Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not only that but they are even less capable of taking off on their own (see the work done by Airbus' ATTOL project [0] on what some of the more recent successes are). So I'm not sure what "planes can land on their own" gets us anyway even if autopilot on modern airliners can do an awful lot on their own (including following flight plans in ways that are more advanced than before). The Garmin Autoland basically annou…
How's that not autonomous? The landing is fully automated. The clearance/talking isn't, but we know that's about the easiest part to automate it's just that the incentives aren't quite there.
It does not have logic to deal with unforeseen situations (with some exceptions of handling collision avoidance advisories). Automating ATC, clearance, etc, is also not currently realistic (let alone "the easiest part") because ATC doesn't know what an airliner's constraints may be in terms of fuel capacity, company procedures for the aircraft, etc, so it can't just remotely instruct it to say "fly this route / hold for this long / etc".
Heck, even the current autolands need the pilot to control the aircraft when the speed drops low enough that the rudder is no longer effective because the nose gear is usually not autopilot-controllable (which is a TIL for me). So that means the aircraft can't vacate the runway, let alone taxi to the gate.
I think airliners and modern autopilot and flight computers are amazing systems but they are just not "autonomous" by any stretch.
Edit: oh, sorry, maybe you were only asking about the Garmin Autoland not being autonomous, not airliner autoland. Most of this still applies, though.