PADI tables finally going away?

[The Chairman]

Anybody who has mental limitations, can be easily deceived, and is prone to making simple mistakes probably shouldn't be diving in the first place. However, if you have your **** together and are of good sound body and mind there isn't a problem.

Denial: not just another river in Egypt. Next you'll tell us that you don't get narced! EVERYBODY has mental limitations and only a deceived mind would think otherwise

Wow, how did we ever survive diving without computers I'll never know

With the unlimited capacity and accuracy of the human brain, why on EARTH did we invent calculators or computers for any endeavor?

 

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[gcbryan]

NetDoc, I don't think it's been discussed how is this subject introduced in your class? Is this a matter of briefly going over the tables, going over the concepts while viewing a computer and then just not having table problems on the test?

If that's the case I'd have no problems with that approach at the discretion of the teacher.

If tables aren't brought up at all I would disagree with that approach. I can't see any reason not to discuss tables even if computers are going to be the focus. Both can easily be discussed.

 

[Tigerman]

...
With the unlimited capacity and accuracy of the human brain, why on EARTH did we invent calculators or computers for any endeavor?

Ok. Lets analyze this a bit..
As you already said, "we" invented computers.
Then we taught them to do math. (strictly speakign we did that when we designed them, we just taught them more advanced math)

How exactly is the computer that we invented and "trained" any smarter than the ones who made it? Thats right, its not!
We didnt make it because we cant do it ourselves, then we wouldnt be able to make computers either, we made it because were lazy and dont wanna!

 

[DevonDiver]

You must be Rainman.... because I could certainly not make the constant stream of algorythmic calculations at the speed of my dive computer

 

[pdelannoy]

There was an amazing opportunity in this thread to discuss the conflict between the tables and multi level diving that has been entirely missed. To bad.

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

Denial: not just another river in Egypt. Next you'll tell us that you don't get narced! EVERYBODY has mental limitations and only a deceived mind would think otherwise With the unlimited capacity and accuracy of the human brain, why on EARTH did we invent calculators or computers for any endeavor?

For the depths I go to, no I do not get narced to any noticable degree. Certainly not enough to get impaired to the point that I can't do a simple glance at my bottom timer and figure out what's doing. 150 is my magic number. I can tell very easily when narcosis hits because my ears start ringing soimething fierce and I get effects identical to nitrous oxide.
Going to 120 or 130 for me is not a problem. If it was I wouldn't be diving to that depth on air, simple.
Doing mental calculations is not brain surgery. Everyone who is addicted to their computers seems to think it's critical that the whole bottom time recalculation every foot up or down is life or death, it's not. Every 10 feet is adequate. Going to 3 or 4 ATM's the pressure changes are diminished the deeper you go. The most critical pressure change is between one and two ATM's.
Therefore at depths of 3 or 4' ATM's a change of a few feet is minimal, it's time that becomes the critical factor in regards to slow tissue loading. This is why deep stops are a good thing (which many computers don't allow for) and stops from 30 feet on up are done on every one of my dives deeper than 50 feet.

Sorry but arguing that computers are necessary and maybe soon to be mandatory to me is silly. Maybe a nice convenience for vacation divers who don't care about the nitty gritty of tables and theory like myself, there's cirtainly a market for that in the light recreatyional sector which I think is great, more power to them, they keep the poodle jackets and computers flying off the shelves, but it's not me. I'm a minimalist and I don't fit in to the cookie cutter dive industry model. I am a hobbyist of the roots of diving and enjoy figuring out tables, understanding theory and diving with a minimum of trinket gear which I consider a computer to be. I have no use for it, sorry.

Maybe we can agree to disagree. That's probably as far as we can go.

 

[DevonDiver]

There was an amazing opportunity in this thread to discuss the conflict between the tables and multi level diving that has been entirely missed. To bad.

Explain?

 

[The Chairman]

Going to 120 or 130 for me is not a problem. If it was I wouldn't be diving to that depth on air, simple.

You are too deluded and dangerous for me to dive with my friend. Have fun, but not with me around. You can easily tell you are narced when your gauge reads below 80fsw. You may not feel it, but that doesn't mean your faculties aren't compromised. For most, narcosis is a silent killer.

Sorry but arguing that computers are necessary

Perhaps you are suffering from surface narcosis. I don't know that anyone has suggested that in this thread. I certainly have not done so. There are a few more windmills to the south, should you deign to tilt at them as well.

 

[The Chairman]

Great question gcbryan!

Computers are taught separately from physiology in my class. If done online, then SDI's superb coverage of physiology is taught and then I cover PDCs later. If done in person, I usually use a two glasses with 21 blue and 79 green marbles in them to teach the physiology portion. I carefully explain tissue groups and specifically why I do a 3 minute half stop and five minute safety stop. I also cover the difference between Type I and Type II DCS and that while commercial divers get hit with almost only Type I, recreational divers almost always suffer from Type II DCS. To be sure, the incidence of DCS among both commercial and recreational divers is so small as to amount to only "noise" (not statistically significant). However, you can make an intelligent SWAG about the type of diver they are by the type of DCS they are suffering from. I think our own Rick Murchison suggested that decompression theory is analogous to measuring with a micrometer, marking with a chalk and then cutting with an axe.

I hope this helps.