Thought for the day is automatic wipers and lights - good or bad?

Yesterday I endured three hours on the M1 in heavy rain and near-laughable amounts of spray. Around 50% of the midday vehicular sailors around me didn't have any lights on. Not good.
The thing is, many of these cars were relatively new, premium or sub-premium family hatches and saloons; the type that are more than likely to be equipped with automatic wipers and lights.

My first question is that do manufacturers not program the headlights to come on when the wipers are on constantly? If not then why not? Visibility was reduced to probably well under 100m in places, and if my learnings of the Highway Code are correct that is the definition of foglight funtime. However noone seemed really bothered about the comedy lack of vision, no doubt presuming that their cars had sorted the lights out for them and that the integrated safety features would keep them safe if their tailgating landed the driver in even deeper water. 

The second part to my end of day rant stems from a snippet I read earlier this week (although I can't remember where). It regailed the story (a possible internet myth) of a chap driving through a tunnel just a few metres long. The car's nannying brain felt the need to deploy some lighting for half a second then shut them off again. Another vehicle further along the lane sees this flashing as their right of way to pull out of a side road, causing the inevitable steel faceplant of doom.

The average human brain is a highly complex organ capable of dealing with millions of sensory inputs and able to make constant quick decisions, unrivalled by anything that man could ever recreate at any cost.
Yet you can buy an ECU for a Renault Megane (with auto wipers) on ebay for £120. I'll stick with the better solution, thanks very much.