"stop telling ourselves lies about the risk"

[Raindawg]

Too long for the fridge. I'll have to hang this one in the sh&*ter next to "you are a child of the universe..."

 

"You are a child of the universe....you have no right to be here.

 

[tvashtarkatena]

In none of the close calls I've had did I ever think about God. "it's all you, babe", "randomness", and "inconvenient timing" came to mind when I had enough time to think.

 

[Raindawg]

The thinking about G_d comes a bit later....when you figure out that you really shouldn't have survived.

[ivan]

The thinking about G_d comes a bit later....when you figure out that you really shouldn't have survived.

hasn't happened for me, but then i'm a simple soul, dog knows...

[tvashtarkatena]

There is no should or shouldn't, there is only did or didn't. Something happens, your brain stem takes over, and several million years of evolution shotgun weds racquetball, Carlos Castaneda and the bag of caramel Bugles you had an hour ago and then you're checking yourself for injuries and scraping grit off your tongue.

 

It's really not any more complicated than that.

 

That should be more than enough.

Edited February 15, 2012 by tvashtarkatena

[JosephH]

Makes ya think 'bout G_d as well.

Being a born-again atheist, I would have thought it would make ya think 'bout not riding motorcycles. But no doubt to each his own. Pretty much just what we were talking about - the choices we make relative to what gambling we're prepared to do with objective hazards.

 

And not being judgmental, but for myself the benefits of riding a motorcycle just don't begin to compensate for what I perceive as the inherent risks involved. And my perception is, helmet or no, that it's gambling with way less optimal odds under the best of circumstances, let alone mixing it up with PNW drivers and weather.

 

Glad you didn't get any more badly hurt.

 

 

[JosephH]

"For years now I have had the same experience: I am working, sitting in a chair, the electric lights playing across my table or desk. I feel the bones snapping in my body and think my entire life at the moment is safe, useless, and like many another. I sense that I can manage, if I mind my manners, to squander all my days and nights and die in bed confirming what I never believed. And that this act will win approval. From everyone, including me. I see myself dead, properly dead. Perhaps kind lies are being said about me. My bones are snapping."

Right or wrong, my perception of you is you're an interesting one. You are smart, well-organized, and have, on the surface, arranged your 'conventional', non-climbing life in ways I could consider as showing a healthy aversion to ordinary domestic risk. But you do so in order to dally with the significant objective risks inherent in high-end alpine climbing. Again, interesting, if not curious, from my perspective - in the way of older, successful big-wave surfers or those olde-school, alps-style, longwire acts of the kind where they took lunch in the middle of the wire they were so long.

 

 

[img:center]http://www.worldrecordsacademy.org/stunts/img/112094-2_Freddy_Nock_highest_cable_wire_walk.jpg[/img]

[bstach]

"The drive to the crag is the most dangerous part of climbing."

This is wrong. Its the drive home that is the most dangerous part. Hot, sweaty day of climbing, a few post climb beers....

On Saturday night I was nearly the victim of road rage while I was driving to the climbing gym. The jerk followed me for over 10 blocks at high speed, despite several evasive manuevers (including running a red light) before finally giving up. I might have to reconsider my statement - perhaps driving to the climb is the most dangerous.

[John Frieh]

"If life insurance won't cover it, it's probably worth doing."

 

 

[ivan]

"If life insurance won't cover it, it's probably worth doing."

 

i still fondly recall being denied life insurance the day after a trip w/ you to ole'rocky butte

[Jim]

We are Homo sapiens, the tool users. We earn the name by developing tools to increase our leverage on the world around us, and with this increased technological leverage comes a growing sense of power. This position of advantage which protects us from wild nature we call civilization. Our security increases as we apply more leverage, but along with it we notice a growing isolation from the earth. We crowd into cities which shut out the rhythms of the planet--daybreak, high tide, wispy cirrus high overhead yelling storm tomorrow, moonrise, Orion going south for the winter. Perceptions dull and we come to accept a blunting of feeling in the shadow of security. Drunk with power, I find that I am out of my senses. I, tool man, long for the immediacy of contact to brighten my senses again, to bring me nearer the world once more; in security I have forgotten how to dance.

 

EC, Climbing Ice

[tvashtarkatena]

This thread is getting dangerous.

 

One more cliche and I'll drive a fork through my eye.

 

[Stefan]

I am still waiting on some sort of statistic that says on average how many hours of actual climbing it takes till one becomes injured or killed. Same thing with driving or being in a vehicle.

