Ron: 0:15

hello again. Welcome to the uncannery. My name is ron. On to my left and the audio listeners anywhere. This is.

Doug: 0:24

Doug.

Ron: 0:26

And to his left. Hey, I'm Don.

Doug: 0:29

It's weird we're in a triangle, so relative to what left means. That's very confusing.

Ron: 0:37

I think it's very clear, okay, a triangle is a point with two lines coming from it One's to the left and one's to the right oh, okay, in in flat plane geometry yeah, but if you use spherical geometry or I'm never using spherical geometry.

Doug: 0:54

I want you guys to know anytime I'm talking, it's never spherical and on the contrary, I will only use spherical geometry in every podcast that we do.

Ron: 1:03

That's good.

Doug: 1:04

We need that covered so that makes us balanced, fair and balanced.

Ron: 1:10

We're a fair and balanced podcast and we want to talk to you all today about something I've been thinking a lot about and I'm wondering if it is something you guys think about ever, and I don't think it's actually things we usually think that much about. I wanted to ask if you guys are consider yourselves reckless people slightly. I I've created a chart or I've ranked how reckless I think each of us is, from most reckless to least reckless oh wow, I'm willing to bet where do you think I take?

Ron: 1:41

the top spot interesting, that's Interesting.

Don: 1:44

What's the definition of reckless?

Ron: 1:46

I think reckless to me means an idiot. No.

Doug: 1:50

I also think I ranked number one on that chart.

Don: 1:54

I vote Doug too.

Ron: 1:56

Reckless to me means someone who is willing to engage in potentially dangerous activity because they see a reward in it and that reward is is worth uh, risk worth a risky behavior well, so like reward.

Don: 2:13

Like a fireman running into a burning building, like that's a risky behavior, but the reward is that he saved somebody. Is that what you mean by reward?

Ron: 2:20

I don't think that's a reward, that's like a. You have to do that, uh, cause he's a fireman. I'm thinking like you get some sort of entertainment out of it, you feel better. Uh, yeah, maybe there is like an, an actual reward, like, oh, if I, if I hit up this bank, I will, I will receive the reward of money and I would say I don't score that high on reckless behavior.

Doug: 2:46

I haven't looked at banks with that intention. Unless I'm playing Grand Theft Auto, then that's always my favorite thing to do.

Ron: 2:51

My chart goes like this I think I'm the least reckless person here, and I think Don is the second most reckless person here, and I do think Doug is the most reckless.

Don: 3:02

What can I say? And?

Ron: 3:02

here's my thing. I think recklessness in my definition, my interpretation I'm trying to present here today, has something to do with the danger, a certain like how comfortable you are. Are you with a certain degree of danger, right? And I think I'm not at all. I don't like danger at all. I don't even want to go to Halloween horror nights because there's a risk that I will be afraid and Don, I think you've spent a lot of time in the wilderness. You used to be outside. I think outside is a place that invites more danger than certainly inside Often yes, that is the case.

Ron: 3:34

So you have to learn to live in that danger zone, right? Yeah and Doug Cue the Top Gun soundtrack. Yep and Doug, you, I think, are somewhat. You engage in a lot of aggressive physical activity. There's a high risk of injury.

Doug: 3:58

To clarify for the listeners.

Ron: 3:59

I practice jujitsu. So instead of I don't go looking for bar fights. Not that you've told us yet, but I sometimes call you on saturday night and you never pick up and um uh, so bar fights are only tuesdays, do we agree? Do you think jujitsu is something that counts as a as a dangerous activity?

Doug: 4:13

inherently yes, even though there are ground rules to take much of that out to protect both people involved. If they're rolling um, yeah, there's always risk involved yeah, would you call jujitsu an extreme sport? I suppose, well, I, because when I hear extreme sport, I think skateboarding, you know so if it's, extreme if, if it's in that realm, yeah, there's danger involved in it.

Ron: 4:41

I think it's a dangerous sport yeah, don do you think like uh, outdoor nearing, is that what you guys call it? No, no one's ever said that word before if I go to disneyland and I can't talk to an outdoor near but uh, would you consider yourself a mountaineer? Did you ever dabble in that?

Don: 5:01

um, I don't. So mountaineering usually implies, um, like off trail trekking or or like ice climbing, things like that. And and no, I'm much more of a on the trail kind of a kind of a guy, although there have been occasions where I've, uh, I've had to cut from one trail to another over some pretty rugged passes, but uh, but no, I wouldn't say I'm a mountaineer outdoorsman, I think would be that would be fair.

Ron: 5:27

So is. There is a degree of uh recklessness in being an outdoorsman.

Don: 5:32

Well, see and so I'm thinking about this word reckless cause. There's an element of danger, of course, but one of the the primary goals of learning the skill of outdoors, outdoor hearing, um is uh is to reduce, to reduce that danger so so that it's not a reckless behavior to go into the wilderness. It would be a reckless behavior to go into the wilderness if you had no idea what you were doing or you didn't have the appropriate equipment or supplies or you weren't prepared for what you might encounter there. But the behavior in itself is not reckless because you plan ahead in order to avoid that danger. But I was wondering about the jujitsu. The same thing, right, like the practice of jujitsu, like going to jujitsu practice on Tuesday at the gym or whatever, like the intention is not that you leave there injured or having injured somebody else, but isn't the purpose of learning the jujitsu so that if there's an occasion in outside of the gym that you need it and you're ready for it, and those occasions might be more reckless than the preparing for those occasions?

Doug: 6:31

I was going to say that my participation in training is because I fear a reckless occasion in which somebody does, yeah, like in, in, in a moment of self-defense, yeah, you would need to make a decision. And so I was going to say it almost becomes less reckless because the idea I've always looked at it as preparation, a potential preparation, um, which I think, yeah, far less reckless. I guess it's very planned, uh would you?

Don: 7:00

would you say that somebody who who comes up to you and challenges you into a fight is being reckless because they don't know how lethal your?

