The pursuit of Records in Diving (depth, etc)

[Akimbo]

Yup. I routinely see trucks loaded with what is labeled liquid nitrogen or liquid oxygen going down the road. In some areas, liquid nitrogen is cheaper (in quantities of several gallons and up) than bottled water is.

Oxygen is the big seller for sure so Nitrogen was mostly a waste by-product for decades until industry found uses for it as a refrigerant and a pure and relatively inert gas for different processes. Most of the production cost is still applied to the Oxygen.

 

[boulderjohn]

Let's try to be clear on the use of the word "suicide" in this thread.

The Merriam-Webster definition of suicide is "the act of killing yourself because you do not want to continue living."

In common language, though, we often use the word metaphorically to refer to an act that not a deliberate attempt at suicide according to the definition but is rather so foolhardy that the person doing should have known he or she would probably die.

A metaphor uses a word in a sense that is not literally true. When you use one, people are supposed to understand without explanation that you are speaking metaphorically and not literally. If high school student says "My teacher is a real witch," those overhearing it do not immediate suppose she is mixing potions and uttering incantations in her spare time.

I have so far assumed that those who have called this dive a suicide are speaking metaphorically. If someone instead believes Garman intended to die on the dive, that should be spelled out clearly.

 

[The Chairman]

You can't tell me that every single one of the tens of thousands of accident victims who die every year on the roads was a suicide...?!

A suicide is someone who killed themselves. It doesn't have to be premeditated. You'll have to factor out equipment failures as well as other contributing factors to arrive at such a conclusion, but sure: many highway fatalities are indeed suicides. Did they kill themselves by driving drunk? Suicide. Did they kill themselves by exceeding safe limits for the road they were on? Suicide. They did in fact, kill themselves and there's not much question about that.

It's been suggested that this 'accident' was the result of some Group Think phenomenon and to me that's just a lot of psychobabble designed to discredit others needlessly. I'm not into such chest thumping. Here we have a gentleman who inadvertently planned his own death. He set a goal that was beyond his limits, was probably beyond all human limits, and then died during the attempt. If I convinced myself that I could survive an impact from jumping off of a thousand foot cliff, then no matter how sincere my beliefs might have been, it would be ruled a suicide when I perished in the attempt.

It's all about culpability. Who is responsible for Garman's death? No one but himself. People want to blame the shop, but he was diving waaaaaay past anyone else in the shop. Some want to blame the dive op who took him out for the dive, but he had convinced them that he was capable of completing this task. Moreover, they had no reference to determine if this dive was unreasonable or not. He had everyone convinced that he knew more about deco diving than anyone else after only being a diver for 6 years and having less than 600 dives. He infected everyone else with his personal delusions.

Now, you're more than welcome to disagree with me. I won't be telling you to do research, call you names or any other passive aggressive smack. But it's still my opinion that the only one responsible for his death was him. Ergo, this is a suicide.

The Merriam-Webster definition of suicide is "the act of killing yourself because you do not want to continue living."

There's more than one definition in there, John. It also says "To kill (oneself)". It's from the Greek meaning "self death", or more grammatically, "death by self". I didn't use it as a metaphor but in the most literal way possible. He's responsible for his own death.

Why do I think this is such an important distinction? The actions we take or fail to take often result in our own personal injury or demise. While it might be a common pass time to blame everyone else and sue every possible person you can, the ultimate price has already been paid. Doc Deep killed himself and there is little if any other blame to go around. You can delude yourself and quite possibly die in the process. Why is this so hard to comprehend?

 

[Bob DBF]

Collins unabridged English Dictionary

suicide (ˈsuːɪˌsaɪd; ˈsjuː-)
n
1. (Psychology) the act or an instance of killing oneself intentionally
2. the self-inflicted ruin of one's own prospects or interests: a merger would be financial suicide.
3. (Psychology) a person who kills himself intentionally
4. (modifier) reckless; extremely dangerous: a suicide mission.
5. (Military) (modifier) (of an action) undertaken or (of a person) undertaking an action in the knowledge that it will result in the death of the person performing it in order that maximum damage may be inflicted on an enemy: a suicide attack; suicide bomber.

I would go with number four to describe the record attempt. Although he is not directly committing suicide, he is placing himself in a position that has death as a likely outcome, even though he may believe himself immune.

