Attitudes & Reality

Ya know, sometimes I agree with you, sometimes I really don't.

In this case seems like an OK to throw some thoughts out there, not really agreeing/disagreeing with you.

I have a few decades in facilities/plant maintenance.
This includes building system management as well as alarms (HVAC, water pressure, compressed air, etc.).
It also includes 15+ years with UPS battery management systems and alarms.

While an engineer may want tight limits, too tight may trigger many alarms. This gets the users into, "it's a stupid alarm, ignore it". Worse if they either don't understand the data or the negative impact of the data.

More than once with UPS batteries, I and a sales guy would be called into a site. The question was, "we spent all this money on battery monitoring, why did we drop the data floor?!?!".

I could look at data and say, "well, for 6 months our system was saying you had issues. They were ignored, then you had a major power event and the system and redundant systems fell....".

OK, take this post out of a niche discussion, make it more "normal".

You buy some cars, they have some warning lights. You likely have a battery light, a brake light (could be low fluid, could be the E-brake is on), an oil light and a temp light.
For those of us that may money working on cars, these are called idiot lights. By the time the light comes on, something bad has already happened. No real forewarning.
Why? They only tell the mechanic what system failed and stopped the car.
On the other hand, maybe your model had gauges or you added your own.
Now you can see a trend to a bad outcome.
Now, you can still choose to ignore the impending bad outcome, but it is a choice.

How does this relate to the discussion?
Well, with proper training and use, eyeballs do a fair job, but not perfect. Likely a bit better than "idiot lights", but not perfect.
Flarm, transponder, whatever.....is more like gauges, still not perfect, but better than eyeballs alone. If you choose to ignore the info, it may still be a bad outcome.

Kirk seemed to think I was against any type of collision avoidance (in another thread), I am not.
Your location can raise or lower the need, but it is better to have if possible.
As I stated in the other thread, most private gliders I fly have some system. I like having more info. Flarm is good as it is more specific to close quarters flying like a thermal.
Asking our club to equip all club aircraft is another matter. If I could afford to just buy it for each club ship, but I can't afford that.
What we have done is try to impart on pilots the potential dangers and push for looking as well as maintaining FAA cloud clearances. This is about on par with idiot lights.