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Dave W.
Info Junkie
USA
26020 Posts |
 Posted - 09/05/2006 : 20:46:53 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by Dude
H.H. said:quote:
Oh, you have evidence that Irwin was handling the stingray? Because in all the accounts I've heard, he was simply swimming above one, a not uncommon practice around the normally docile creatures.
He and his camera crew apparently boxed it in.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Irwin#Deathquote:
After reviewing the footage of the incident and speaking to the cameraman who recorded it, marine documentary filmmaker and former spearfisherman Ben Cropp speculated that the stingray "felt threatened because Steve was alongside and there was the cameraman ahead." In such a case, the stingray responds by automatically flexing the serrated barb on its tail up to a maximum of 25 cm (10 in) of length. Cropp said Irwin had accidentally boxed the animal in. "It stopped and twisted and threw up its tail with the spike, and it caught him in the chest.
Wikipedia continues:...and it caught him in the chest. It's a defensive thing. It's like being stabbed with a dirty dagger." The stinging of Irwin by the bull ray was "a one-in-a-million thing," Cropp told Time magazine. "I have swum with many rays, and I have only had one do that to me." So there's an experienced opinion, basically saying this was a freak accident. |
- Dave W. (Private Msg, EMail)
Evidently, I rock!
Why not question something for a change?
Visit Dave's Psoriasis Info, too. |
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HalfMooner
Dingaling
Philippines
15831 Posts |
Posted - 09/05/2006 : 21:33:48 [Permalink]
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quote:
The stinging of Irwin by the bull ray was "a one-in-a-million thing," Cropp told Time magazine. "I have swum with many rays, and I have only had one do that to me."
So, by "many rays," Cropp logically must mean he's swum with a million of them?
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“Biology is just physics that has begun to smell bad.” —HalfMooner
Here's a link to Moonscape News, and one to its Archive. |
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Dude
SFN Die Hard
USA
6891 Posts |
Posted - 09/05/2006 : 23:23:05 [Permalink]
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Dave_W said:
quote:
So there's an experienced opinion, basically saying this was a freak accident.
I never suggested that dying from a stingray strike to the heart was anything other than freakish.
The point, however, is that if you get up-close and personal with wild animals often enough, you are going to increase the chance that you come to harm from one of them. Add to that Irwin's highly interactive style, and you increase your chance of harm yet again.
If anything the freakish nature of his death supports my point. How unlikely is it to die from a stingray? 17 recorded deaths since we have bothered to keep track of such things.
How many of you honestly were shocked to hear that Irwin died from being attacked by a wild animal? My bet would be none.
H.H. said:
quote:
Right, that's what I heard. They swam around the animal and "boxed it in." No handling of the stingray was involved, although even that wouldn't apear to rank as an extremely dangerous activity, as this diving group illustrates:
Who said that being near a stingray was dangerous? Now you are just making shit up. Shit, I have personally been diving with Southern stingrays, 2m across and 140kg, and had them swim right up to me and around me for several minutes. You can go to the FL aquarium and "pet" immature rays in a tank. They let kids get up there and pet and feed them.
My point, yet fucking again, is that it is not suprising to me (and likely to no one) to hear that Irwin died from a wild animal attacking him. The fact that it was a basically harmless animal only illustrates my point, not yours.
quote:
That would have been an absurd claim, but beskeptigal never made it. Take a deep breath, read through her post again, and stop trying to save face by arguing against a strawman of your own creation. This is a skeptic's forum, Dude. We aren't fooled by such tactics.
You need to go back and re-read what she posted.
In this post she throws out statistics about animal handling and fatalities, then throws out some stats on the hazards of every-day things.
Then she concludes, based on those statistics:
quote:
So while there are risks Irwin took in his job, the perception those risks were larger than risks other people take in their jobs or everyday life is not born out by the facts. While we don't have a denominator on the number of people who work with exotic animals in the above cited study, it didn't stand out as an exceptionally dangerous job.
So kiss my straw-man's ass H.H.
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Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson
"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin
Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth |
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H. Humbert
SFN Die Hard
USA
4574 Posts |
Posted - 09/06/2006 : 00:04:15 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by Dude
Who said that being near a stingray was dangerous? Now you are just making shit up. Shit, I have personally been diving with Southern stingrays, 2m across and 140kg, and had them swim right up to me and around me for several minutes. You can go to the FL aquarium and "pet" immature rays in a tank. They let kids get up there and pet and feed them.
My point, yet fucking again, is that it is not suprising to me (and likely to no one) to hear that Irwin died from a wild animal attacking him.
Right, but nothing about it was inevitable. And for the record, I did find the manner of his death surprising, since stingrays are not considered dangerous animals.
quote:
The fact that it was a basically harmless animal only illustrates my point, not yours.
