Why is DIR controversial?

[omar]

For a good understanding of the "controversy" you need to read the old Techdiver archives. The posts by George (for awhile Katherine and kirvine because of a legal issue) on how to dive and the equipment rigging are very informative from a few different perspectives. I think that you will find the nexus of the friction in his numerous posts and the responses by others to him.

 

[headhunter]

And...if you are diving in places where there is no team, is that is a consideration in the "DIR or Not?" , if you are a purist?

I wonder if explaining who DIR is not for, from a DIR perspective, would be helpful?

I believe that on the Internet too much emphasis is placed on the issue of "DIR or not". If someone has not been exposed to the DIR philosophy it does not mean that they are inherently "unsafe". There are many divers in the world who are very good divers, but they have never even heard of DIR. The concept of the team becomes more and more important as the dive becomes more and more advanced.

For the purpose of illustrating what I'm talking about and hypothetically speaking, let's say that there is a diver with Internet access in some region of the world where no one has ever heard of DIR.

That diver could be a very good diver who has years of experience, but either wants to learn more about different ways of diving or simply desires to reevaluate their own diving style in light of new standards and advancements that they may not be aware of.

Maybe that diver comes across this very thread and after searching through some more information on the topic, they are intrigued enough with some of the concepts that they read about that they decide that it would be worth it to fly to a place where they can take a DIR-F class to see what this is all about first hand.

After taking the DIR-F class they decide based on what they learned in the class that this is the direction in which they would like to take their diving. I would argue that the conscious decision to dive this way in the future would make this person a DIR diver. So they go back to where they came from and have no one to conduct DIR dives with because no one knows what DIR is.

It would be silly to think that they would not dive with the same people who they have been diving with for years before the class. Most likely they would go diving with the same people and share some of what they learned in the class. Eventually, some of the people that they dive with would find the concepts interesting and would also want to take a DIR-F class. If they develop enough interest amongst enough people they would then fly a DIR-F instructor in to teach the class.

During this whole process the diver who originally took DIR-F and decided to pursue this as their philosophy of diving would not cease to be a DIR diver. I think that part of being a DIR diver is assessing the risks of conducting a particular dive. I would argue that this person would be a DIR diver that is conducting non-DIR dives within what they determine to be an acceptable level of risk.

In light of their new knowledge, this may mean adjusting their concept of what they previously considered acceptable or maybe the dives that they were conducting where just fine.

If Jarrod Jablonski comes to California and goes out on a shallow reef dive with a non-DIR diver to demonstrate some of the skills that would be considered important to a DIR diver, I do not think that he somehow ceases to be a DIR diver. I believe that in this scenario he would simply be a DIR diver conducting a non-DIR dive.

I think that this is what it means to be a DIR diver in a place where there is no team.

As far as explaining from a DIR perspective who DIR is not for, I believe that people need to make that decision for themselves. Only you can decide whether or not DIR diving is for you.

Christian

 

[H2Andy]

For a good understanding of the "controversy" you need to read the old Techdiver archives. The posts by George (for awhile Katherine and kirvine because of a legal issue) on how to dive and the equipment rigging are very informative from a few different perspectives. I think that you will find the nexus of the friction in his numerous posts and the responses by others to him.

alas...

it would be hard to find a worse public relations person for DIR than George, despite his many technical achievements

 

[shakeybrainsurgeon]

Spoken like someone who knows only what he reads about DIR...

It should be changed to DIS --- do it the same. The key to a community of divers reaching maximum safety and efficiency is not to do it right, necessarily, since there is often little or no data to know what is "right", but to do it in a reproducible way.

An example from surgery --- I was helping on an open heart case with the chief of cardiac surgery and his chief resident. The chest was opened, the sternum sawed and spread and the resident began to tack up the pericardium to the chest wall to elevate the heart. He put a stitch in, and the boss slapped his hand and cut the stitch out..."first," he said, "the top right stitch, then the bottom right stitch..." The resident interrupted...'what difference does the order of the four stitches make?"

"because," replied the boss, "you do it the same way each time...one way isn't more correct, just do it the same every time, that way your assistant will always know where your hands are going, and you won't waste minutes thinking about the rotuine crap when you should save your brain for the hard part of the case."

Thus, I sense the essence of DIR is military conformity, not scientifically-tested methodology. It isn't more 'right' to keep your octo long and wrapped around your neck, or your gauges on your wrist, just so everyone does it like that. In the rec world, if we see a buddy in trouble and go to check his air, where is his gauge? On his wrist, on his console? Does he have an octo or an air2? Where is he going to be in an emergency? How has he been trained? In diving at the extreme, like surgery at the extreme, you can't waste minutes on things that can be standardized beforehand, minutes you can use to solve the unexpected in a crisis.

Thus, do it right, do it wrong, do it crazy, but do it uniformly so we are all on the same page when the doo doo hits the fan.

 

[headhunter]

Thus, do it right, do it wrong, do it crazy, but do it uniformly so we are all on the same page when the doo doo hits the fan.

I really like the analogy you used to illustrate this.

That's why I believe that the most important thing is not which standard you use, but that you use one.

Of course, it helps if more people use the same standard. That's one of the arguments for using one standard of mixed gases over the other. If a standard is more widely accepted throughout the world, then it should be used because you generally gain more though the uniformity than you do by having a "better mix".

