No certificate

[SharkRider]

Around here divers without c-cards can go to the local air-fill house and get all the air they want!

 

[SamDiver14]

Well, granted that those people who engage in activities that require a greater amount of skill and training usually need it for the level of participation in their chosen sport, ie. racecar driving, sky diving, catching poisonous reptiles, etc. My point is that SCUBA is an inherently dangerous activity. The only way to minimize the risk is to engage in the sport with reliable equipment, good instruction, and slow gains in experience. True that if a person would like to be a cave diver they need a greater level of training for the greater level of risk, however, to a non-diver an open water situation can be just a deadly as a cave to a new cave diver. That is not to say that some people haven't survived, thousands of people have dove with little or no training in Florida and penetrated into the caves in the springs and lived to tell about. But if trending was possible I would suspect that those who would continue to do so would greatly reduce their life expectancy. The point is that sometimes people who have the training to engage in their chosen activity still become a statistic. The survivability of those who have no training has to be much less. Isn't this true? Now perhaps some of these great divers did things that were wrong, but they were trained to do things correctly (unless you go back to pre-training days before certs etc.) and they still died. Doesn't a diver that hasn't been trained to do things correctly (as far as we know by todays training standards) stand a greater chance of being injured or winding up dead?

 

[SamDiver14]

Has anyone else ever noticed that you have to be as precise as a biblical scholar speaking at an Atheist convention on this board? There is less tolerance (meant in a mechanical design sense) in discussing SCUBA than acutally exists in practicing SCUBA.

 

[pasley]

Has anyone else ever noticed that you have to be as precise as a biblical scholar speaking at an Atheist convention on this board? There is less tolerance (meant in a mechanical design sense) in discussing SCUBA than acutally exists in practicing SCUBA.

Wow, that is some beautiful word smithing. I may have to write that one down.

 

[ramblinpaul]

Is it illegel in the USA to dive or buy scuba gear without a diver certificate,and who has the power to enforce it if there are laws?

I haven't read all the posts, so I don't know if anyone actually answered the question?

It's not illegal to buy the gear, but a dive shop is well within their rights to deny you service. Though it's probably unlikely to happen when buying gear at either your Local Dive Shop, or on the internet.

 

[RICHinNC]

Two posts on the first page and nothing from him since then. What does that thell ya??

 

[cuddlefish]

No laws except those relating to scuba tanks by the DOT. The diving industry is self regulated. Dive centers require a certification card for air fills for their liability protection and your safety.

 

[Michael Schlink]

This is probably one of the best troll started threads I've read, we got a pretty clear picture of how Mike feels about training agencies, we've established that you should probably not be a self taught dive and you can get a class for $99, (Mike did you miss that one?) This has been a pretty good read.
For those of you that keep answering the original post,STOP, he either was a troll, or he couldn't take the beating as refered to in a previous post. Either way he hasn't been heard from so he's either scared to poke his head up or maybe he didn't like SB and he jumped over to Deco

 

[boulderjohn]

I read an article a few years ago about a study that showed that people who are not competent in a particular area of knowledge are not capable of recognizing competence in others. The article related primarily to business, explaining poor hiring decisions and other related problems. I saw it myself when a person who was considered by management to be an expert in technology was known to be incompetent by anyone who actually understood technology. Managment still relied upon him for his "expertise" when making one disastrous tech-related decision after another.

It also works when trying to get instruction when you are learning a new skill. How do you choose someone to teach you? How do you know competent instruction from incompetent instruction when you are not competent to judge the difference?

I did not learn to ski until I was in my 20's. I could barely afford the lift ticket, let alone instruction, so I relied on friends who seemed to know what they were doing, and I watched the experienced skers to learn good technique. In accordance with the research posted above, I managed to pick out really poor role models, and when I eventually started getting competent instruction, it took many, many years to overcome the bad habits I had acquired.

I did not get certified until I was in my 40's, and I soon found myself surrounded by experienced divers who were eager to give me advice. I also watched the processes followed by those around me who seemed to know what they were doing. Fortunately, I had already had my skiing experience, so I was very careful about accepting anything I heard or saw.

I have since had a lot of instruction from certified scuba instructors. I know that much--perhaps most--of the early advice I received from experienced divers was BS--and sometmes dangerous BS. Some of it could get one killed.

So, if I want to learn more about scuba, especially with skills that are life-threatening, how do I pick a competent Mentor?

Do I listen to a certified instuctor from any agency?

Or should I listen to someone who tells me he doesn't have any formal training but it doesn't matter because certifying agencies are a bunch of crap and his experience is better than the stuff all these agencies teach--"just trust me and put your life into my hands"?

 

[SharkRider]

I find it interesting that dive shops think they can deny service to anyone without a C-Card. The ACLU should be notified. I'm sure if enough uncertified divers complained and brought forward enough lawsuits... something would give. I see the denial of any service equivelent to denying a person a seat on the bus or a table at a restaraunt or a job or any other thing where there is no legal reason to deny service (no law requiring certification or for that matter no law denying anyone air fills on the basis of a lack of certification,) an argument could easily be made by the ACLU that non-certified divers are a minority group that are being discriminated against.