Would a record attempt to 600' on air be suicide, or a valiant attempt at a record? Guinness World Records ceased to publish records on deep air because of the death toll, may be they should do that for mixed gas scuba as well.

The continuation of depth records depends on whether or not the Scuba Industry or the US Government decide there are too many lives lost, or people complaining about it, and they want to put a stop to the practice, in the case of the Industry, or stop the practice in the US, in the case of the government. More likely the insurance companies start tightening down their policies on tech divers and the service providers they depend upon.




Bob

 

[Hetland]

The continuation of depth records depends on whether or not the Scuba Industry or the US Government decide there are too many lives lost, or people complaining about it, and they want to put a stop to the practice, in the case of the Industry, or stop the practice in the US, in the case of the government. More likely the insurance companies start tightening down their policies on tech divers and the service providers they depend upon.

Insurance or Government (or both) will eventually pop the boat captains.

 

[DevonDiver]

So, using a "less common" definition of suicide.... we can infer that it was an "assisted suicide" as it was not a lone venture?

To further an analogy that's been used already...

"Did they kill themselves by driving drunk? Suicide."

So what if the drunk person was handed the car keys by a friend. Loaned the car, to make the drive. Cheered along as he cranked the ignition. Told he was good to drive at that time. If those friends ignored the warnings shouted by onlookers. If a party was planned for the drunk driver, upon completion of his journey.

Does that have no bearing on the issue?

Personally, noting that plans were in place for a post-attempt celebration.... nobody involved was seriously considering failure or fatality. Or, at least, they were not voicing any concerns.

Where external concerns had been raised, the team insulated themselves from them... not just online, but locally.

I'll ask some trust on this... because I've been given information privately by multiple sources linked to the team, but there were personal and professional concerns voiced locally... and people close to Dr Garman abstained from involvement with the attempt... and there were concerns in the team (unvoiced).

One question I'll ask is if the team sought any manufacturer support or sponsorship for the attempt. None seems apparent.... which differs from previous record projects.

If they didn't seek sponsorship.... why not?

If they did seek sponsorship, but were declined, what scared off the potential sponsors? And were these reasons communicated to the team?

For manufacturer representatives here on the board... how do you calculate risk versus reward for such sponsorship?

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

I would go with number four to describe the record attempt. Although he is not directly committing suicide, he is placing himself in a position that has death as a likely outcome, even though he may believe himself immune.

Would a record attempt to 600' on air be suicide, or a valiant attempt at a record? Guinness World Records ceased to publish records on deep air because of the death toll, may be they should do that for mixed gas scuba as well.

The continuation of depth records depends on whether or not the Scuba Industry or the US Government decide there are too many lives lost, or people complaining about it, and they want to put a stop to the practice, in the case of the Industry, or stop the practice in the US, in the case of the government. More likely the insurance companies start tightening down their policies on tech divers and the service providers they depend upon.




Bob

I don't know how they would legislate it. There's nothing keeping someone from going out solo on a single 72 and diving air to 300 feet either (if they could even make it that for down one way). I guess that would be suicide too, unless they are too stupid to know it can't work.
What about the three guys that jumped into the ocean off a rocky point to ab dive on a day with 12' crashing breakers. None of those guys ever been in the ocean before but heard that's how you're supposed to do it. They had no experience therefore no fear, they had no idea what they were supposed to be afraid of. One of them was a business man from New Jersey. So in that case would it be suicide because they had no idea they were about to die?

 

[DevonDiver]

Dismissing 'Groupthink' as "psychobabble" is rather disrespectful to the noted psychologist, Irving Janis, who coined the term in his highly respected book.

I was not aware that Yale University produced 'babblers'.

Nor was I aware of august organizations like NASA, the military or blue-chip business using 'babble' in their professional analyses.

Considering the impact of Groupthink, or other academically supported psychological processes, on the functionality of Dr Garman and his team IN NO WAY designates culpability.

It merely explains how a chain of thought processes by individuals, and as a group, was able to go from one stage to another... whilst explaining how those processes would influence behaviour in generally predictable ways.

I'm not aware of any incidence of an identified psychological process being used to assign culpability or responsibility. It's been used in accident analysis before, and to explain business performance.

To identify a psychological process does not lead to an accusation of negligence. If anything, it defends against it.

