MNScuba.com

Wow, so many topics for just one post, or even thread for that matter.

I’ll address the stroke comment first. If someone has no trim in the water and sucks down a tank like a Hoover I wouldn’t say that they are a stroke- just a diver in training. On the other hand, when a diver continually runs out of air, fails to perform correct deco, but never learns how to do it right, even after several trips to the chamber, I will call them a stroke and identify them as someone I don’t want to be near in the water. I would think that this would hold true of all divers, DIR or not. A stroke doesn’t mean a lousy diver, it means a diver who is unsafe.

As far as a religion, I find it hard to believe. I dove all kinds of goofy rigs over the years until I found a system that I liked. I dove single and ponies, double independents, side mounts, Hp’s, Lp’s, aluminums, steel stages, ect. I went to the DIR gear because it was much more comfortable in the water. I switched over to the whole “no air dives below 100’” after my daughter was born. As a matter of fact, many DIR divers I know dove all kinds of ways until they had small children to worry about. At this point it became a balancing act between doing the dives you want to do, but also making sure you where going to be there for your children. That was the reason I adopted it, and not for some unfulfilled religious zealousness.

When It comes to using DIR in the Islands I can only say that it works for me. On my last trip I used my back plate and wing and it packed up much smaller than my wife’s travel BC. IT also is much more comfortable, when set up correctly, than any other BC I’ve owned- and I’ve owned a LOT!

When it comes to breathing the long hose in warm water vs. an AII, I can only ask’ “how many times have you actually had to share air?” I’ve had to do it more often than I care to think- and it was usually not with my dive buddy! I’ve had people swim up and hit me underwater with those big saucer circle eyes and the need for air NOW! You’ll also find that the long hose routing makes your second stage hose come in much closer to your neck than a standard hose, with the exception of a Sherwood Maximums. This make s it easier to poke your head into those coral caves and wrecks without getting hung up. It also makes it easy to take your tank off underwater and readjust your first stage underwater too minimize the leaking bubbles coming out of the tank valve- anyone who has dove in third world countries will know exactly what I mean by that one.

IF you really want to use your computer while warm water diving go ahead. I would be more concerned with getting a hold of some nitrox on my trip than if I had a computer on my wrist or not..
Lastly, for this post at least, the DIR-F courses are not the push through classes that PADI, and others, run. The last one that I know of had 40% of the class fail. They learned a lot, but their skill needed work before GUE was going to hand them even a fundamentals card. This came as a BIG shock to some of them who were used to just putting their money down and getting a card by the end of the weekend. They all came away learning something and described it as very worth while.

Jon

Can't understand the tone of your post. Most of my post was a positive acknowledgement of what I see DIR brings to diving.

No, I don't regularily question that the earth is round, or that gravity exists, but there are many, many things I do question. I don't put DIR on the same level as any of the immutable laws of physics.

I certainly don't "dismiss the knoweldge gained through years of exploratory diving." I do acknowledge that there was more than one person (or group of persons) participating in exploratory diving, and that the body of diving knowledge continues to grow. Believe it or not, some of the things I've pulled of this website (including DIR concepts) do affect my diving (obviously not my choice of OC vs. CCR). It is a constant learning process.

If DIR leads to a "Socratic" approach to diving, then I applaud it.

The fact of the matter is that in some people it probably does, and in others it doesn't. There are divers that are "fascist" DIR divers. "What's the DIR way to do this or that (not thinking just doing), you're a stroke if you don't dive like me, etc." (there may even be Nazi DIR divers, but I doubt it has anything to do with the fact they are DIR )On the same token there are divers who ignore anything with the DIR label attached to it, just because it has the label. I don't agree with either group. As reasoning human beings, we need to be able to draw our own logical conclusions from varying viewpoints, and if we can't defend our viewpoint, it's probably worth considering a change (whether it's on abortion, gun control, religion, taxes, DIR, CCR's, or any of a variety of topics on which reasonable people tend to disagree).

Just like any other philosophy or tool (religion being an EXAMPLE), it's how you use it that counts.

Regardless of what you think about DIR (or any other diving topic), you've got to admit that topics which elicit this type of response (i.e. lots of long, well thought out posts with some emotion involved) are a big part of what makes forums like this fun.

I think ghosch is making some good points here. I think it definitely applies to the broad stereotypes that are made about non-DIR instructors. Don't get me wrong, I've seen a lot of bad instructors from every agency you can think of. But I've also seen a lot of good ones too. My point is that it's up to the individual. An instructor doesn't have to be DIR to be a good one.

