Becoming a pilot in the RAF is incredibly difficult due to the physical and mental demands required, however, did these standards drop during the Second World War because the demand for pilots would have been greater, if so were there any implications for this?
I'm fairly certain (my sources are controversial at worst) that in WW2 the Royal Air Force standards had probably gotten higher than it had in the past.
The RAF in WW1 had largely consisted of scouting; very little aerial fighting took place if any. Your biggest concern was getting shot from the ground. Now suddenly, with WW2, dogfighting was a big thing since machine guns could finally be mounted on a plane without shredding the propellers.
Not to mention the actual training itself. In WW1, the RAF was trained in England. Between Britain's fast approaching debts and the war effort itself, it's safe to say that they wouldn't be able to support the pilots with world class training. However, in WW2, the Luftwaffe prompted Britian to train the air force elsewhere (shooting down pilots who were training and such) Thus was the British Commonwealth Air Training Program (BCATP) which trained all the RAF pilots in Canada. Far from the battlefield, the pilots could train safely, not having to learn quickly or get the "gist" of it as they would have to in the war zone that was the skies of Britain.
Unlike Japan (who started the whole Kamikaze thing due to unskilled pilots and poorer fighter planes) Britain didn't have to begin mass producing pilots who would've died in the air As fast as they took off. Especially after Hitler had ended the Blitz, RAF pilots had never been robbed of proper training, making sure the pilots could survive the demands that such a job entitles.
Did people get worse at typing when the typewriter was first mass produced?