Martini Effect -- No Consistent Definition

[Bombay High]

I can't recall a time when a few drinks made me almost panic

When I get beyond a few drinks, everyone else in the room panics !

 

[nolatom]

Olive or no olive? I like olives.


Seriously, I haven't really felt the "narc" nor encountered an obviously narced diver til last Christmas at Hole in the Wall off Jupiter. Descended with buddy on N-29 I recall, we were starting to level off at about 110 when she (a DM and really good observant diver) noticed a lone diver much deeper on the bottom, sorta standing there leaning into the current and staring, staring, at his computer. We went down there (about 150') and she looked him in the eye and brought him up 20 feet and he was okay then and finished the dive with us. Seems he was using a steel tank but weighted for aluminum, went down too fast and stayed there (where buddy? who knows?).

So I learn something every day. I'm willing to get narced if I have a buddy like her, and she lets me have all the olives ;-)

 

[TSandM]

I think the underlying concept is simply that narcosis is not a step function, but a continuum. The metaphor of drinking may not be a good one, as drunk and narced often don't feel anything alike, but it is at least a type of degraded functional capacity with which most people are familiar. It doesn't surprise me that different folks use different definitions of the Martini effect, as narcosis is both personal and variable. I am seriously below par at 100 feet on Nitrox, but my husband is not.

 

[dumpsterDiver]

For the longest time could not figure out what all this talk of narcosis was about -- until I got a DSLR.

Things that I have no trouble figuring out on the surface are just completely beyond me past 100 feet. Even at 80 feet I find that trying to determine what the best settings for an individual shot can be a challenge. Same shot at 30 feet gives me no trouble at all.

For me the effects are nothing like being drunk, just feels more like that every 30 feet or so shaves off 10 - 15 IQ points. Some dives this is not an issue, as swimming around looking at the pretty fish does not require much in the way of smarts or problem solving. Other dives when I am trying to get just the perfect shot of some creature hidden in the coral it becomes really noticeable.

Dark nark is a whole other experience. Paranoia and a feeling of dread. Has only happened a couple of times and is no fun at all. First time freaking out while smoking pot describes it perfectly. If I can remember that far back.

Kinda like sitting around the campfire and drinking.....Everything seems fine until you have to stand up to take a leak...

 

[Jim Lapenta]

Or drinking saki and feeling nothing. Not a big deal until you try to stand and find out that you can't feel your legs either.

 

[FPDocMatt]

It's hard to describe a 'sludgy mind'... like 'thinking through setting concrete'..having to 'mentally force coherence through brain neurons travelling in slow motion' or the occurrence of dive amnesia after an otherwise faultlessly performed technical dive.

It is to thinking, what being in waist deep water is to walking.

Wow, you've really got me thinking here. If nitrogen narcosis is just a general degradation in brain function, then somebody needs to do a study, or 2 or 3. We need to know:

• What brain function is degraded specifically, or is it all brain functions?
• Is this anything like the experience of getting Alzheimer's?
• Is this a decline in IQ?
• Does it affect everybody the same way?
• Etc.

I bet somebody has done studies of nitrogen narcosis to figure out exactly what is going on physiologically. You could do it in a hyperbaric chamber (or whatever kind of chamber they use to "virtually" dive to depth). You'd put people into narcosis and give them tasks to perform, figure out which mental functions are affected.

 

[TSandM]

Take a look at the Rubicon database, Matt. They have studied this to some degree. But studies done in chambers don't generalize well, because low visibility, dark, cold and CO2 all play a role in narcosis.

 

[PfcAJ]

The great thing about narcosis is that we already know how to reduce it. Helium.

 

[Griffo]

The great thing about narcosis is that we already know how to reduce it. Helium.

Now I just need to find a cheap source of the stuff that's significantly less than $300 for a"G".

To the OP. Does it really matter anyway? What's the difference if it was the equivalent of 1, or 2, or 3 martini's? Don't your books also say that it depends on the day, the person, the temperature, the work effort etc anyway? Just spend more time in the water, and judge your own loss of capability as you go deeper. Set yourself some maths tests on a slate and try to work them out at various depths, or something similar. I think sometimes new divers get too caught up in reading diving theory rather then getting wet.

 

[Bob DBF]

The Martini Effect is an analogy, it was used to create a discussion around imparement. At the time alcohol was the drug of choice and most divers had imbibed or seen others "in their cups".

If I were to describe being drunk without the knowledge of actualiy drinking, only the effects on my thinking:

It's hard to describe a 'sludgy mind'... like 'thinking through setting concrete'..having to 'mentally force coherence through brain neurons travelling in slow motion' or the occurrence of dive amnesia after an otherwise faultlessly performed technical dive.

It is to thinking, what being in waist deep water is to walking.

Seems to me we would be on the same page, especially as the fact that you are impaired may be hidden from you by the impairment itself.


Bob
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A man's got to know his limitations.
Harry Callahan