Do you think computers encourage risky diving in new/ young divers?

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Yup, and there are some AOW divers that can plan dives as good as any technical diver. So what! You're arguing from a logical position called the missing middle. My first sentence supplied the other half of that logical construct. Exceptions don't prove anything. In fact, if anything, they disprove common misconceptions. The missing middle is that the vast majority of AOW or recreational divers can plan dives. But, the issue is what constitutes a plan?

I can tell you from my own experience as a recreational diver who's come up through the ranks (I'm a master diver now) that most of the dives I planned with occasional buddies consisted of: (1) who's going to lead the dive, and (2) where are we going (i.e. which end of the quarry, how deep do you want to go, or what do you want to see)? My buddies and I knew enough to watch our SPG's and surface with 500 psi. This idea that we should plan dives down to the tiniest detail is simply the result of higher trained divers projecting their own biases toward rec divers in out-of-context scenarios. Now, the dives I'm talking about are typical rec dives that don't include overhead environments or tasks that depend on minimum bottom times. For those dives some minimum gas planning and more detailed planning should be done.

Some posters in this thread have argued that beginning divers should know more about the inner workings of their PDC's. While I agree that some extra knowledge is helpful I would emphasize it is not necessary. What is essential is understanding what the display of the PDC is telling you. This argument for knowledge that goes beyond a minimum amount of knowledge required for safe rec dives reminds me of this analogy:

Most, if not all of you, reading this drive a car. How many of you look at the dashboard of your car? I would bet dollars to donuts you know what the gauges and idiot lights tell you. But, do you understand the inner workings of your engine to appreciate what those instruments are telling you? Automotive engineers do. So, the argument directed against new or inexperienced divers to learn the theory behind their PDC to be a safe diver is like an automotive engineer telling you you don't understand your car well enough to drive it safely.
Good points made. My buddy diving plans are the same as yours. My shallow solo shore dive plans are much less intricate-- out to the left, over to the middle, back in.

Agree completely with wetb4.
I think people, myself at least, are advocating that new divers understand the very basics of NDL: the amount of nitrogen the body is absorbing is affected by pressure. Go up, and your body absorbs more slowly. Go down, more quickly. (yes that is a crude oversimplication, but I think it suffices). Tie that into the NDL time remaining (or a bar), and they basically have what they need to know to dive more safely.

Don't know what the numbers in the posts above mine mean.
 
I think people, myself at least, are advocating that new divers understand the very basics of NDL: the amount of nitrogen the body is absorbing is affected by pressure. Go up, and your body absorbs more slowly. Go down, more quickly. (yes that is a crude oversimplication, but I think it suffices). Tie that into the NDL time remaining (or a bar), and they basically have what they need to know to dive more safely.

I agree that new divers should learn the basics of nitrogen absorption and its relationship to NDL. However, I don't believe it makes them any safer than divers who don't know those basics. Compare two divers: one who knows the basics and the other who knows nothing except what the NDL display is telling him. To be clear, the second diver knows to go shallow before his PDC's NDL display counts down to zero but doesn't know why. Let me ask you this: How does the second diver's safety differ at all from the first diver who knows the basics? They both make the same dives and both dive to the same NDL.
 
Blaming that on the DC is equal in my eyes to people who blame the GPS when they drive off the road.

"But the GPS said take a left" said Betty before driving her car into a lake.
 
Yup, and there are some AOW divers that can plan dives as good as any technical diver. So what! You're arguing from a logical position called the missing middle. My first sentence supplied the other half of that logical construct. Exceptions don't prove anything. In fact, if anything, they disprove common misconceptions. The missing middle is that the vast majority of AOW or recreational divers can plan dives. But, the issue is what constitutes a plan?

I can tell you from my own experience as a recreational diver who's come up through the ranks (I'm a master diver now) that most of the dives I planned with occasional buddies consisted of: (1) who's going to lead the dive, and (2) where are we going (i.e. which end of the quarry, how deep do you want to go, or what do you want to see)? My buddies and I knew enough to watch our SPG's and surface with 500 psi. This idea that we should plan dives down to the tiniest detail is simply the result of higher trained divers projecting their own biases toward rec divers in out-of-context scenarios. Now, the dives I'm talking about are typical rec dives that don't include overhead environments or tasks that depend on minimum bottom times. For those dives some minimum gas planning and more detailed planning should be done.