;D
hey, does the the gear carrying for the instructors remind anyone else of being a private in the army and/or pledge hazing in college?

Dean,

As I go back over the posts, there's so much information in there, I realized I might have missed a point- or two, or three.

I don't feel that you're picking on me and there is a lot of misinformation out there about DIR, mostly because George himself doesn't do it a lot of good with his rants. If you ever slum though some of the posts on Rec.scuba you'd think we're all a bunch of a$$es- only some of us are. Slowly the good ideas from DIR are getting out into the main stream and many of them will be adopted, eventually- just like nitrox, spg's, BC"s, and the octopus were.

I've learned way more about diving equipment that works, or doesn't, and practices that work, or don't, by working on the lake than by teaching in any dive shop. By working in a single dive shop you get blinded by what goes on eslewhere. By working in many different dive shops you get to pick up many ideas that work, and a while bunch that don't. By working on a charter boat, especially one with a very wide client base, you get to see lots of things, good or bad, that you wouldn't see otherwise, in action.

Over the years I have had to swim for more divers than I can count. I've had to swim to other boats because they had a diver bent, and then there have been some more extreme situations that I won't comment on here. All of this exposure to other divers, and gear, have helped me formulate my opinion of DIR. It didn't happen overnight, and I was just as turned off by George as are others, but the ideas work and I overlook that fact. Just because he spouts about it, doesn't mean he invented it. It was formulated over the years by various divers. Most of the ideas came through accident analysis and prevention of future ones. As long as the sytem is safe I'll go with it, even if the leader is a jerk. I'm not the only one to follow along with a certain idea even if the leader is a jerk, my Republican friends are doing it right now. OK, save that for another thread. ;D

One example, for me at least, is the Willy. It has claimed 4 divers over the years. The one thing all of those divers had in common was that they started, or ended up, solo. Some where kids while others were certified trimix divers, and one was even an instructor. There have been a number of near misses over the years and much of it could have been avoided, or at least given the diver a fighting chance, if they would have a buddy. DIR is heavy on the buddy system.

There are other examples I could site, like the guy wearing a recreational BC trying to get back out of the engine room, but the BC was so sloppy that he kept on banging his tank valve, and boot, against the doorway in his panic to get out. I slipped up behind him and moved his tank over on one of his lunges and he was able to slip out. He never knew that I was there, since he was diving solo, but what would have happend to him when he busted off that first stage and I hadn't swam by? First, he should have had a buddy, and second, he could have used a back plate and wing that was adjusted properly so that his tank wasn't floating all over the place.

I can go on with other war stories and examples of why I switched, as there are a lot of them over the years, but I'll leave it there for now.

BTW: Before someone slams on me for being a liberal, my most trusted dive buddy, who also dives DIR, is a huge Republican and we kid eachother all the time about how we disagree on the contriversial stuff, like politics, but are in complete agreement and the simple stuff- like DIR. You don't have to hammer on me because he already does.

Jon

This is fun!

I simply liken it to a religion – not exactness, and you have somewhat proved my point. As an accepted philosophy, you have, believe it or not, taken a leap of faith. There is nothing wrong in this, it is not being challenged. We all do it every day in one form or another in the things we covet.
Liken to a religion, someone comes to you and says, “I have seen the truth, a better way.” A better way in which they believe to be true for them.

Gear is not the driving force of DIR, holistic hargothian was not created from DIR. Instead DIR at it’s basic foundation – it’s actual name in and upon itself “doing it right” is a philosophy, and philosophy closely resembles religion.

Ask that person, why they made that leap of faith, and they will have plenty to tell you. Ask them what is wrong with another philosophy/religion, this is always a slippery slope - as that can also open up doubt and possible weaknesses that may mirror and challenge their own choice, but there will still be plenty to talk about. As in religion/leaps of faith, any question of which doing so, will undoubtedly create conversation - those who also may interpret this as a challenge to their belief system, and a defensive posture is made. But as in religion and philosophical argument, the ideology is to build an argument that wins others to that side. Yet, as in all philosophy, there is an argument that can equally counter, who wins? The winner would be able to tell us where the circle begins and where infinity ends…

I’m not sure people who are whole DIR understand, the controversies heart lies not in the gear, it’s in the way in which SOME folks have perpetuated a negative aspect in which they view non-DIR divers or themselves before becoming DIR. It makes those who are not DIR understandably as defensive as those who are. “What do you mean tell me I’m not doing it right?”