Doug: 7:08

hands are the grappling abilities I have. Well, that is maybe the thing that's most interesting. Is everyone that I train with? Like we are all so adverse to fighting. Fighting, like all of us, I think, just have this unanimous agreement that you know violence is awful, even though that is like what we practice so never having been at the gym while you're practicing I just have this very strong image now of an octagon of some kind and someone blows a whistle and you all just scurry to the corner and try to make yourself as small as possible.

Don: 7:41

Is that how jiu-jitsu?

Doug: 7:42

works quite, not quite. Um yeah, big mat space and, uh, several one-on-one like partnerships that essentially you're going between training partners and working out five minute rounds, uh, grappling each other. But I like that a lot.

Ron: 7:57

But would we agree that these uh activities um have certain inherent risks involved with them? Right, like there's a less than 0% chance that you could wind up hurt doing one of these things or invite pain upon yourself Absolutely. Yeah, I want to talk to to date.

Don: 8:14

What's your danger, ron?

Ron: 8:16

Oh very little, absolutely nothing.

Doug: 8:18

I know one. What I've seen. This man make some risky decisions at the Warhammer table. I've watched him push his troops forward. Far too many have been pushed forward across the halfway point of enemy lines in order to make some risky decisions, to secure battle points in our miniatures war game that we play.

Ron: 8:42

And you've actually bring up a really good point, which is I actually do really like risk, uh, frequently, like when I'm playing a game I will take the most risky decision, because I think that is the most fun decision if it gets pulled off, then that is the most exciting thing that can happen yeah um, but that is a situation in which I myself, as a person, is in no uh, yeah, there's no risk of me the dangers to your poor little.

Don: 9:05

Yeah, toy soldiers, not to you.

Ron: 9:07

Yes, exactly, which is me, I would make a fantastic like a member of a presidential administration or something like that, um, where other people have to do the suffering.

Ron: 9:17

But what I wanted to talk about today is um people who, um invite this, these kinds of risks, into their lives frequently. In fact, they might even be addicted to inviting of risks into their lives frequently. In fact, they might even be addicted to inviting these risks into their lives and they engage in very what I think is insane activity. And I first learned about this when I found this image on the internet, I don't know, a couple of years ago. I'm gonna show this image to you, doug. Would you please describe it to us and even read it for us.

Doug: 9:48

Do we wanna start with the image or the words? Image first I think we have a Grim Reaper who's so poorly drawn. He looks like I believe that he's beckoning you, but it looks like he's flipping you off. It looks like he's flipping you off. We've got some divers it appears that are skeletons laying at what looks like the bottom of the ocean and the words very bold, typeface, big letters stop, prevent your death, go no farther. And then we've got some bullet points here. Fact more than 300 divers, including open water scuba instructors, have died in caves, just like this one. Fact you need training to dive. You need cave training and cave equipment to cave dive, and cave training, cave equipment, cave dive all underline. Fact without cave training and cave equipment, divers can die here. Fact it can happen to you. There's nothing in this cave worth dying for. Don't go beyond this point. And then there's the messages provided by a few organizations at the bottom Very extreme.

Don: 10:58

I love it. Well, that's an uplifting message. That's fine.

Ron: 11:01

This is the kind of sign that would greet you if you were recreationally diving and I've never participated in a recreation that had to tell me you're going to die if you continue doing this, and so I think I found that very arresting, considered an extreme sport. It's probably considered one of the most dangerous sports in the world, and every year there are about 100, something between 100 and 150 deaths related to cave diving, not even just normal scuba diving. It is incredibly dangerous and I want to know why people do it. Do you have any hypotheses? What could possibly be so alluring about? Can I describe cave diving real fast?

Ron: 11:49

Sure, in case you're not familiar, cave diving means strapping a scuba tank more than one scuba tank onto you because you need frequently. You will be under the water for eight hours or more, so you need sometimes four, five tanks of gas that are strapped to you. You will be inhaling a mixture of gases called trimix. It is not just oxygen. You need nitrogen and helium in order to get the right mixture of oxygen, because if you just had straight oxygen to your body, you would receive an effect called narcosis, which is essentially like being drunk and you are unable to make intelligent decisions. So you actually need to dilute the oxygen your body receives.

Don: 12:29

You actually would get oxygen toxicity if you're breathing in pure oxygen. If you have too much nitrogen, you get narcosis.

Doug: 12:36

Yes, okay, Thank you so to be clear if you're underwater for eight hours and this is a tank you're also for eight hours, and this is a tank. You're also taking in nitrogen and helium as well.

Ron: 12:47

Eight hours straight, wow, okay yeah, and the reason why you're down in the water. You, uh, you might dive to the bottom of a of a cave that is in excess of, like I don't know, 500, 600, sometimes a thousand feet deep. Um, in some really extreme cases, and to get to the bottom of that cave it might take 10, 15 minutes. The rest of the time you are ascending, because if you ascend too quickly, the molecules of gas in your tissues will expand too quickly and give you what is called the bends, which is incredibly painful and often results in death. So you need to very slowly ascend in order to dissipate these bubbles and avoid this very cruel and painful fate.

Ron: 13:26

You're also in complete darkness. There is usually a ceiling above you. You cannot just swim up in order to get out of a bad situation. You need to swim back the way you came, which means you're usually using guidelines and fixing them into walls and hoping you don't get tangled into them. There's usually silt at the bottom of these caves where, if you disturb it even a little bit, you'll create these massive clouds that completely disorient you. You can start to panic, which means your breathing level will increase, which means again, you are moving through the gas supply you've brought a lot quicker and also creating that oxidative toxicity that Don mentioned. So you need to be incredibly calm the entire time. You have very little wiggle room to panic or make the wrong move, and if you do, you die and your body is left at the bottom of a cave for the rest of time.

Don: 14:14

So the way you're describing this, Ron, it sounds like you think it's a bad idea.

Ron: 14:20

I?

Doug: 14:21

yes, Can I speak as the most reckless member of the group.

Ron: 14:26

Yeah, I think yeah. Does it sound cool to you? Not even slightly, just you describing every part of this.