The purpose of understanding, rather than cynically dismissing, performance psychology is to explain WHY things went went wrong, not WHO went wrong.

In that respect, understanding WHY provides a valuable lesson to lessen potential re-occurance.

Or... "suicide"..."ignore the psychobabble"... and let the dive community move forward with no greater understanding and a warm sense of calm that the incident stemmed only from the egotism of a suicidal maniac....or that some planning or equipment failure for extreme depth was entirely to blame.... and thus has no relevance or threat to us, or our safety when diving.

Nothing to see here folks... move along. Right?

 

[The Chairman]

An interesting read from the Internet: http://www.tsc.state.tn.us/sites/default/files/jean_garman_v_guy_garman.pdf

Although extremely intelligent and articulate, his attitude to the problems confronting the financial difficulties of this marriage has been egocentric. For example,he places the lion’s share of the blame for the financial plight of the parties on the wife because she handled the finances for the parties. However, it is obvious that the financial collapse of the marriage was a lifestyle in which both parties participated....While his testimony does not embrace total untruths, much of his testimony is half truths. His testimony was an exercise in sophistry and his logic was specious...

Obviously, this wasn't his first rodeo of delusion and denial. Call it what you will, but his support staff were as much of his 'team' as the gardener is a part of a household or as the ball boy is a part of the football team. They were given tasks to do, but they were never asked for their input. He didn't need it because he thought he had it all figured out. Again, they fully believed that his understanding was far beyond any local authority on the subject and they stated as such.

I have no problem with the concept of groupthink. I take issue with the psychobabble that concludes that this was a function of that by someone who is not an authority on the subject. Surely, you don't put yourself on par with any psychologist, much less Irving Janis, do you? I guess when all you have is a hammer, the world becomes a nail. Unfortunately, people jump on these theories du jour, because it feels like they've done research and they're quick to smack others down when they disagree. Given it's a cool concept allowing you to smear lots of people in the process, but why over complicate things trying to force this on everyone? It's a classic Occam's Razor: "when you have two competing theories that make exactly the same predictions, the simpler one is the better." The simpler explanation, delusion and denial, fits everything easily without trying to force the square, albeit popular, peg to fit the round hole.

Yeah, I've been in contact with people who were on the scene and others close to him as well. So what? I don't need to rely on a fallacious appeal to authority and I don't need to ask others to "trust me" about my take on this. It's readily apparent if you simply look at the background and you don't need to be a psychologist to understand it. It's not nearly as sexy, but the simpler theory fits it all in.

 

[DevonDiver]

I refuse to get draw into personal slanging with you. My intention is not to allocate blame, merely to further understanding of potential psychological issues effecting team dynamics and decisions.

Why do I do that?

1. The pre-dive events is all we can currently study, pending the release of technical and medical issues of the dive. The events are the planning and the psychology.

2. I do not consider myself qualified to educate anyone on extreme deep dive planning issues, or extreme hyperbaric maladies. I've been grateful to learn from those who do have the experience and knowledge to tackle those issues.

3. I have a longstanding layman's interest in the psychology of teams, stemming from decades experience training and running high-performance teams; military, humanitarian, sporting, expeditionary and diving. This allows me the experience to consider academic psychological theory in relation to a well honed understanding of team dynamic and performance.

I'm not seeking to 'defend' what I wrote. I have no vested interest in the article and seek no reputation as a psychologist or academic. If a serious alternative, or amendments were offered in response, I'd actually enjoy the debate, as it'd further a greater understanding and not be dismissive.

My only concern has been, and will be, that the dive community makes itself safer. Your notions do not further that, as they encourage reasonable divers to disassociate themselves from a single unreasonable diver.

I don't, however, enjoy your rancid-agenda to belittle any theory you disprove of, to cast dispersions on people's character or motives, and to stifle free-thinking and free-speech due to some unfathomable personal grudge.

I will say one last time. My article attempts to explain team dynamics as a factor in permitting an accident to occur. Accurate or not, the issues presented nonetheless form a valuable safety concern for divers. That is reflected in the fact that the article has been requested by a dive magazine, a dive medical magazine and even a skydiving magazine.

The article is not, repeat not, attributing blame or negligence. I have made every effort to not attribute blame or negligence to any person. If you can please try to accept the points above, and clear your mind of preconceptions, perhaps we can discourse in a more civil manner?7