Let The revolution Begin!

[Genesis]

The problem is, you can't make the credential meaningful, because you have no power of legitimacy to do so. That is, unless you're willing to start doing at gunpoint (e.g. the government) - which I'm not.

As such I am increasingly coming to believe that Darwin needs to be the only judge.

After all, he does such a fine job.

 

[dweeb]

"The way to make this profitable is to use the OW as a loss leader, kind of like razor blades. If the course/instructor is good, then the students will come back for more. They'll be hooked and they will want to learn more. They will realize that by having better bouyancy they'll have more fun, breath less air and have better visibility. They'll learn that to be warmer, you need to wear a drysuit, but there are procedures that you need to learn. They'll know about deco problems, and that you need to learn more than the basic tables."

No, the empirical evidence is that they don't. At member updates and in internal publications, PADI contsantly laments that most 90% of open water students do not seek any further training, ever. Most people do not want knowledge or education, they want the benefits that people with knowledge and education have, without having to put forth the mental effort. Otherwise we wouldn't have an education crisis in this country. Most people are perfectly content to be lousy divers, as long as it doesn't bar them from diving, so they can say they've done it before moving on to bungee jumping, or whatever the next trendy thing on their list is.

"Crack dealers know how to get their customers addicted, the key is to get customers comming back for more."

And there you have it. What an appropriate yardstick for PADI - crack dealers. As long as we're making money and giving our customers what they demand, it's all good.

 

[dweeb]

Now for the record, please understand that I do not disrespect you or your accomplishments. However I do completely disagree in the most strenuous way possible, with the premise that self-taught is better than being trained. Being trained, and learning from an instructor is nothing more than learning from the past mistakes of others,

See, the thing is, we have this really neat invention called the written word.
(We're using it to communicate right now!) The mistakes of others can be documented using this nifty tool, so you can learn from them without having someone else facilitate it.

Ideally, you publish everything one needs to know, and then diving becomes a eugenics program for higher literacy rates, killing off those with marginal reading skills.

 

[NAM001]

The problem is, you can't make the credential meaningful, because you have no power of legitimacy to do so. That is, unless you're willing to start doing at gunpoint (e.g. the government) - which I'm not.

As such I am increasingly coming to believe that Darwin needs to be the only judge.

After all, he does such a fine job.

UNFORTUNATELY this is true fortunately it is a better measure of true failure than what if. not to make light of the matter. its reality... and i dont want the government into the control process. a lot us useless crap in all areas are sold on what if......let each organization put out thier stats and let the end user determine what is best for them. as if they know till afterwards. if a sloppy organization has all the bad stats let it be. the ship captain is final authority on ship. no shirt no shoes no service. itmay be interesting to hear a dabate between the main players on some of these issues..

KWS

 

[Genesis]

UNFORTUNATELY this is true fortunately it is a better measure of true failure than what if. not to make light of the matter. its reality... and i dont want the government into the control process. let each organization put out thier stats and let the end user determine what is best for them. as if they know till afterwards. if a sloppy organization has all the bad stats let it be. the ship captain is final authority on ship. no shirt no shoes no service.

KWS

The problem is figuring it out beforehand for the newbie.

It MIGHT work, once word gets around.... Maybe. If certain agencies don't start suing and claiming "discrimination."

 

[dweeb]

I can tell you how much I saw it being done during the OW classes I have observed.

Zero.

That include my own OW class.

Any PADI members been to the update? During the Risk Management portion, they show video dramatization of the deep dive from Adventures in Diving (AOW) These are AOW students on their last AOW dive, and after descending along a line, set just short of the bottom to avoid stirring up silt.
Both students and instructor kneel on the bottom to check their SPGs and trade OK signals before starting their tour, then do it again upon returning to the line prior to surfacing. There is an incident after that, and during the dramatization of the depositions, and the discussion both in the video and from the presenter, there is not a hint that this kneeling on the bottom is anything but normal.

 

[dweeb]

mike here is some things to think about and i am not trying to lecture. only to offer another perspective because i respect those who persue perfection. and i think you do.

1st society has made a no accountability world. if you pour coffee on you sue mcdonalds. halloween costumes that say this costume does not permit the user to fly. your car engine blew up because the dealer did not mail you a come in and get your oil chamge notice. kids are taught to deal with the word no untill they are adult inwhich tempertantrums involve guns and not stomping feet. i am invincable, no one can tell me no and i will do what i want. this is not a sport that can be enjoyed by that mentality.

BINGO!!! THis is the crux of the biscuit. This society will either descend into totalitarianism or collapse unless people start taking responsibility for themselves. The current PADI paradigm (supervision instead of competence) absolves divers of the need to do so. It also rewards learned helplessness. What's good for PADI is bad for humankind.

 

[dweeb]

The problem is, you can't make the credential meaningful, because you have no power of legitimacy to do so. That is, unless you're willing to start doing at gunpoint (e.g. the government) - which I'm not.

WRONG!!! A credential is not meaningful because someone enforces the need for it. It's meaningful because the attribute it testifies to is true. A credential doesn't grant you the access; it attests to some attribute you have that someone trusted third party has verified. The attribute is the real criteria for access. I can pick a carrot from the ground and know it's kosher, or I can buy carrot sticks from the store with the little symbol on the label that says they're kosher. The symbol doesn't force a Jewish person to buy the product, it testifies to him that someone he trusts has made sure it meets his criteria. This is an excellent example of a credential system that is fully voluntary and nongovernmental. All the government does is enforce the copyright laws that prevent forgery of the credentials.

 

[dweeb]

The problem is figuring it out beforehand for the newbie.

This is why PADI's pure capitalist paradigm doesn't work for education and why the USA's post-secondary education system, our greatest export industry (the world comes to us for college education) is all non-profits.

Adam Smith's models all depend on an informed consumer. However, when the product is education, the consumer is, by definition, not informed, else he would not be in the market for the product. Thus, he is dependent upon the vendor's sense of social obligation. When the vendor is a for-profit company, that sense is drowned out by the siren song of easy money.

 

[chrpai]

BINGO!!! THis is the crux of the biscuit. This society will either descend into totalitarianism or collapse unless people start taking responsibility for themselves. The current PADI paradigm (supervision instead of competence) absolves divers of the need to do so. It also rewards learned helplessness. What's good for PADI is bad for humankind.

I don't recall being taught any of these attributes in any of my PADI classes.