Doug: 14:32

I mean, my heart rate has been accelerating the entire time. Thinking of how many variables of death there are. I despise it. Have you ever been diving? No, no, I think. Even the thought of scuba that you're talking to somebody who's a little bit ocean averse, though in general like I think it's beautiful, but I've never felt more out of my element and not belonging than swimming in the ocean.

Ron: 14:56

I think yeah and I think that's actually like um, I would like to scuba. I think I do actually like the ocean. This is I've been snorkeling, which I'm not trying to say.

Ron: 15:06

It's like whoa crazy, this guy snorkels right, but I have snorkeled and both times I snorkeled I've seen a shark which was sick and I thought actually pretty cool, and only the second time it might have been dangerous. It might have been a tiger shark, but it was very far away. Um, so I I do kind of understand the allure of going underwater, of seeing like a world, a thing that is usually outside of our realm of experience. I think it is neat. I have always thought the ocean is very cool. Have you ever scuba donned?

Don: 15:34

I have. I am a certified advanced open water diver with nitrox training as well, so I have some knowledge about the mixture of gases. I haven't done tri-mix. That's more advanced than what I am, but regular recreational scoobers use nitrox, which is an increased mixture of oxygen to nitrogen, so that way you reduce the nitrogen absorption.

Doug: 15:58

Well, now I feel compelled that I have to go, because if this is something that fascinates you so much, I need to get over this.

Ron: 16:05

Wait, I need to know your history of this. I've never known this about you yeah yeah, when did you? When'd you get certified or whatever?

Don: 16:11

I was certified in 1997 or 8 originally.

Ron: 16:16

Yeah, so just something that I I did for fun where, where have you been like around here, yeah, so uh so, yeah, off the coast here, Um and uh, I've I've dived in Belize twice on two liveaboards.

Don: 16:31

So for you, go for a week and can dive as much as you want, like six times a day. Um, also, uh, a little bit in the Caribbean.

Ron: 16:38

So Are you doing reefs? Are you doing wrecks? What, what, what, what, what calls to you.

Don: 16:46

Uh, I like wrecks. I I haven't, uh I haven't sought out enough wrecks to uh to say I'm a wrecked diver. I've been on a couple, but um, but reefs mostly and yeah, super fun all right, this is good.

Ron: 16:53

You can keep me honest with my information then, because otherwise I might spin a lot of bull.

Don: 16:58

Um, but never the call to cave dive, huh no, but um, my last instructor, um, actually was a cave diver and a rebreather diver, which is another piece of equipment that you can strap on where it's uh, uh, it's a machine, basically, that mixes a mixture of gases, uh, immediately for your consumption, and then captures your exhale and uh, and filters it out. So there's less, it's quieter, there's less bubbles and you can stay down longer, things like that. But, but, uh, but no, the, the. The thing about cave diving that I don't like is that that overhead, the, the fact that you're, you're trapped that way and then, like you mentioned, the, the spaces that they swim into are tight, like it's, it's not, it's not. Cavern diving, like, oh, it's a big giant, you know, underwater cathedral, it's, it's. Cave diving, the way like spelunking works on land where they're squeezing through tiny spaces in order to get deep into, um, the, the, the rock formations or the caverns, and um, it's uh, yeah, no, I don't like that idea.

Ron: 17:59

So same, but some people do, some people are absolutely crazy for it Um, and I really kind of wanted to explore the psychology of these people. But I think one of the stories that really got me fascinated, uh, with this hobby, I suppose um is a story of a cave diver named uh Dave Shaw. Um in 2004, dave Shaw uh went to uh make a record dive. Dave Shaw went to make a record dive. He wanted to be, he wanted to swim to the deepest freshwater point that anyone had ever swum to using a rebreather. This would have been like I think this is like the rebreather was kind of new and a lot of people were skeptical about its abilities, but he was a big proponent of it. So he wanted to go to the deepest point that anyone had been to with a rebreather at this time. So he went to a?

Ron: 18:44

Uh a cave called Bushman's hole, which is in South Africa. Um, it is 927 feet deep. Uh is the third deepest freshwater hole in the world. Um, the first person to reach the bottom of this hole was Nuno Gomez back in 1996. Oh yeah, nuno, you don't remember Nuno?

Don: 19:02

No, you don't have a poster of Nuno, no, but but just want to clarify. When we say that the this hole is 942 feet deep, it means it's filled with water to the depth of 942 feet. Or you have to go 942 feet into the earth and there's a pool of water.

Ron: 19:17

It's 927 feet of water, okay. Yeah, and apparently like it was originally it was like 840 feet deep and then Nuno, like sonar did, it was like actually there's a way to go even deeper. So you know, thanks, nuno, um, and this is another thing that frequently seems to occur with these cave divers, which is, um, the thrill of the record, like being the first of, like pushing yourself in some other way. But I'd like to save that for later.

Don: 19:42

Also I think it might be helpful to know the standard limits of recreational diving are like 100 feet. To go deeper than 100 feet it's a little bit more of a risk. The amount of time you can stay down there is really short on a single tank just because the 30 feet of water is the equivalent of an additional atmosphere's worth of pressure. At 100 feet you're in almost additional atmosphere's worth of pressure. So at at 100 feet you're in almost four atmospheres of pressure. So every breath you take has four times as much air as it would at the surface. So you're breathing air four times faster. So if you're going down 900 feet like that's, it's crushing depth. So there's a every breath you're taking is is got huge volumes of air in it.

Ron: 20:22

Incredibly extreme. Right 2004, Dave Shaw is swimming to the bottom of Bushman's Hole in order to make this new rebreather record. He successfully does so. He touches the bottom. He can only be down there for a couple of minutes because every minute at the bottom of this hole adds approximately one hour of ascension time, so not a lot of time to hang out and enjoy the scenery. Um, he is down there. Um, he is about to begin ascending. When he turns to his left and he sees a floating body in the cave. Um, he immediately recognizes this body as the body of Dion Dreyer. Dion Dreyer was a cave diver who died in 1994 trying to dive this exact same cave. He was 20 when he died.

