Fortunately, such technical differences really don't matter in the discussion at hand.We may be miscommunicating on the "automatic firing" part. Yes, of course it's the pilot that activates the system when authorized to do so or when it becomes clear it's needed (see my response to Revoltingest as an indication that I'm not just moving the goal-posts here), but what I have heard definitely more than once is that when it's activated by the pilot, what happens next pretty much takes care of itself unless the pilot deactivates it. Since this was information I heard many years ago (late 1960's and late 1990's), to what extent this may or may not be accurate I simply cannot say.