Warped Dive World Evolution - BP/W Subgroup Mindset

[MauiScubaSteve]

In plainer terms....lets look at Halemano. He is an instructor, and he has been teaching most of his students in vest style or non-bp/wings for at least a decade now....the shop(s) he has affiliation with are most likely primarily non-bp/wing...and Halemano dives in a place where the average skill levels of tourists in diving, is at a level that we should perhaps question.....Halemano has every reason in the world to want people to believe he has always been correct in teaching people with vest BC's, and in pointing them in this direction for purchase---and it appears to me there is an ego thing going on as well, where he wants people to associate his choices with the right choices. He has squarely tied his ideas to the prevailing DEMA disseminated dogma on the gear divers need...and he now invests an enormous amount of time in attempts to discredit opionions that differ from those he is invested in.

I would say, when you read Halemano posts, have a few grains of salt handy

All I'm sayin' is that whenever I run into silly typing I will point it out.

You have a very fertile imagination; perhaps the "pharmaceutical industry" does have something to do with the bad typing on SB.

 

[gypsyjim]

Why would we bother? Lets just dive what we like, for whatever reason we have. Experiment. Try different things out for ourselves to see what works best for US.

If it was the only option available I'd suck air through a garden hose, and swim naked, if it was that, or not dive at all.

 

[50Fathom]

If it was the only option available I'd suck air through a garden hose, and swim naked, if it was that, or not dive at all.

Some of us dive naked as a matter of course.

 

[gypsyjim]

Some of us dive naked as a matter of course.

For some

For many others

 

[50Fathom]

For some

For many others

And The Man is always there harshin' my mellow.

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

Halemano,

I just have to ask, how is any of this bp/w stuff hurting you in any way?
So there are people out there that swear by BP/W's and try to convert people. There are also people out there trying to poo poo BP/W's just as hard.
Who cares?
You're living and working in Hawaii. I would love to be in Hawaii right now after the horrible winter we had. Why can't you just be happy and not let all this crap eat at you so bad.

There are mindsets I don't care for and some people don't care for what I'm into.
That's just the way hobbies go with as many variables as diving.

 

[Kern]

Anecdotal evidence is not valueless. Many problems have been solved by insightful interpretation of anecdotal evidence.

Again, I'd love to see some data from well designed and controlled experiment, however to illustrate the major problem associated with such an approach let me ask the following question:

Can you contemplate *any* test that might validate that BP&W's offer any quantitative advantage being accepted by the halemanō's of the diving world?

I know I don't.

Tests are expensive, time consuming, hard to design and hard to execute. All of these burdens might be worth bearing if there was any chance of settling the argument conclusively. I am pessimistic that it would.

Tobin

I don't think all anecdotes are valueless. I agree that some anecdotes can be very enlightening. I'm sure that many an anecdote has inspired an hypothesis that proved out to a theory.When there are no established facts, & all either side can offer up is a series of anecdotes, you get a waste of time, rather than a worthwhile debate. Duelling anecdotes just don't prove very much.

No, I can't contemplate any test that the Halemano's of the world would accept as proof that they may be wrong. I'm equally dubious that there is any test that the Dan's of the world would accept as proof that they may be wrong.

Yes, any test would be expensive, time consuming, & difficult to design & execute. It's findings would probably be considered faulty & disregarded by many who's ideas it disagreed with. It would indeed be a complete waste of time & effort if done to settle this argument. I'm not that interested in settling this argument though.

I'd be interested in the results. If the experiment was conclusive, & could be replicated, I may even accept it as a fact.

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

Yes, any test would be expensive, time consuming, & difficult to design & execute. It's findings would probably be considered faulty & disregarded by many who's ideas it disagreed with. It would indeed be a complete waste of time & effort if done to settle this argument. I'm not that interested in settling this argument though.

I'd be interested in the results. If the experiment was conclusive, & could be replicated, I may even accept it as a fact.

I guess my question would be what "facts" are you looking for?

People's choices of dive gear are based on very subjective criteria. A few years back we had a fellow in here who was extremely anti-BP/W. He was quite vocal about his preference for his jacket-style BCD. Problem is, although his views were very emphatic about not liking a BP/W, he had never actually dived one. So Tobin offered to send him one to try out ... free of charge ... which he did. He came back and reported that although he liked the stability, and yes, it did feel more streamlined than his current BCd, he still preferred the one he had over the BP/W. The reason? ... the BP/W didn't have pockets, and he wanted a BCD with pockets.

So what did the test demonstrate, really?

I always get a chuckle out of the "speed test" that a certain dive magazine always used to conduct with fins. Like, who purchases a fin because it's the "fastest"? Or more to the point ... why? Skittering around a reef only assures that you're going to miss an awful lot of the stuff you went down there to see ... not to mention limiting your bottom time to maybe half what it would've been if you'd just slow down and look around a bit. So why would someone possibly want the "fastest" fin?