Come again? How does a freak accident with a "basically harmless animal" prove that "that Irwin's hands-on approach with wild animals is wildly dangerous?"
You're trying to have it both ways. You're suggesting that his risky behavior around dangerous wild animals was a factor in his death, and that his seemingly non-risky behavior around a non-dangerous wild animal is evidence of it. That makes no sense.
quote:
You need to go back and re-read what she posted. So kiss my straw-man's ass H.H.
 Ok, I'll give you that one. I'll admit to not reading that very carefully. Beskep did overstate her case a bit there.
However, she did restate her point a different way before you made that comment:
quote:
I don't even know what Irwin's real risks were. I'm just saying they are easily perceived as being greater than they actually were and that many things we don't perceive as risky are much more risky than we think.
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"A man is his own easiest dupe, for what he wishes to be true he generally believes to be true." --Demosthenes
"The first principle is that you must not fool yourself - and you are the easiest person to fool." --Richard P. Feynman
"Face facts with dignity." --found inside a fortune cookie |
| Edited by - H. Humbert on 09/06/2006 00:08:15 |
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Dude
SFN Die Hard
USA
6891 Posts |
Posted - 09/06/2006 : 03:36:30 [Permalink]
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H.H. said:
quote:
Come again? How does a freak accident with a "basically harmless animal" prove that "that Irwin's hands-on approach with wild animals is wildly dangerous?"
You're trying to have it both ways. You're suggesting that his risky behavior around dangerous wild animals was a factor in his death, and that his seemingly non-risky behavior around a non-dangerous wild animal is evidence of it. That makes no sense.
If you are harmed, killed even, by an animal that is generally considered harmless.... then you have likely made some error or misjudged the response of the animal, or antagonized it in some way. Swimming with stingrays should have been essentially risk free. That, combined with Irwin's very hands on approach, supports the conclusion that he may have been in error in what he did, in some way. That was the point.
I'll grant that, after further reading, it seems that he wasn't doing anything especially stupid. But between him and his camera crew they managed to initiate a defensive response from the animal.
quote:
However, she did restate her point a different way before you made that comment:
No, she is still trying to flood the argument with irrelevant statistics and trying to draw the conclusion that his activities weren't as risk-laden as I think they were.
quote:
Right, but nothing about it was inevitable.
Ok, I was being a bit facetious with that remark. I thought it was obviously so. Then came the flood of nonsense trying to paint Irwin's style of animal interaction as low-risk.
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Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson
"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin
Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth |
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beskeptigal
SFN Die Hard
USA
3834 Posts |
Posted - 09/06/2006 : 15:23:01 [Permalink]
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For Pete's sakes, how could I overstate what I didn't say?
BE: A lot of people are unfairly IMO making the same comment as you Dude. A lot of his death defying stuff was fake. It was hype for the show. I posted a bit on JREF about the causes of accidental death and we all take greater risks daily just getting in the car.
DUDE: His style of interaction with wild animals was for the shock value. It made him a successful entertainer. It was also very risky. Yeah, a lot of it was staged....To compare Irwin's style of interaction to the risk of driving a car is idiotic.
BE: we perceive risk one way, but the facts tell a different story.
SOURCE: We found that approximately 1% of workplace fatalities are associated with an animal-related event....Exotic animals are also responsible for several fatalities each year, especially in circus workers and zookeepers...
So lets fill in the blanks here which I left out.
Of the occupational deaths involving animals, most were unrelated to handling the animal and instead related to hitting the animal with one's vehilcle. Therefore considerably less than 1% of occupational fatalites in the USA from 1992-1997 were from handling exotic animals.
"Several a year" x 7 years (92 and 97 included), so about 20 out of 350 total deaths on the job involving animals x .01 (1% of the total occupational deaths which 350 represented) = .00057% of occupational deaths over that 7 year period involved handling exotic animals.
What I didn't say you seem to think I said: that this was a number we could directly compare to Irwin's risk taking.
You can't compare it unless you knew what % of workers in the workforce did similar things Irwin did when handling those exotic animals.
So I never put this up to compare to Irwin directly. I just put it up to show the risks people have of being killed at work are high in many jobs. Handling exotic animals whether like Irwin or just normal zoo keeping did not stand out as particularly hazardous.
Then to Dude's reaction to my comments, I added a quote from the friend of a friend that Irwin's antics were more put on than not, Dude even agreed.
I can add to this, I noticed in some of the wide shots of the clips of Irwin, there are 4-5 people on the periphery inside the enclosure that certainly look like backup.
The following post I put up references and comments about perceived risk. Nothing there was specific to Irwin except in general risk perception. I said so. I think the comments Dude made exaggerate the risk taking of Irwin. I cite my personal expertise, a nurse practitioner certified in the specialty of occupational nursing, (COHN-S), and the references on risk perception to draw the conclusion, I do not believe Irwin's antics posed a greater risk than people take every day in many occupations. And a job that requires motor vehicle driving poses a much greater risk than snake and crock handling did. Especially if you consider how much of the time Irwin spent doing the perceived risky events compared to his entire time on the job.