Doug: 21:10

And this means that he was aware that this was the last person who tried to get to dive into here and he recognizes him as he's diving. Is that what you mean?

Ron: 21:19

He just knows that Dion is a person who has dived this cave and he recognizes him as he's diving. So you mean, uh, he just knows that dion is a person who has dived this cave and he died. So if he sees a body, he immediately knows oh, this has to be dion. Um, it's been 10 years since, uh, dion has been down there, and so he described the body as a wetsuit with a skeletonized face that still had goggles on and the hands had been skeletonized, but the rest of the body seemed to be more or less intact inside a preserved in the wetsuit and he was just sort of floating there with his feet, kind of submerged in the silt at the bottom of this cave.

Doug: 21:51

So looking like the picture that you showed me. Then the grim reaper was there too a little bit yes, um.

Ron: 21:57

So as uh dave shaw starts ascending, he uses a slate to send a message to the other divers, because usually you are not diving alone, you have a team. They will be posted at different um depths above you, uh just to kind of make sure everything's fine and to pass messages along in case there were trouble or anything like that. And he passes a message to the first diver on his team, says like dion's down here, um, and he comes up, the first thing he says is we need to get him out of there. So it becomes Dave Shaw's kind of personal mission to return to Bushman's Hole and retrieve the body of Dion Dreyer so that he can essentially return it to Dion's family and his family in measure of peace, of restitution. That part confuses me too. I, if I am dion's parents, right, I don't know if I need that, yeah, but maybe I'm weird. I'm not a parent. I'm not a parent. Uh, I don't know if I need to see the skeletonized face of my 10 year old, 10 year dead son. Am I wrong on that?

Don: 23:09

Well, I don't, I don't know, but there have been a lot of stories of people who have missing loved ones that are looking just for the closure of knowing that they've been recovered, loved ones that are looking just for the closure of knowing that they've been recovered. Um, there's um.

Don: 23:22

uh was just watching a TV show the other day actually that spoke about uh, a mine disaster, where the resolution to the fire in the mine was just to brick everybody in on the assumption that everybody had already died. And uh, and the families of the men who were bricked into the mine suffered for 50 years until they passed away themselves, knowing that their loved ones were buried there, but they didn't ever reclaim the bodies, get the bodies you know out so they could have a. So I don't know if it's so much that they needed to. I wonder if it's so much that they needed to see, versus just know that that he's been recovered and that you know, he's somehow buried in a place that they know but yeah, and I'm sure I'm not trying to

Ron: 24:05

you know, uh, be a jerk to these people who are clearly have suffered a lot of trauma and in grief that I hope I never can understand. A fraction of you know what you're reckless with insensitivity and I won't forgive you all. Right add that to ron's reckless chart.

Doug: 24:22

I'll take it you just went up a notch yeah so and he's he.

Don: 24:26

He found this body at the bottom of this 927 foot hole yes, so I think that is another kind of um.

Ron: 24:34

My understanding this is not the depth that deon had dived to. Deon was an amateur cave diver at the time that he died. Um and uh. I believe the explanation is that his tanks dragged him to the bottom Cause normally, right, there would be some buoyancy in the body, right? Is that what you're calling attention to?

Don: 24:54

Well, a lot of things. So his the fact that he's wearing a wetsuit. The wetsuit is buoyant by itself, um, and so the only way that the wetsuit would sink is that the wetsuit is weighted down, which, of course, divers do wear lead weights to to counteract that buoyancy of that Um. But as a body decomposes underwater, it does fill with gases, and so most, most drowning deaths, uh. The body's surface within about three days or so after the gases start to fill up, however, depends upon how deep he was when he drowned so.

Don: 25:26

so that's kind of where I'm asking my question, because if he wasn't diving super deep he should have popped back up to the surface, so he had to have drowned, or he or at least made the dive to more than about 100 feet or so, because below there the compression is working against the buoyancy of the wetsuit and the buoyancy of his tanks would have been buoyant too, possibly. Most tanks are aluminum and an empty aluminum scuba tank is buoyant. It will float. An empty steel tank if it were steel, would sink. So it depends a little bit upon what his equipment was like.

Don: 26:00

But as the body starts to decompose, it should fill with gases and pop back up. But also 10 years is a long time to be under. So so he did find him 900 feet deep, that's, you know, it's 30 atmospheres worth of of pressure, which causes your bones to start to dissolve. So like, think about, like the Titanic is, you know, an even greater depth, obviously 12,000 feet, but like they've never recovered any skeletons because, like everybody just literally dissolves into the ocean. So I'm wondering, like, how did this body last that long in that?

Ron: 26:29

depth. So I do know I didn't write this down, but I do know that when he was diving, I believe he was at a depth of around 300 feet, so he was below, yeah, so he was he was going deep, he wasn't trying to reach the bottom, he was with a partner and um, I don't remember precisely what the nature of his accident was, um, and I can't answer the rest of your questions, but this is, I swear.

Don: 26:51

I swear he was at the bottom. It's just unusual, I know, but it's just an unusual find.

Ron: 26:55

Does fresh water change anything.

Don: 26:57

It does, yeah, yeah.

Ron: 26:58

Because there's no salinity right.

Don: 27:01

And there's the buoyancy. The buoyancy changes like it, so you're less buoyant in fresh water than you are in salt water.

Ron: 27:05

Yeah, so back to Dave Shaw. He begins setting out and planning and gathering a team to and he contacts the Dreyer's family and tells them I found your son and I would like to return him.

Ron: 27:21

And they say, yes, please, they are all on board with this. Um, so he begins planning, uh, what would be the deepest body recovery ever, right? And um, there's a south african documentary filmmaker who joins, uh, uh, dave, for this. Um, he's got like old, an old buddy named dave shirley who's going to kind of be his number two during this recovery, and I found a quote that I thought was very interesting. A lot of this information, I should also state, I'm getting from an article called Raising the Dead, which was posted in Outsider, an online kind of web magazine. We'll link the article in the show notes, I'm sure, in case you want to read this, uh, in a good form, um and uh.

