On Bashing, Flames and Training
by
Larry "Harris" Taylor, Ph.D.
This comment
is excerpted from a conversation on Dive Training Agencies on the GEnie Scuba
Diving Round Table. A shorter version appeared as a guest editorial, "Listen To
The Music" in Underwater, USA (November, 1994). This material is copyrighted and
all rights retained by the author. This article is made available as a service
to the diving community by the author and may be distributed for any
non-commercial or Not-For-Profit use.
All rights
reserved
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To my
knowledge, nearly everyone agrees that the individual instructor, regardless of
the dive shop, agency, or geographical location, determines the quality of scuba
training. What SOME of us are attempting to debate is differences in training
philosophy and YOUR RIGHT TO ALL INFORMATION AVAILABLE ABOUT THE RISKS YOU
ASSUME WHEN YOU GO DIVING!
If you doubt that your right to information is being
curtailed, then look at a 10 year old copy of "The New Science of Skin and Scuba
Diving" or an older version of The Jeppesen Diving text and compare it to newer
editions. Notice how much information is missing in the newer, "modern" text.
If you doubt that your right to information is being challenged, then read the
editorials in Skin Diver. You will see RESTRICT DEPTH, RESTRICT TRAINING
and RESTRICT Almost Everything of substance.
I believe that part of the phenomenal growth in phone calls to
DAN reflect an eagerness for divers to learn information that used to be part of
basic training. More modern courses consider stuff like physics, physiology and
self assessment of skills and environment to be "Too Much Information" or
"unnecessary skills." Also, I hear training agencies tell me that
what-used-to-be-required-for-basics is now "too complex a task." Whenever I hear
"too complex," I automatically translate to "I cannot waste my time teaching you
this skill" or "I am NOT skilled enough to teach this skill."
Diving is, in essence, a most sensual sport! The sense of
one-ness of self and environment that comes from having the knowledge and skill
to glide weightless in a variety of unique environments is a truly wonderful
emotional high!
As a sensual experience, diving can be compared to listening
to fine music. Assume that you are listening to the POWER of Beethoven's
"Ninth"
or Wagner's "Das Valkyrie" or the interplay of battling themes in Tchaikovsky's
"1812." A worldwide
"all-star"
10-piece orchestra is performing the music. Because of the superb skill of the
musicians, you leave the auditorium with a sense of wonder and awe and the
majesty of the classical music experience.
At some later time, however, you happen to listen to a live performance
of the same music as interpreted by the New York Philharmonic Symphony. There is a distinct
difference!
Although, the ten-piece band delivered an awesome performance,
there is NO COMPARISON to listening to a classical ballet when interpreted by a
world-class orchestra. The
difference is that the 10-piece band is simply missing information! The
emotional experience, though satisfying, cannot compete with the experience
derived when the music is played with the entire orchestra! More instruments ...
more notes ... more information ... a much greater emotional
experience!
What many folks are doing (in all agencies!), in this rush to
train more people with less time developing skill and knowledge, is removing
pieces of information from the full orchestral experience that is diving!
Unless you have heard the symphony, then you do not know of
its "wonderfulness." Unless you have heard Swan Lake performed by more than one
orchestra of varying talents, you have NO BASIS for comparison! (As I understand
the word COMPARE, more than one entity must be involved!) Within diving, there is too much
religious zeal! (Listening to someone else is "heresy" in many dive shops!) I suggest, that before anyone discuss
the "wonderfulness" of any agency (or the ineptness of others) that they
experience the training of a variety of instructors, dive shops, agencies, and
geographic locations! In other words, listen to more than one orchestra before
you decide which plays music to YOUR liking.
The greatest truth I have ever uttered in diving is what my
students call, "The Gospel According To Harris" - "Knowledgeable, physically fit divers
ALWAYS have more fun!" Don't let
religious-like zeal (my dive shop's better than your dive shop AND I will not
open my mind to other opinions) close the mind! When you close your mind, then
you shut off much music and many pleasurable future experiences will be
eliminated!
There are a whole host of opportunities out there. Don't allow
undeserved loyalties to DENY you the opportunity to listen and experience the full
orchestra that can be your music when you dive!
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About The
Author:
Larry "Harris" Taylor, Ph.D. is a biochemist and Diving Safety
Coordinator at the University of Michigan. He has authored more than 200 scuba
related articles. His personal dive library (See Alert Diver, Mar/Apr, 1997, p.
54) is considered one of the best recreational sources of information In North
America.
All rights reserved.
Use of these articles for personal or organizational profit is specifically denied.
These articles may be used for not-for-profit diving education