The name/label DIR itself isolates all others as “doing it wrong”.

DRE you quote” There was no leap of faith involved, just a lightbulb that went on when I realized I had been a stroke for all these years, jeopardizing my life and that of others by my decisions and actions, luckily never without any real consequences.”

Perhaps you might understand that the controversy is more avoidable (but not entirely) when you remove certain aspects of that comment. “I realized that what would work better for me was to keep the same mindset and gear configuration throughout all the ways I dove, this worked better toward my concentration of my own safety, enjoyment of the sport, and exploration, and those around me who did the same as I”

Instead, your previous statements sounds like, “I was a stroke waiting to happen, those of you who aren’t DIR are strokes waiting to happen. You can’t dive with me because you are a stroke. Don’t be a stroke, come join ‘the club’, the rest are idiots for not following this – they will not know perfection, they don’t know how to do it right, they all do it wrong.”

Notice the difference in edge and tone? This shouldn’t be the way it is approached, you sound angry with others who question it? Facist’s, whimpy, gay, all words used in the wrong contex – which is helping to perpetuate the wrong viewpoint of who may or may not be DIR.

Is DIR a self-prescribing elitist mentaility that the rest of those who are not 100% DIR are subbordinant and inferior – simply strokes waiting to happen?

Yes, DIR has fulfilled the void of which you feel was missing from your diving. Others may not share that same feeling of void needing to be fulfilled, but why are the wrong, why are they strokes? Until you see how your wording and the outlook that others are inferior, you will mis-represent what can be a more remarkable kindling of future growth for DIR.

For DIR to succeed in limiting controversy and gaining acceptance, they need not be a George Irvine.

(This is no personal attack on you DRE, or anyone in particular).

This is turning into a terrific thread indeed. As far as the use of the word stroke is concerned, I wholeheartedly agree with FreediveWi. There are people who ven when knowing better still maintain an unsafe attittude: they're strokes. There are divers who claim to be DIR but when asked a specific question about the why of what they do, they cannot come up with the correct answer (that's why so much time in a DIRF is class is spent going over all the why's instead of the how's): these people in my opinion are the biggest possible strokes. Is it possible to have a safe attittude towards diving when using a CCR: absolutely - it just doesn't fit within the DIR concept.
DIR is a niche in diving and will always remain that way, but both because of tone and message it created quite some controversy. I have no illusions that some people will always disagree and that's their good right - I don't care - I just won't dive with that person. If that's considered by some a religion, so be it. As long as I won't have to die because of my religion (actually, now that I come to think of it, that's the last thing DIR wants ) I'm fine with it either way...

I still don't see the religous analogy here? If it is, then I would say that it should also apply to all of the Inspiration divers. They way they wax on about those yellow boxes you'd think that they had just bought a miricle in a box.

I'm not attacking CCR divers, I just don't understand why they get a free pass when they do the exact same thing as the DIR divers- speak about the psotives of their type of diving.

I also am not sure that being a CCR diver is not compatible with DIR. Right now DIR divers use certain rebreathers, like the RB 80. They use the RB80 to get the same gas advantage as the CCR divers, but they don't trust the electronics to do the mixing for them. Given time, there may, or will, be a CCR rebreather that they could feel comfortable with. Just because they aren't there right now doesn't mean that they couldn't get to that point some day.

I could see giving an RB80 a whirl, if I had the cash, but since I have had years of experience with electronics failing underwater (such as strobes, cameras, computers, diver location dvices, lights, scooters) I am not willing to trust myself with a CCR just yet. Others have had different experiences with water and electronics and have come up with another view point.

This is fine and is know as the "Field view of education". That means that everyone takes in knowledge through their own field of experinces and applies those values to them. THis would explain why I feel much safer diving DIR, while someone else feels safe enough on a CCR- or diving deep air.

I am not out to set the world on fire with DIR, just elminate the misinformtaion that is out there, like it's a religion, and explain why it works so well for the people I dive with. There are even some local divers who say they are DIR, but don't have the goods to back it up. I think that this does the DIR crowd a huge disservice sine we get lumped in with them.

Jon

The thing that really gets me with DIR with respect to rebreathers is their closed mindedness. There are a lot of good SCR units out there that deliver the same reliability that DIR requires out of it's equipment. The only thing wrong with them is that they're not made by the blessed Halcyon. Any of you who have ever seen an RB80 would agree that they are in fact more complicated than lots of other SCR's, not to mention that they are HUGE.