Ron: 28:08

So one thing Dave Shaw talked to. He was talking to a guy named Peter Herbst, a 40 year old, a 42 year old dive instructor, um, and the owner of, like a shop that uh, was going to be a part of this recovery. And Peter is on record saying to Dave I think what you're doing for the dryers is great. And Shaw apparently looked at him, winked and said face it, we're doing this for the adventure of it. And I think this is kind of one of those things that I'm very interested in is like who are adventurers? What is adventure? And are they jackasses? Because I don't understand what we mean by the word adventure anymore, and but I just seems to me like the age of adventure is over and there's like a. The impulse to adventure seems to me somewhat fraught with.

Doug: 29:03

I don't know, with the exception of the final frontier. Oh, yeah, yeah Death, there's a step in between, which is space, but that's all right.

Don: 29:12

What do you mean? The age of adventure is over.

Ron: 29:15

I think, when you think of age of adventure, right, cartography, yeah, if I go in the library and I type into the database Age of Adventure, I'm going to get European discovery of continents that aren't Europe. Right, I'm going to get like I'm going to get the race to the South Pole. I'm going to get Marco Polo. I'm going to get everyone who came over to North America and eventually colonized and settled it Right and eventually colonized and settled it right. And so I think, like, in a world where we now have GPS of everything except for the moon and Mars and extraterrestrial avenues of adventure, right, there's not a lot to discover. Right, like a lot of people got really famous by being reckless and risky and taking on dangerous journeys to go to the South pole for the first time, even though that really didn't mean a lot back then. Right, like there wasn't a lot of like study going on.

Ron: 30:08

I also really love polar exploration stuff and, yeah, there'll be like, oh, we, you know we mapped the route to the pole. But you look at these guys, these Amundsons and these Scots and these, uh, uh, who's the other one who didn't die? Um, anyways, seward, I don't know. Um, and they're all just like giant egomaniacs, right. It's about the race, it's about getting there first. It's about the record again, right.

Ron: 30:31

Like I want to be the the the man in the history book who reached the South pole Right. And then I think they find ways that make it sound logical and appealing and not insane by saying like, oh, it's for science, or yeah, I think that there's the classical definition which is going to be like going to foreign place, somewhere that you're not necessarily comfortable with, like that kind of outlines it.

Doug: 31:13

But then there's also life experience in general. That kind of becomes adventure. So it kind of depends on how you define it becomes adventure, so it kind of depends on how you define it. But yeah, there were several years as a touring musician that I felt I was very much adventuring the things that I hold dear about that and all well trod territory, but yes, very much so.

Don: 31:34

Does our imagining of adventure? Is it connected to your opening question, Ron, of recklessness or danger? Yes, 100%. So in order to have adventure, you have to be reckless or you have to have danger, or both.

Ron: 31:48

There needs to be a degree of danger, I think, and you need to be taking what seems like a risk, I think, in adventure. I think, yes, a vacation to a new place is a bit of an adventure, right, and I understand what is cool about that, like the new experience putting ourselves in somewhere, like expanding our experience and our understanding of what the world is like. Oh, those are great. Those are great cool things about adventure. And sometimes there's a little bit of danger, right. There's like I don't speak the language, I might get robbed.

Doug: 32:17

I might get a bad rate on this hotel. I don't speak Portuguese. Instantly going to be robbed. I don't speak.

Ron: 32:26

Portuguese Right, I mean, at least, even if these, this sense of danger is usually misplaced. I feel like we frequently feel that right. There's awful often a travel anxiety, I'm outside of my comfort zone, kind of thing right. Leaving the comfort zone is, I think, risk-taking to an extent. Do we agree with that?

Doug: 32:47

That's something that now I'm feeling like I'm a cave diver in this element. I almost feel addicted to that. I love the feeling of going to go somewhere completely new. Yeah, like uh, I almost experienced no anxiety over it other than the excitement of, like, what is the adventure going to be? So, yeah, maybe this is a philosophical question.

Don: 33:08

Well, and I wonder if it's for me to answer the question would depend a little bit upon where I would be exercising that adventure, cause some of it is simulated adventure and some of it is simulated adventure and some of it is actual. You know, like um, riding a rollercoaster, like there's a an element of fear and and excitement, but it's safe, right, like you don't get on the rollercoaster Like well, I hope I make it off this time, um, but but it's simulated. And same thing I would say with travel. Like there's travel locations where, yeah, it's an adventure, because I've never been there before, I don't know what the customs are, I don't know what the locality is, but it's a westernized, you know first world, relatively stable political environment. Like I know that I am safe, even though I'm going to have a steep learning curve to to adapt, versus there are places where your I have traveled that are not stable in that way and and the danger is much more real than simulated and um, and so I think that would alter the way I I approached that a little bit, but I think it's there's still.

Don: 34:14

There's still plenty of adventure to be had, but I think I understand what you mean about the age of adventure, like we know where most things are on the planet not all things, but we know where most things are. Um and uh, we're not looking for stuff, but but that's. I mean, I was about to ask before you brought it up. But but so he, he dives to the bottom of this hole, he sees a body and then he leaves it there again, yeah, and and now he's going to say, okay, we're going to go rescue that thing that I just left down there again. Why didn't he just bring it up when he, when he was there? Why? Why leave it in the first place?

Ron: 34:48

Well, let's talk about the plan. So the plan involves bagging it up. So I think the main concern is if you just bring up a, you know you see a body and you bring it up, it's going to start to fall apart, right?

Ron: 35:01

So, you need to put it in a body bag and you also need to tie it to a cable, which is apparently not the cables that he was going down there as his guidelines. So and and also, if you talk to I've not spoke, this is I have not spoken to cave divers. I have read people who have spoken to cave divers.

Doug: 35:20

And what?

Ron: 35:20

all the cave divers always say is, like you were talking about earlier with jiu-jitsu and outdoor nearing, is you always have a plan right? You are mitigating the risks by planning and sticking to a plan. And it's the same with cave diving. They always have a very tight schedule. They know how to monitor their levels and when they should be, moving at what depth, et cetera. And how to monitor their levels and when they should be, you know moving at what depth and et cetera. And so you don't ever want to deviate from that plan, and I think pulling up a body you found would be a pretty big deviation. He's correct not to do that right.

