Mxsmanic wrote:

To some extent, I think that people who have trouble taking simulation
seriously may also have trouble taking the real thing seriously. And
simulation also requires following certain rules and exercising a
certain amount of discipline; people who cannot do that for the
purposes of simulation may also have trouble doing it in other
situations ... including while flying a real plane. "Oh, I don't need
to listen to that controller--I know what I'm doing and he's just
following some stupid procedure."

OK, here's where your reality disconnect shows itself... I can't
imagine *any* pilot not taking "the real thing" seriously. True, some
may have attitudes that are more cavalier than they should, but anytime
you strap your butt into an airplane and slip the surly bonds you're
taking a risk. A measured risk maybe, but still a risk. There is no
100% guarantee that you & the airplane will make it back in one piece.
Good pilots manage this risk. In addition, NO pilot I've ever
instructed or talked to has EVER shown that attitude of disregarding
ATC. That kind of behavior will get you in deep shiite quickly.


Full-motion sims have an evil reputation, perhaps in part because the
instructors operating them seem to often have a sadistic streak. But
I think that pilots who have been through the wringer in a sim will
still agree that it's worth the trouble.

Training sim operators have a sadistic streak because they know that
failures, while somewhat rare, do happen and that the pilot must be
able to handle the aircraft with failed systems (sometimes multiple).
The lives of the paying customers in back depend on it. Try and
separate full motion sims from PC-based machines (technically they're
Flight Training Devices) one is a learning tool - the other (while it
has its uses) is essentially a toy.