Some posters in this thread have argued that beginning divers should know more about the inner workings of their PDC's. While I agree that some extra knowledge is helpful I would emphasize it is not necessary. What is essential is understanding what the display of the PDC is telling you. This argument for knowledge that goes beyond a minimum amount of knowledge required for safe rec dives reminds me of this analogy:

Most, if not all of you, reading this drive a car. How many of you look at the dashboard of your car? I would bet dollars to donuts you know what the gauges and idiot lights tell you. But, do you understand the inner workings of your engine to appreciate what those instruments are telling you? Automotive engineers do. So, the argument directed against new or inexperienced divers to learn the theory behind their PDC to be a safe diver is like an automotive engineer telling you you don't understand your car well enough to drive it safely.

Excuse me master diver, I wasn't arguing anything I was stating a fact. This year starts my 52nd year of diving, I've been around awhile and have dove with just about every type of diver/person you can name and have seen a thing or two myself. I'm not a card collector however. There wasn't a lot of cards to collect when I started we all learned by reading and doing.
IMO diver training is in a sorry state, people being lead around on dives because they don't have the confidence that good training would have instilled in them. When I got certified there were no DMs to hold our hands during a dive and tell us where to go and when to end the dive, that's why we got trained so we could do those simple things ourselves, that's the purpose of training after all. It's not just to certify more divers and sell more gear.

The inner workings of my diver gear, washing machine, dryer, car, guns, and everything else I own are no mystery because I maintain/repair everything I own. A PDC is a computer is works on zeros and ones the difference is in the software and yes new divers buying a PDC for the 1st time should know enough about the algorithms/software used to know the difference between their choices and if what they are buying is what they need for their type of diving.

Do get me started! :)
 
I agree that new divers should learn the basics of nitrogen absorption and its relationship to NDL. However, I don't believe it makes them any safer than divers who don't know those basics. Compare two divers: one who knows the basics and the other who knows nothing except what the NDL display is telling him. To be clear, the second diver knows to go shallow before his PDC's NDL display counts down to zero but doesn't know why. Let me ask you this: How does the second diver's safety differ at all from the first diver who knows the basics? They both make the same dives and both dive to the same NDL.

After I posted the above I realized that although the second diver without the basic knowledge might be safe, she is not safer. The diver might think "what does it matter how close I come to NDL as long as I don't get it down to zero. Once knowledge is gained she might think "if I keep my NDL greater than 10 minutes I will be safer than I would be diving to within a few minutes of zero.

To answer the OP's question, I don't think PDC's create any desire for divers to run down their NDL in comparison to using tables. Divers who like to push the limits would look at the tables and say "Give me that time in that black box". The PDC just makes it easier for them to do that. No setting a dive watch or starting a bottom timer and carrying a separate depth gauge.
 
Maybe. At a first glance, I'd say no as well, but it's really an empiric question.

As a counterpoint, consider helmets in American football. There is some ongoing research (and of course, controversy) about helmet use in the sport. The helmets are designed to reduce skull fractures, but are commonly believed to reduce concussions as well, which they don't. In fact, the research has the counterintuitive result that concussions have increased since helmet use became widespread. It could be due to the way the helmet changes the physics of a head hit, but this is unlikely. The most likely explanation is that hard helmets have given players a false sense of security, which has lead to more aggressive and dangerous behavior, hence the increase in concussion rates.

This is quite analogous to the question posed by the OP, and to your example of seat belts. I don't know the answer to any of the 3 cases, and if I were a gambling man I'd say computers are overall helpful (I use one myself, after all). My point is that questions like these are deceptively deep and complex, sometimes the obvious-looking answer ends up being incorrect.
I have zero sympathy for NFL players with head injuries. Clearly there is a good deal of risk involved in making millions of dollars by smashing your body into other armored people for a living. Otherwise, the job wouldn't pay millions of dollars. I'm not saying they deserve it or anything but they really should expect to be injured after playing professionally for a few years. Next, we'll have fighters complaining about cauliflower ear after getting punched in the head a zillion times.
 
Most new divers have never had a table in their possession to make that connection.
I think that depends on agency and instructor choice. When I did my NAUI OW class about 5 years ago, we had to use tables for every dive. The class gear had AI dive computers (sherwood wisdom I think), but we used them as gauges.

Not that this has a lick to do with instructor or agency choice. At the time, I didn't realize that NAUI and SSI were different things. Well, not until I brought the instructor my SSI medical forms that I'd downloaded and he told me about it. Fortunately, he didn't make me go back to the doc for additional clearance forms.
 

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