Ron: 35:50

So he's got to go in and now create a new plan that does involve that.

Don: 35:54

But the wink wink that you're referring to seems to imply that his plan is less about providing closure for this family and more about having a second opportunity to make it to the bottom of this hole.

Ron: 36:06

Yes, that is my editorial insight. The fact that he is also bringing a documentary team, I think, is sort of speaks as evidence to that fact as well. Evidence to that fact as well, I think a lot of these cave divers like. The reason I liken them to the age of exploration is they are chasing that same thing that I think Shackleton and Scott and Amundsen are trying to chase, which is like that fame, that infamy, that look what I have done, which others cannot do or would not dare to do Right, and that, to me, is not a thing I've ever felt. I'm not a person who seeks that and I know there are smaller ways perhaps in our lives where we can be that. I don't know, were you guys ever like chasing the high score on a Pac-Man machine or something? Oh yeah, big time. So maybe I'm not showboating.

Don: 36:57

I'm not old enough to know what a Pac-Man machine is. That's right, you are our age.

Don: 37:06

But I would even argue with that. This seems a little bit more swarmy to me, because going back down to the bottom of the hole he's not going for any greater purpose. You were alluding, I think, to the fact that the explorers chasing the South pole um, we're doing it more for their own benefit than the benefit of mankind. But I would argue that even if that's true, there was a benefit that mankind got from it, in in cartography and in even in in the skill of surviving in that type of an extreme environment, where, in this case, it doesn't seem to me like there's any benefit to the greater society for the second dive, other than the recovery of this person for their family, which, not that that's not important, but it seems like a smaller magnanimous move, I agree.

Ron: 37:57

magnanimous move, I agree, and I think it's part of how. I think what really fascinates me is like, what is the psychology of a person who one cave dives or just engages in any of these kind of dangerous, what we might call like exploratory behaviors, right, and, yes, oftentimes there is a benefit to mankind. Or, you know, someone's got to be first right, and whoever's got to be first has got to be pretty brave, right. Be first right, and whoever's got to be first has got to be pretty brave, right. But I do think there is a phenomenon where they frequently have to validate their decision to do this thing which to us does seem pointless, essentially right or unnecessarily reckless right. And they say, oh well, here's my validation, I'm going to go do this good thing which is return Dion Dreyer to his family, which, yeah, good thing. Yes, won't argue, I won't say that's not a good thing. I wonder if it's worth the risk. Is the spit I'm spitting no-transcript.

Don: 39:22

And in the examples that we were tossing around first, our rewards were, you know well, robbing a bank, right that you were rewarded with money, or um. But in the case of like these types of adventures, the the reward is just an adrenaline rush, isn't it? I mean, because it's not that he's doing something that hasn't been done before. He was, he was at the bottom of this hole already. It's not a, it's not a new record to check the box for Um. So I wonder you know cause you bring up the idea of psychology? Can you be addicted to adrenaline?

Ron: 39:47

So I did start looking this up right, like, why do people engage in, you know, these kinds of risky behaviors? And, um, I figured it would be useful to actually hear from, like an actual divers point of view. So I did find this one interview from a, um, a cave diver named Maria Bollerup, um, and she is writing this article, uh, in scuba diver magazine, which, uh, you probably have a couple of those done. Um, but uh, she says, after some time you don't know where your body ends or the water begins.

Ron: 40:12

The state of mind is a passageway to a deep meditative state. There are extensive studies on what happens in the mind during floating and I recommend you look it up if you have a trauma, stress, anxiety, ptsd or other mental challenges. Trust me on this. But floating also presents a perfect environment for developing focus and calm through visualization techniques. Every time I closed in on myself in the tank, I visualized two predetermined critical skills or scenarios Mentally seeing, feeling and dealing with each situation. Skills or scenarios mentally seeing, feeling and dealing with each situation. Breathing calmly throughout each step, working patiently to still and focus. The bouncing mind.

Ron: 40:47

And I think this answers for me, like she's describing this, this feeling of floating, as being a sort of meditative act, and she says it's like a curative for anxiety and stress. And I did manage to find a dissertation by someone who was studying this kind of thing which is like yeah, why do people?

Ron: 41:04

do this. This is dumb, and there is a higher propensity of divers who do have issues with anxiety. It is not just an adrenaline thing they're like. Frequently they have some sort of problem with anxiety. This is a quote I found. The practice of high-risk sport may be a means of anxiety regulation, allowing some people to experience an emotional benefit that they do not experience elsewhere, and there was a study conducted on skydivers which saying skydivers who had issues with anxiety. They experienced none of it while they were skydiving and frequently it would alleviate the symptoms of anxiety for up to an hour or two after the skydive. However, it was not a curative to it.

Don: 41:49

Uh, in the long term, so and I'm pretty sure, if, if I'm in the airplane and and you open the door, like that's the moment of anxiety for me, I don't think that's going to erase that for me.

Ron: 41:59

The, um, the, the person that you're quoting, uh, the lady you're quoting originally, um, the quote said that that she's floating in the tank yeah, she was talking about practicing um in this, particularly since she's like how do I practice for a cave dive, and she said she goes into a tank um which uh, creates like a, a neutral buoyancy tank type thing, where so like a float therapy tank. Yeah, okay, yeah, um, um.

Don: 42:25

But she said that is the, the way to imitate, or like the closest way to get it, um, when she's not actually on the dive, but she's not talking about floating while you're diving, because, because what she's describing there like that sounds like narcosis, like that sounds like um, that disassociation from your body is not a is not a thing you want to happen when you're 300 feet underneath the surface of the water.

Ron: 42:46

But I think it partly helped me understand, like another part, why I'm afraid of all this and I don't understand why anyone would do it is that it's not so much the descent but the the ascent, where you are spending hours at a time eight hours, in a dark cave with a dinky flashlight, trying to breathe correctly, so you don't die like I don't. I don't know if I could be alone with myself for an hour, let alone in in the womb of the earth, you know like. So what do you do? What happens in the brain there? Right, and and according to a lot of what I read, it's nothing like in their head. They just focus on the task. I'm breathing, yeah.