Humans do a poor job of estimating the actual risk of various activities. Sandman discusses which elements increase one's perception of how risky activities and events really are. Irwin's activities involved a number of things which tend to increase perceived risk. Risk is typically underestimated for everyday things like driving.
Beyond that, disagree all you want. But don't accuse me of overstating the above case unless you can cite some evidence Irwin actually took more risk than say a truck driver or a taxi driver. I'm not looking for evidence snakes or crocks kill, I'm looking for evidence Irwin deserves criticism for taking more risks on the job than other workers not being criticized take.
The data shows driving is the riskiest occupational activity as far as percent of total deaths. Fishing, crabbing and logging are considered some of the most dangerous jobs per capita of workers. Farming is the most risky job of children. The leading cause of death on the job for females is homicide. There is a lot of risk out there. |
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Dude
SFN Die Hard
USA
6891 Posts |
Posted - 09/06/2006 : 18:44:17 [Permalink]
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There can be no statistical comparison to Irwin and other (normal) animal handlers. The sample size (Irwin = 1, and he happens to be dead from interacting with a wild animal) is to small.
Your continued assertion that Irwin's risk was the same as the risk for other (normal) animal handlers is ridiculous.
Your further assertion that driving contains more risk than Irwin's style of animal handling just makes you look foolish.
Ask filthy how normal herpetologists handle snakes with potent venom. Then please observe the footage of Irwin holding a mamba by the tail, dancing around with it, and the snake gets away from him and heads right for the camera crew, and how his assistant Wes (kinda like that poor dude from the old Wild Kingdom TV show) almost takes a strike to the chest to save the camera crew from being bitten.
Seriously, leave the inappropriate statistical analogy at home before your next reply.
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Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson
"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin
Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth |
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McQ
Skeptic Friend
USA
258 Posts |
Posted - 09/06/2006 : 19:10:19 [Permalink]
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Isn't all the arguing about this just a matter of opinion anyway? Some people here think Steve Irwin's behavior was riskier than what others think. For Pete's sake, the guy is dead and everyone is just trying to be the most right about how risky his job was!
Reminds me of the phrase, "Pole vaulting over mouse turds."
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Elvis didn't do no drugs!
--Penn Gillette |
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Ghost_Skeptic
SFN Regular
Canada
510 Posts |
Posted - 09/06/2006 : 21:40:45 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by McQ
Isn't all the arguing about this just a matter of opinion anyway? Some people here think Steve Irwin's behavior was riskier than what others think. For Pete's sake, the guy is dead and everyone is just trying to be the most right about how risky his job was!
Reminds me of the phrase, "Pole vaulting over mouse turds."
You can catch Hantavirus from mouse turds, so it is wise to pole vault over them. |
"You can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink. / You can send a kid to college but you can't make him think." - B.B. King
History is made by stupid people - The Arrogant Worms
"The greater the ignorance the greater the dogmatism." - William Osler
"Religion is the natural home of the psychopath" - Pat Condell
"The day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the supreme being as his father in the womb of a virgin, will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerva in the brain of Jupiter" - Thomas Jefferson |
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beskeptigal
SFN Die Hard
USA
3834 Posts |
Posted - 09/07/2006 : 00:12:21 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by Dude
There can be no statistical comparison to Irwin and other (normal) animal handlers. The sample size (Irwin = 1, and he happens to be dead from interacting with a wild animal) is to small.
There can be but the data was not readily available on the Net.
quote:
Originally posted by Dude
Your continued assertion that Irwin's risk was the same as the risk for other (normal) animal handlers is ridiculous.
Made no such assertion.
quote:
Originally posted by Dude
Your further assertion that driving contains more risk than Irwin's style of animal handling just makes you look foolish.
You have presented no data to the contrary.
You did not address the comparison I did make which was, Irwin's job was subject to being perceived as more dangerous than objective measuring of risk would indicate.
Occupational hazards we are most familiar with are perceived to be less hazardous than objective measuring of risk would indicate. Driving is responsible for the majority of occupational deaths.
Objective comparison of Irwin's occupation with other occupations, including his at least partially faked exaggeration of the actual risk he was taking, needs to include the time he spends actually doing what you perceive as risky compared to a job where the risky behavior is taken throughout the entire work day, every work day.
quote:
Originally posted by Dude
Ask filthy how normal herpetologists handle snakes with potent venom. Then please observe the footage of Irwin holding a mamba by the tail, dancing around with it, and the snake gets away from him and heads right for the camera crew, and how his assistant Wes (kinda like that poor dude from the old Wild Kingdom TV show) almost takes a strike to the chest to save the camera crew from being bitten.