[Choada_Boy]

"I would rather be ashes than dust! I would rather that my spark should burn out in a brilliant blaze than it should be stifled by dry-rot. I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet. The function of man is to live, not to exist. I shall not waste my days trying to prolong them. I shall use my time."

[ivan]

"I would rather be ashes than dust! I would rather that my spark should burn out in a brilliant blaze than it should be stifled by dry-rot. I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet. The function of man is to live, not to exist. I shall not waste my days trying to prolong them. I shall use my time."

the problem w/ jack london, like most philosophers, is that he's dead

[tvashtarkatena]

Knock yourself out:

 

linky

 

2009: 1.14 fatalities per 100 million miles driven. If you drive the standard 15,000 mi per year throughout your adult life, that's about a million miles, so you've got a 1:100 chance of becoming road kill.

 

You'll also have driven to the moon and back...twice.

 

 

[Choada_Boy]

Total Odds of Dying

 

[tvashtarkatena]

No pregnancy? 1 in 8200 pregnancies are fatal (UK stats).

 

Staying home may NOT be safer...

Edited February 15, 2012 by tvashtarkatena

[denalidave]

This thread is getting dangerous.

 

One more cliche and I'll drive a fork through my eye.

Stupid is as stupid does. You can have my fork. Please post pics once fork is inserted.

[G-spotter]

"Why should I spend a couple of days kissing ass at a tradeshow to get a free rope when I can just work for two hours and then buy one?"

[markwebster]

I am still waiting on some sort of statistic that says on average how many hours of actual climbing it takes till one becomes injured or killed. Same thing with driving or being in a vehicle.

 

You can come up with statistics that answer that question regarding driving, see above. But common sense pokes a big flaw in statistics. Statistically, I am overdue for an accident. I haven't bent a car since 1979, nor has my wife, or either of my kids. Chances are I will hit someone on the drive home tonight.

 

But tonight, just like every night I will keep my eyes on the road, I won't answer my cell phone if it rings, and I will constantly check my mirrors for aggressive drivers putting me in peril. So even though statistics and "the odds" are telling me I am overdue for an accident, I will continue driving carefully, and probably be ok.

 

Same thing with climbing. I've overdue to break another ankle...did that in '79, must have been a bad year. But as I do every time I rope up, I will obsessively check all knots and harnesses. I will tie through my chalk bag back up harness. I will place twice as much pro as my partners. I will retire my ropes twice as early. And I will climb like an old lady...a bold old lady. I'll probably be ok, even though I'm sure the odds are against me. I know a lot of older climbers with decades of experience. We don't get hurt, we just get old, like Fred.

 

There are old pilots, and there are bold pilots, but there are no old bold pilots.

 

Anyone wanna' go climbing with an old lady? Presidents day at Vantage or Smith, be there or be square!

[DPS]

But common sense pokes a big flaw in statistics.

Well, not really. Statistics apply to samples and are extrapolated to populations. You really can't apply statistics to individuals. As the saying goes, the average person has one testicle, one ovary, and one breast. Interesting, most of my relatives have died of heart disease, strokes, and suicide, among the most popular ways to die.

Edited February 16, 2012 by DPS

[genepires]

 

You can come up with statistics that answer that question regarding driving, see above. But common sense pokes a big flaw in statistics. Statistically, I am overdue for an accident. I haven't bent a car since 1979, nor has my wife, or either of my kids. Chances are I will hit someone on the drive home tonight.

 

 

Like most of america, you have a incorrect view and understanding of probability probably because it is a really hard thing to understand. I used to understand parts of it and still struggle with the most basic today.

Been thinking of the probability of event of a 1%/day taken out for 500 days as a binomial probability. I think it is 34% or so. That means that if one thinks they will experience a 1% chance of having a serious accident on a given climbing day, then take it out for 500 days, the chance that there will be at least one serious accident is 34% for that 500 day period. The probability per day stays the same at 1%.

[DPS]

If you flip a coin 9 times and come up with heads everytime, the probability of flipping the coin again and coming up heads is still 50/50.

[G-spotter]

If you flip a coin 9 times and come up with heads everytime, the probability of flipping the coin again and coming up heads is still 50/50.

 

if you flip a coin 9 times and get a heads every time, there's one probability that you are at the long tail of a normal distribution, and the Bayesian statistician would also evaluate the probability that there is something wrong with the coin you are using (in which case the chance of getting another head might be 100%)