Ron: 43:26

Like so I don't again.

Doug: 43:28

I don't understand the appeal Maybe that is partially where the meditation comes from is because if you are focused on breathing, like every single meditation technique it seems that I'm not going to don't quote me on that, but it seems like all of the meditation techniques I've ever studied are always focused on breath. So I wonder if that's a part of it as well as because you are focused on breathing that it would be there, and I also imagine there would be almost like a superhuman quality to it, where it's like I am existing in, where this would only be natural for fish and me as a land mammal, I'm able to conquer this in a sense, Because I think that that maybe is a big part of it is the idea of how you're able to conquer something potentially.

Ron: 44:11

There's a quote that I kept seeing coming up, which is a lot of cave divers will be. Like you know, more people have been on the moon than have dove to the depths that we frequently do. Right, there's a kind of like special club of like yeah essentially a dozen people who have given a dove in dove dived, dived to depths in excess of like 500 feet, right. So it is a kind of a badge of honor, right.

Doug: 44:37

Doven kind of sounds beautiful Doven, I think that's like.

Ron: 44:39

Edwardian English kind of sounds beautiful, dovin, I think that's like edwardian english. It sounds beautiful to me. Um. So, uh, the team is ready. Uh, in january, uh, 8th 2005, that's when they convene at bushman's hole to recover dion. Um shaw is going to be the one who goes in, uh, dion's family, uh, his, his parents even arrive to to witness the, uh, you know, the recovery efforts. Um shaw goes in first, he reaches the bottom in about 11 minutes. He's got a body bag with him this time, uh, and he gets to work trying to recover dion's body.

Ron: 45:16

The second person in the water is Don Shirley, dave's close friend and another experienced diver. He's kind of just, you know, I think, sitting at a depth of I don't know, 800 feet maybe or so, just to kind of watch and make sure that everything's ready. Don recalls that as soon as he got in the water and started diving down and eventually could see Dave's light at the bottom of the cave, he realized something was wrong because the light was not moving. So it turns out that he had a quick moment to decide whether or not he should return to the surface and say something is up or try and go deeper to see if he could possibly help. At this time, I believe Dave had already been on the surface or the bottom of the cave for about four minutes or so.

Ron: 46:06

He decides to go down and help his friend. When he does, he shatters his. What would you call this, don? He's got like a wristwatch that tells him his it's a dive computer, dive computer. Yeah, the pressure breaks his dive computer and so he has to manually start to regulate his breathing and his gas mixture, um. But he does manage to make it to the bottom, um, and he sees that, uh, dave has also, uh, drowned. Um, he is not sure why, but Dave is sort of floating there at the top of the cave. So he begins ascending. He meets the next diver up. Eventually, he passes him a slate that says Dave is not coming up.

Ron: 46:51

And now essentially becomes a rescue effort for Don Shirley, because he's not doing great either. They do eventually successfully return Don to the surface. Um, he does suffer uh, like he does have. He does uh have the symptoms of the bends at some point and he spends months kind of rehabilitating himself, going into therapy tanks in order to uh depressurize the bubbles of the gases in his tissues. But he does eventually recover Um, but he does have a kind of lifelong equilibrium problems and things like that. Um. So um does eventually recover Um, but he does have a kind of lifelong equilibrium problems and things like that.

Doug: 47:22

Um so, um, does that clarify and you might be getting to this why, um, uh, dave, dave was our central, why he died?

Ron: 47:33

Why did he drown? So Dave did have a camera attached to his uh diving helmet. Uh, when he uh went down, he went down and three days later Dave's body and Dion's body do return to the surface yeah, the thing is both of them.

Ron: 47:54

Dave had managed to tie Dion to a cable and as they started pulling it up, it had dislodged them and they were both tied together. And once, of course, both bodies arrived, they have a camera and of course the first thing they do is turn it on to see what happened. Essentially, what happened is Dave got to the bottom of the cave and he. They had multiple scenarios on how the body retrieval would work, but apparently in all of them they assumed Dion's body would be lodged to the silt at the bottom of the cave. This turned out actually not to be true. As soon as he began trying to bag him, he immediately became dislodged and started floating up, and so none of the scenarios were like well, how do I actually bag a floating body? That's going to result in much more exertion on my part. So instead of returning up and canceling the dive, as his friends say he should have, dave tries to do it anyways and he is trying to manipulate a floating body. The tissue is essentially do you know the name of the? Actual, but like the tissue is dissolved to a consistency of soap, so it's like a more Saponification. Thank you very much.

Ron: 49:05

And uh, according to the camera, like as you're watching this in the film, apparently, um, the cable from his light starts to get intertwined around the body bag and himself. This becomes a giant issue again, because you cannot control your light source. He is struggling to do both manipulate a body and control his light. He's becoming tangled in it. He's digging up silt the whole time. It just kind of escalates from there. His breathing starts becoming irregular. He is not maintaining the breath schedule that he's supposed to and, uh, eventually he um, essentially passes out from carbon dioxide and then drowns. Is the official diagnosis, prognosis, which is which cause of death? God thanks? Um, I really don't like that, yeah, it's terrible.

Ron: 49:53

um, obviously, this like shatters um dryer's parents. Um, dave has a wife. He has two adult children that he leaves behind. There's a, you know, the article describes how their minister tries to deliver the news to his wife in Australia and she's like, they're like, trying to be hopeful. She's like, oh, you know he's been down for five hours but you know there's still chance. And she's just like, no, there isn't. I know what we've signed up for, um kind of thing. And so, uh, yeah, but uh, the kind of silver lining that everyone draws from this is that he did technically succeed in the mission.