Seriously, leave the inappropriate statistical analogy at home before your next reply.
So you witnessed one or more events which from the edited video version you judged to be reckless. It may or may not have been as reckless as perceived.
I will take my careful analysis over your quick impression any day.
In the end, Irwin's perceived reckless behavior did not lead to his death. Rather a hazard we don't perceive as being very hazardous, swimming around a coral reef, did. |
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Dude
SFN Die Hard
USA
6891 Posts |
Posted - 09/07/2006 : 03:27:30 [Permalink]
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Whatever.
You go on and continue to think that driving is more inherently dangerous that what Irwin did to get his video footage.
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Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson
"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin
Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth |
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Ricky
SFN Die Hard
USA
4907 Posts |
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Dude
SFN Die Hard
USA
6891 Posts |
Posted - 09/07/2006 : 18:11:43 [Permalink]
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No, seriously, Ricky, if you think that driving is more dangerous that what Irwin was doing, there is nothing left for me to say.
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Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson
"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin
Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth |
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HalfMooner
Dingaling
Philippines
15831 Posts |
Posted - 09/07/2006 : 22:17:05 [Permalink]
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I think that Dude's comments about what Irwin did in his profession are valid. He really was the only member of an idiosyncratic set. He was not even "typical" (if there is such a thing) among wild animal wranglers. Stats on other activities only show how dangerous they are, not how they compare to the activity of "being Steve Irwin." On the other hand, one Steve Irwin dying, by the paucity of data, does not constitute valid statistics for the danger of "Irwining." I've long expected Irwin to come to final grief via wild animal, but the freakishness of being stabbed in the heart by a stingray still boggles my mind.
The data being what it is, one reasonable person's conclusions are as valid as another's. Germaine Greer, the Aussie feminist, has chimed in, basically saying Steve was an animal torturer who had it coming. I think that was uncalled for.
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“Biology is just physics that has begun to smell bad.” —HalfMooner
Here's a link to Moonscape News, and one to its Archive. |
| Edited by - HalfMooner on 09/07/2006 22:21:04 |
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filthy
SFN Die Hard
USA
14408 Posts |
Posted - 09/08/2006 : 07:59:00 [Permalink]
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Poe's raven croakes and caws with glee above my chamber door. I'd barely goten my computer straightened out, when lightening nailed my meter pole. Now that that's finally fixed, I'm gonna shoot that fucking bird, pluck him, and have him for dinner!
I've been dealing with hot snakes since about age 12. And I've had some serious bites -- all of them due to stupid mistakes on my part. Thus, it is telling to note that the first thing I thought about Irwin's death was that he was messing with the animal to no purpose; just to mess with it.
The way he handled his subjects is simply not done. We tail snakes, but get them on the hook as soon as possible, then into a bag. Usually, we hook them first, then grab the tail. We raise the rear of the serpent so that it's weight acts against it if it should jump the hook and try to bite. In short, we don't mess around with them. In fact, we don't handle them unecessarly at all, and as much as I love them, I have no desire to play with them.
These methods not only keep the handler out of trouble, but insure that the snake will not be injured as well.
Irwin used to travel with a sort of mobile ER, equipped to not only administer antivenin interveneusly(sp?) (the only effective method), but with venelator equipment as well. I have been told that he also used every trick in the book, notably chilling the animal down to slow it and make it a little less hazardous to show off with.
I found his methods unecessarly rough, and he was bitten far too often by animals (nonvenomous) that it never should have happened with. When I do a presentation, I make very damned sure that none of the snakes or lizards or small crocodilians I'm showing will bite me. I mean, I'm supposed to be an expert and what sort of an ass will I look like if I get whacked by a rat snake or monitor I'm presenting?
And the best way to keep from getting whacked is simply to handle them gently and no longer than necessary to show them. The longer you hold and restrain them, the more stressed they become, and so the greater likelihood of a bite. And this varies with the specimen. A friend keep a Columbian boa that I've borrowed in the past that will go along with almost anything, and another friend has a lovely carpet python that takes very little shit from anyone. I no longer borrow either snake because they have gotten too large.
And so forth.
But I will not slight Irwin's knowledge and his contributions to public awarness. The man was very, damned good and although I am highly critical of some of his methods, I hold his memory in high regard.
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"What luck for rulers that men do not think." -- Adolf Hitler (1889 - 1945)
"If only we could impeach on the basis of criminal stupidity, 90% of the Rethuglicans and half of the Democrats would be thrown out of office." ~~ P.Z. Myres
"The default position of human nature is to punch the other guy in the face and take his stuff." ~~ Dude
Brother Boot Knife of Warm Humanitarianism,
and Crypto-Communist! 
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