y ago
It’s the explanation that requires the fewest explanations and assumptions I’d say.
Aeolun 1y ago
> You don't know this. That it isn’t certain doesn’t change anything about it being pretty likely. Unpleasant, but I suppose at least it means we won’t suddenly see other planes falling out of the sky due to fuel switches being set to off.
sailingparrot 1y ago
> sometimes act unreasonably. Intent cannot be determined without clear evidence or statements because that's now how thoughts locked away in people's minds work. By this logic it would be impossible to ever find anyone guilty of murder (or any other nefarious action) with intent unless they explicitly state that it was in fact their intent. Obviously this is not how justice works anywhere, because at some point you have to assume that the overwhelmingly most likely reason for doing an action was the true reason. If someone pulls out a gun, cock it, aim it at someone and pull the trigger, killing the other person, should we hold off any judgement because they might have done it purely mechanically while in their head thinking about the lasagna they are going to cook tonight and not realizing what they were doing ? The fuel cut off switches have a unique design, texture and sequence of action that need to be taken to actuate them, they don’t behave like any other switch. Pilot are also absolutely not trained to engage with those particular switches until it’s instinctual.
- jltsiren 1y ago
  Courts do not seek to establish the truth. They aim for a reasonable balance between false positives (innocents convicted of crimes they didn't commit) and false negatives (criminals allowed to go free). In practice, the false positive rate is probably around 5%, and innocents go to prison all the time. Air accident investigations mostly deal with one-in-a-billion freak occurrences. Commercial aviation so safe and reliable that major accidents rarely happen without a truly extraordinary cause.
  - agubelu 1y ago
    Yet Occam's razor still applies
    - jltsiren 1y ago
      That's not what Occam's razor means. It means that after you have exhausted all options to rule out competing hypotheses, you choose the simplest one that remains, for the time being. Consider some explanations that are consistent with the evidence presented so far. And remember that the purpose of the investigation is to come up with actionable conclusions. 1. One of the pilots randomly flipped and crashed the plane for no reason. In this case, nothing can be done. It could have happened to anyone at any time, and we were extraordinarily unlucky that the person in question was in position to inflict massive casualties. 2. Something was not right with one of the pilots, the airline failed to notice it, and the pilot decided to commit a murder-suicide. If this was the case, signs of the situation were probably present, and changes in operating procedures may help to avoid similar future accidents. 3. One of the pilots accidentally switched the engines off. The controls are designed to prevent that, but it's possible that improper training taught the pilot to override the safeties instinctively. In this case, changes to training and/or cockpit design could prevent similar accidents in the future. Because further investigation may shed light on hypotheses 2 and 3, it's premature to make conclusions.
      - manquer 1y ago
        Given the fly by wire nature of 787 there is an also fourth option. The physical switch was not touched at all , and the software has a bug under some rare conditions which cut off the supply to both engines.

neuronic 1y ago

The most likely scenario is not necessarily the truth. It still remains pure speculation and nothing else.