An academic discussion of which gases should become the standard for the widest range of environments is helpful if after arriving at conclusions, it is adopted by a wider number of divers. I believe that adopting a standard does not preclude the use of a different set of gases for a team that regularly conducts a particular dive where a different set of gases simply make more sense.

Christian

 

[TSandM]

Christian, your posts in this thread are simply superb.

I would say that I differ from shakeybrainsurgeon in one regard . . . I DO think some practices or equipment setups are better than others. I, personally, believe that a longer hose/bungied backup configuration is better, because it's more flexible. It offers more options. I do understand the arguments from the other side, but I've weighed them in my own mind and made a choice. I think the use of can lights, anywhere except in very brightly lit, clear water, adds to safety because they are so helpful in keeping track of the team.

But it's certainly entirely true that there are many ways to dive, and probably many SAFE ways to dive, and it depends in part on what dives you are doing. Each of us has to find a way to dive that seems good to us, that fits our diving and our temperament.

Everybody on this board knows I've found mine!

 

[Diver Dennis]

If a standard is more widely accepted throughout the world, then it should be used because you generally gain more though the uniformity than you do by having a "better mix".

An academic discussion of which gases should become the standard for the widest range of environments is helpful if after arriving at conclusions, it is adopted by a wider number of divers. I believe that adopting a standard does not preclude the use of a different set of gases for a team that regularly conducts a particular dive where a different set of gases simply make more sense.

Christian

Isn't this a contradiction? I mean the team you talk about is using a "better mix", deviating from the standard. Many teams have differing views on which gasses to use, so how do you apply the standard to so many different situations? I can see this point with equipment and understand the concept of diving the same set up.

 

[headhunter]

Christian, your posts in this thread are simply superb.

I would say that I differ from shakeybrainsurgeon in one regard . . . I DO think some practices or equipment setups are better than others. I, personally, believe that a longer hose/bungied backup configuration is better, because it's more flexible. It offers more options. I do understand the arguments from the other side, but I've weighed them in my own mind and made a choice. I think the use of can lights, anywhere except in very brightly lit, clear water, adds to safety because they are so helpful in keeping track of the team.

But it's certainly entirely true that there are many ways to dive, and probably many SAFE ways to dive, and it depends in part on what dives you are doing. Each of us has to find a way to dive that seems good to us, that fits our diving and our temperament.

Everybody on this board knows I've found mine!

Thanks for the kind words.

While I agree with shakeybrainsurgeon's comment about the essence being conformity, I agree with you that a great deal of thought has been put into the parts of the system that we conform to.

The thing is that another system for diving as a unified team could exist where the "great deal of thought" I mention above could lead to slightly different parts to the system and those parts would be secondary to the conformity to standarization within "the team" or in a broader sense "the adherents to the system".

Christian

 

[headhunter]

Isn't this a contradiction? I mean the team you talk about is using a "better mix", deviating from the standard. Many teams have differing views on which gasses to use, so how do you apply the standard to so many different situations? I can see this point with equipment.

I don't believe it is a contradiction. It's the point of having a general rule, but also allowing exceptions to a rule where special circumstances dictate that it makes sense to do so.

GUE recommends standard mixes for certain depths, but it is my understanding that they allow for the possibility that in particular circumstances it might make sense to deviate from the standard as a team.

Any standard is based upon the analysis of a variety of factors and the general acceptance by a deciding body on what should be accepted as the standard. Standards can also change based on new information.

I based my comments on an article written by Jarrod Jablonski. This is the part of that article that I interpret to allow variation from the standard where it makes sense:

I was hoping to select gasses that had notable utility across a broad range of diving, thereby increasing the benefit of standard mixes in general (because they would become somewhat ubiquitous). As a set of mixes becomes utilized by a greater number of people then it becomes easier to integrate teams, locate desired mixes in a given region, justify banking mixtures that are regionally appropriate, etc. I tried to weigh the various issues from safety and convenience to efficiency and simplicity. Of course there are always going to be particular dives for which the selected paradigm is less ideal. However, I would argue that the vast majority of scenarios find little benefit from tinkering with Standard Mixes.

This part of the same article also seems to support this notion:

With respect to the WKPP mixes there are some inconsistencies but please recognize that the goal of those mixtures is different and are regionally specific; notice that there are really only two bottom mixes 0-190 and 190+. The GUE mixes are designed to work for a larger audience with a greater diversity. Of course one might choose to create a set of standard mixes for their region but they do lose some of the benefit found in a larger audience of divers that are on the same page so to speak.

To be clear, I am not trained in the use of these mixes and am simply citing the academic discussion of the use of these mixes as an example of conformity to standards while still allowing individuals to be "thinking" divers.

Christian

 

[lamont]

DIR is inherantly controversial because it makes decisions about which kinds of gear to use, how to configure it and the procedures to use in the water. That implies that there must be the negative where those who dive the system have decided that other gear, other configurations and other proecedures are not as good. Add on top of that the name and the history with GI3 and you've just thrown a match into gasoline and someone is going to be offended.

And I sort of disagree with the moral relativism approach since I think that is trying to paper over differences. DIR divers have generally decided that bungee wings are inferior, for example, if for no other reason that it fails the test that it solves non-problems. That is inherantly going to piss off everyone who dives a bungee wing.

What is a little weird is the animosity. That probably has to do with the GI3 history and that it concerns techdivers who often have large, easily bruised egos (go no further than Gary Gentile and John Chatterton / Richie Kohler for another example).