Same held back when I was a ski instructor WRT skis ... there were endless discussions among some of my fellow instructors over which ski was "best" ... with endless criteria for what that word meant. Some folks felt that performance was defined by speed. Others felt it was agility ... performance in the bumps, for example. Still others defined it as "forgiving" ... skis that weren't too hard to work, or that didn't toss you for a minor technique error.

Just like scuba gear, the "best" depends on your goals, your skill level, your physique, and what you consider important.

No scientific test is going to provide those answers. The best way to find out what scuba equipment works best for you is to take it for a dive ... that way, you'll know what's "best" when you feel it ... and all the studies and anecdotes in the world won't make a damn bit of difference ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

I guess my question would be what "facts" are you looking for?

People's choices of dive gear are based on very subjective criteria. A few years back we had a fellow in here who was extremely anti-BP/W. He was quite vocal about his preference for his jacket-style BCD. Problem is, although his views were very emphatic about not liking a BP/W, he had never actually dived one. So Tobin offered to send him one to try out ... free of charge ... which he did. He came back and reported that although he liked the stability, and yes, it did feel more streamlined than his current BCd, he still preferred the one he had over the BP/W. The reason? ... the BP/W didn't have pockets, and he wanted a BCD with pockets.

So what did the test demonstrate, really?

I always get a chuckle out of the "speed test" that a certain dive magazine always used to conduct with fins. Like, who purchases a fin because it's the "fastest"? Or more to the point ... why? Skittering around a reef only assures that you're going to miss an awful lot of the stuff you went down there to see ... not to mention limiting your bottom time to maybe half what it would've been if you'd just slow down and look around a bit. So why would someone possibly want the "fastest" fin?

Same held back when I was a ski instructor WRT skis ... there were endless discussions among some of my fellow instructors over which ski was "best" ... with endless criteria for what that word meant. Some folks felt that performance was defined by speed. Others felt it was agility ... performance in the bumps, for example. Still others defined it as "forgiving" ... skis that weren't too hard to work, or that didn't toss you for a minor technique error.

Just like scuba gear, the "best" depends on your goals, your skill level, your physique, and what you consider important.

No scientific test is going to provide those answers. The best way to find out what scuba equipment works best for you is to take it for a dive ... that way, you'll know what's "best" when you feel it ... and all the studies and anecdotes in the world won't make a damn bit of difference ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

The only time I could see a diver wanting the absolute fastest fin would be for lobster diving. That activity requires a diver to be very fast to be able to swoop in and grab bugs and also to cover a lot of ground. Mileage isn't really a consideration with lobster diving and that's why they will wear a big huge tank and they'll drain it each dive. It's kind of like a fighter jet, they go very fast but burn huge amounts of fuel to accomplish their mission.

Some lobster divers, the ones with really in shape legs, have also found freediving long fins to provide the speed and power they need. The one trade off besides horrible mileage is that they find that they can't wear jacket BC's or even a BP with a wing effectively because the drag gets very noticeable once they get up to speed and into the power curve using long fins.
They have resorted to just wearing a tank mounted onto a plastic back pack and use it with no BC. At the speeds they travel through the water they have found this to be the most streamlined setup they can wear.

All of this is purely subjective and has no scientific backing to prove as fact, but maybe it doesn't need to be scientifically proven. These lobster mobsters have been at it for years and have tried every combination, so I'm going to conclude that they probably know what works and what they're talking about so that's good enough for me.

I guess we could also say that the no BC divers have bypassed this entire argument.

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

The only time I could see a diver wanting the absolute fastest fin would be for lobster diving. That activity requires a diver to be very fast to be able to swoop in and grab bugs and also to cover a lot of ground. Mileage isn't really a consideration with lobster diving and that's why they will wear a big huge tank and they'll drain it each dive. It's kind of like a fighter jet, they go very fast but burn huge amounts of fuel to accomplish their mission.

Some lobster divers, the ones with really in shape legs, have also found freediving long fins to provide the speed and power they need. The one trade off besides horrible mileage is that they find that they can't wear jacket BC's or even a BP with a wing effectively because the drag gets very noticeable once they get up to speed and into the power curve using long fins.
They have resorted to just wearing a tank mounted onto a plastic back pack and use it with no BC. At the speeds they travel through the water they have found this to be the most streamlined setup they can wear.

All of this is purely subjective and has no scientific backing to prove as fact, but maybe it doesn't need to be scientifically proven. These lobster mobsters have been at it for years and have tried every combination, so I'm going to conclude that they probably know what works and what they're talking about so that's good enough for me.

I guess we could also say that the no BC divers have bypassed this entire argument.

Maybe they should just do what I do when I go hunting for dungeness crabs ... use a scooter ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)