...However, as I previously mentioned, either people can behave properly "under fire" or they cannot. We can discuss all details that contributed to one's reactions at a given moment/environment after the event but some people are deselected from some professions (such as aviation) because they demonstrate they are not capable of reacting properly to given stimuli. This is called aptitude.
Well, we need to agree to disagree
I don't believe in black and white. While certain people indeed cannot work under fire, most can. They just may need different amounts of time to get used to stressful conditions. Long periods are not an option in the job environment, so I agree that many people can't work as aviators (military, firemen, or whatever). But with the proper training, I still think that a relative majority can do that.
This is a super interesting sub-discussion, and very important. Really good thread here, and I value the OP's openness because I get to learn from your mistakes.
I'm not a cave diver
yet, so take what I say with a grain of salt. But I am a combat arms veteran and have seen people who can and cannot operate "under fire/under stress" (however you want to say it).
@ginti I like you already, though we've never met, because I also think there is
no such thing as black and white. This is a situation, though, where we can see particular shades of gray.
I think we need to take a step back and realize that cave diving is a small subset of an already small hobby/profession within global society. This is similar to military members in high-stress situations... Not all military men and women are able to operate under stress, and they wear the uniform! No, they are not all heroes. Sorry to break that American bubble... I saw soldiers that could barely hold it together enough to accomplish organizing equipment and inventorying property. That's why most don't join (or remain in) jobs like the infantry. That's why there are psychological tests for
all special operations candidates. Cave diving has many similarities to combat operations, from detailed planning, to discipline needed, some forms of social pressure and ruthless adherence to proper execution. It is a high-stakes environment (although not nearly as high as combat, of course... No one is actively trying to kill you).
When you put cave diving in its proper place, you see that the vast majority of divers self-select themselves
out of cave diving. Many people are scared to go into a cave when it's dry! Many are not interested. What's in a dark cave, right? Then there will be a subset who
think they want to do it, until they are met with the reality of it. Then there are the actual cave divers, which are probably less than 5% of all divers on earth. (That statistic is right out of my tail pouch, don't get excited...)
@ginti I think there's another type of deviance that we don't think about. Being a small subset, cave divers are (I think) generally well-trained, apt, attentive, and detail-oriented. You wouldn't enter a cave otherwise, unless you're suicidal or one fry short of a happy meal. Cave divers don't think the same way as non-cave divers about how specialized and demanding cave diving is. This is similar to how I came to think that directing automatic weapons fire from multiple locations while talking on a radio, maneuvering vehicles, and consulting a map during live-fire training exercises with night vision on was not so special, or how
@306dive306 saw flight operations become similarly normalized (I'm guessing he was AF?). Once you get into a specialized hobby/profession, it becomes the norm. There is a
"deviation of norms".
I do not agree that most everyone can operate well under stress. Take the
average diver into a cave with no training (including doubles) and someone
is going to die. They probably haven't even heard of rule of thirds! Even with training, most divers I've seen (and I'm a novice!) would probably die or cause someone else to die. For the
average diver, there is a significant amount of task loading just to get into a cave and start (
e.g., true buoyancy control, trim for the cave floor/ceiling, regular gauge checks, situational awareness, checking teammates, knowing the route, following the line, use of correct markings/cookies/REMs according to training and team SOPs, using any form of can light/multiple lights, using doubles and stages, proper communication... shall I go on?). I think research has shown this not to be the case. You can train people to understand and to react, but you cannot change their personality, sensitivity to stress, aptitude, etc. For an off topic example, do you think everyone could get PhDs... in any field? There is a significant amount of aptitude and stress involved with that. Either the answer is no, or standards for PhDs are low enough for the degree to be meaningless.
Now if you
really want to get philosophical/theoretical, what is stress? Is it only external, or also internal? How do different people perceive and react to stress? How could a team test their weak points to identify them? That's where it gets gray... and interesting...
