Would YOU trust AI to fly a plane? Darpa tests 'genius' robot co-pilot - but not everyone thinks it is safe

Yesterday, a turboprop plane took off from a small airport in Virginia that from the outside, looked fairly unremarkable. But inside the cockpit, in the right seat, a robot with spindly metal tubes and rods for arms and legs and a claw hand grasping the throttle, was doing the flying. The demonstration was part of a government and industry collaboration that is attempting to replace the second human pilot in two-person flight crews with robot co-pilots that never tire, get bored, feel stressed out or become distracted. The Aircrew Labor In-Cockpit Automation System (ALIAS) project envisions a day when planes and helicopters, large and small, will fly people and cargo without any human pilot on board. For example, an array of cameras allows the robot to see all the cockpit instruments and read the gauges.