Earlier quoted context omitted.
What's the difference?
That's more valuably left as an exercise for the reader.
In other words, you're unwilling to back up what you say.
Two days in an underwater cave running out of oxygen
221–230 of 320 posts
Re: Two days in an underwater cave running out of oxygen
#222Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Given the choice of having a father at home or have one dead in cave but famous for exploring cool places I don't think it's hard to guess what most children would pick. In all seriousness, I do have a hard time guessing which one most children would pick. I can see reasonable arguments made on either side. Personally, I think it would be far more inspiring to have a father who died pursuing his passion, then one w…
If you just asked them, in all their ignorance, you're undoubtedly right. If you asked the children who chose the adventurous dad after he had died pursuing his passion, nearly 100% would trade the world to reverse that choice.
That's an inherently biased question, because they've already suffered the loss, and so would've chosen not to suffer it given the chance.
The same thing (but reverse) with asking children whose fathers didn't go on an adventure and see if they would've preferred a more adventurous father!
Re: Two days in an underwater cave running out of oxygen
#223Earlier quoted context omitted.
My brother did a fair amount of mountain climbing in his 20s, but stopped around the time he had kids. He specifically said "I don't want to go again until they're old enough to remember me." Done properly, the risks are limited, but they do exist no matter how careful you are. Now he's hit about that right time and I don't know if he even still has the desire. Age changes a lot of that. Still, it does seem like he m…
"It's amazing how much mature wisdom resembles being too tired." --Lazarus Long (i.e. Heinlein, though it's arguable if everything LL says is Heinlein speaking) I'm not certain if this is an argument for or against, given how much I'm in the same "too tired" boat.
Call my a cynic, but it seems like some people try to pass off their tiredness as wisdom in itself.
Re: Two days in an underwater cave running out of oxygen
#224Earlier quoted context omitted.
What's the difference?
Your life being the thing on the line.
Since I talked about life insurance, obviously I'm talking about cases where your life is on the line. So does that mean you should never do anything that might get you killed if you have children? Even if you have life insurance?
Re: Two days in an underwater cave running out of oxygen
#225Earlier quoted context omitted.
> it seems quite a reasonable argument that, while you have a young child, you shouldn't actively go around risking your life -- they're your dependents That's an argument for having life insurance; it's not necessarily an argument for not taking risks.
There is no argument for taking risk but for necessity and reward.
There are a lot of people that would disagree with that. You could say the same thing about a lot of things that enrich your life.
Re: Two days in an underwater cave running out of oxygen
#226I'd like to address the false assumption in this thread that cave diving is more dangerous than driving a car! I cave dive on a regular basis with two other guys. We've dived together as a team for nearly 10 years. I'm late 60s and single, the second guy is 50s and has a partner but no children, and the third is early 40s with a six-year-old, who he has every intention of seeing grow-up into adulthood. We often dive…
And what happens when the fixed line breaks, somebody kicks up a little silt and you get disoriented as well? (Which is exactly what happened in the article.) FWIW, I've done exactly one cavern dive, in cold water with low visibility. It scared the crap out of me: as an amateur, it's difficult even to figure out which way is up , never mind the other directions. (Yes, air bubbles go up, so just breathe out right? Eas…
> And what happens when the fixed line breaks, somebody kicks up a little silt and you get disoriented as well? (Which is exactly what happened in the article.)
It's not unknown for fixed lines to break. Generally you'd tie-on a spool, and swim forward in the correct general direction until you found the line again. But if the other end had been pulled right out, you could be in trouble! In the system I referred to, there's a spot where the farmer who owned the land above, drilled down into the system to get some water. By a chance in a thousand, he drilled directly through (and severed) the fixed line in one of the main tunnels!
As for silt, a key part of cave diver training (certainly in this part of the world) is being able to perform all skills in a total blackout (whether from silting, loss of light, or whatever). This includes sharing gas, donning and doffing tanks, navigating restrictions, following the line, finding a lost line, and so on. That's just "part of the job", as it were.
Re: Two days in an underwater cave running out of oxygen
#227I might be speaking out of line, but taking on these kinds of risks with young children at home seems kind of selfish. The fact that he went back into the same cave that nearly killed him only a month later...almost as if to say: "I would rather my kids grow up without a Dad than live without my adrenaline fix" I am neither a father or a cave diver though, so I might be missing a piece of the puzzle. Would either gro…
I race motorcycles and also ride on the street most days, so this is a familiar topic of discussion with my wife, especially considering that we have a two-year-old son. What I can say on the subject is that there's a big difference between taking every precaution to minimize risk and being careless or reckless. What stood out to me when reading this article was "why the fuck would you use a guideline that could brea…
Cave line doesn't break easily. Having a boulder fall on it isn't a normal or expected event.
Re: Two days in an underwater cave running out of oxygen
#228I'd like to address the false assumption in this thread that cave diving is more dangerous than driving a car! I cave dive on a regular basis with two other guys. We've dived together as a team for nearly 10 years. I'm late 60s and single, the second guy is 50s and has a partner but no children, and the third is early 40s with a six-year-old, who he has every intention of seeing grow-up into adulthood. We often dive…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Micromort has a single scuba dive as having the same risk of death as ~1700 miles in a car. And cave diving is even more dangerous.
The statistics on the page you reference come solely from UK divers, and US divers "insured by DAN"! That's not much of a cross-section. And the relevant link: [14] "UK Diving Fatalities Review" doesn't work, so we don't know how they estimated the total number of dives per annum - a notoriously difficult figure to gauge, as many other diving safety reports have admitted.
As for "cave diving is even more dangerous", I assume you mean compared to recreational diving. If so - says who? The whole thrust of my previous post, which I illustrated with copious details, is that cave diving is probably not more dangerous than various other daily activities. You're welcome to disagree, but what are your actual reasons for doing so?
Re: Two days in an underwater cave running out of oxygen
#229Earlier quoted context omitted.
A similar trough exists in general aviation—accident rates are markedly higher for somewhat experienced pilots than for beginners. The consensus among pilots seems to be that you are most dangerous between the time you think you know what you're doing, and the time you survive your first big scare. There's probably a good lesson here for computer programmers...
I disagree here. You're dangerous until you know you know what you're doing. Having a bad scare might make you not repeat that situation, but you're still just as dumb after it as you were before (well, at least that's been true for me).
You can disagree, but I'm talking about an objective phenomenon.
https://www.amazon.com/Killing-Zone-Second-How-Pilots/dp/007...
Re: Two days in an underwater cave running out of oxygen
#230Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you just asked them, in all their ignorance, you're undoubtedly right. If you asked the children who chose the adventurous dad after he had died pursuing his passion, nearly 100% would trade the world to reverse that choice.
That's an inherently biased question, because they've already suffered the loss, and so would've chosen not to suffer it given the chance. The same thing (but reverse) with asking children whose fathers didn't go on an adventure and see if they would've preferred a more adventurous father!
While, as a father, I instinctively hate your answer, it is a very good point that helped me see beyond my previous horizon, thanks for that!