Ron: 50:30

The body of Dion Dreyer was returned, um, and it was eventually, uh, you know, given to the family and they had it interred and they found their peace. They did describe that being a, you know a, being a thing that was of value to them and that helped ease their suffering. So again, I don't want to make light of the tragedy of the situation, but I still find this just a very odd thing for a person to do and for a person to attempt. And again, it draws me to the psychology right, where it's like especially when you have a family and you're going to engage in reckless behavior for the sake of exploration, for the sake of infamy, for the sake of the record. It's just not something I understand. I don't understand it. That's all I got to say. I don't understand it. It's just not something I understand. I don't understand it. That's all I got to say I don't understand it.

Don: 51:26

You mentioned it a little while ago that there's a swagger among the cave divers of how few they are, and they make this comparison to the men who've walked on the moon.

Don: 51:44

But that's actually where my mind goes with this is because that, like, I will dive in the ocean. I've got no problem with that Um, but the idea of like launching me at hundreds of thousands of miles an hour towards a tiny rock that's circling the planet, and if we miss, like I, there's no stopping, like you just keep going forever, um, that freaks me out. And but it's that. I think it's that same psychology. But again, like, I'm super thankful that those men that that were involved in and the women that were involved in the um, the, the space program, did those things. I'm glad that somebody signed up for that, because I can make popcorn in the microwave because of it.

Don: 52:17

right, like it's a lot a lot of benefits to society as a whole came out of that, because they had that psychology. So so, yeah, it's not something that that I possess, but I'm thankful that other people do. In the case of the, this diver though I'm, I'm I'm struggling with it more because it doesn't seem to be, as you know, for all mankind type of a, of a choice.

Ron: 52:45

Yeah, I do feel like there are certain challenges or discoveries that, like they, they pass a threshold of not actually being purposeful, right like like we're going into the least inhabitable places of the earth for our species and I, and I suppose they would say like, exactly right, like how, how freaking cool is that?

Doug: 53:05

like right.

Ron: 53:06

I I've pushed the limits of the human body right and achieve something that was thought impossible, and I guess I'm just not impressed by that. Like I feel like there are spaces we're just not allowed in and that's perfectly fine, you know. Like I don't need to know how deep bushman's hole is or if a person was down there. It doesn't fill me with wonder. Maybe I'm a cynic, though I don't. Maybe there's a boy in south africa who's like man, that's sick. That guy went down there. I don't know. Is that what? Are we doing it for the kids?

Don: 53:34

there's definitely kids don't do this, by the way.

Ron: 53:37

Psa for listeners yeah, don't cave, dive, you will die. Um, I, I found so, like, I found some. I like okay, the big thing for me is like, as I'm reading this story, I'm thinking about myself, which is something I do all the time, and I'm thinking like I couldn't do that. Did you feel like you used to be more adventurous or reckless, say like I don't know your teens, your 20s, like were there certain adventures or risks? You found like I don't know your teens, your twenties, like, where there's certain adventures or risks. You found like easier to take, and this is a tired narrative. But as you grow older, you're like, oh, screw it. Like what's the point?

Doug: 54:12

I have.

Ron: 54:12

I have crossed that point now where I feel like I will not do certain things Cause it's like I'm married, I'm happy, I have a stable job for the first time ever. Like I'm like, I'm good. I don't even want to like go in the desert because I'm like what if I lose my water?

Doug: 54:27

It's not worth it. What I find weird is, I think through getting married, stable job, those types of things, I feel like it's increased my interest in some of these things because there is the element of, okay, we know this is going to be like kind of day in, day out, so I get more interested in some of it. Now that, granted, when you say cave diving uh, cave diving not at all, I had no interest in that whatsoever, but there are other ones that I go. I probably wouldn't have done that in my twenties because I would have been busy with this, but yeah, I'd try that now. I don't know.

Don: 55:04

And I feel so as the, the wizened, uh uh Pac-Man remembering elder Exactly, thank you. Um, I played a lot of Pac-Man. For the record, what I'm this is Pac-Man. I think I would have to think a lot harder about about, a lot harder about, about what you're asking, but I, my, my initial response is the no, I don't feel less inclined to want to take a risk, but my body feels less inclined to be able to survive it or enjoy it. Yeah, like I get tired more quickly. I I takes longer to recover from things that I I do. Like it's. That's the. That's what sucks about getting older. Is that the I don't think the desire changes, but the the ability certainly starts to flag.

Doug: 55:49

So I think that might be my driving energy in some of those pursuits. As interesting as that is, is being afraid of if I don't keep doing this, what if I can't? Yeah, Maybe that's it. I hadn't thought about that, but that's a great point. What's?

Don: 56:07

the what's the riskiest thing you're willing to do now that you have never done. So like if, if we were going to pool our, our collective funds and we were all going to fund a risky adventure for each of us, what would be your risky adventure that you'd not done before?

Doug: 56:22

done oh wow, this is going to be very, very difficult to come up with on the spot I can open the bank account today.

Ron: 56:30

We can start saving money for this, yeah wow, what would it be?

Doug: 56:34

um, I'm gonna need a moment to think, because adventure I'm instantly just thinking somewhere else, right off the bat. So money and time are no object, no object. I, I would be fascinated to just stop the clock for a moment, immediately go to Japan and then just like, see what happens Join the Yakuza. I don't think they'd have me, but just like, see what happens Join the Yakuza, yeah, I don't think they'd have me. But, um, yeah, knowing, knowing that I probably would be watching sumo a lot, I can see myself rubbing shoulders with a few of them. Um, but, yeah, like, uh, the thought of going to Japan, just starting and seeing how long I could be there, and then like where that would lead, like, would that lead to a job? Would I end up doing it? Like, how much language would I acquire? That would be fascinating to me, but I think it would terrify my wife, so I don't think it'd be a very long lived.

Don: 57:36

So your your risky behavior is just existing in Japan.

Doug: 57:41

Seeing, not making too, it doesn't sound that risky. One is going without, without a prep, yeah, and just seeing. Let's see where this goes like. Am I gonna end up in the countryside, do I?

Ron: 57:55

what you want is like complete carte blanche right, you're just like. What if I started zero in a place again? How far can I get?

Doug: 58:00

to me that's a giant adventure. I think that that's the most exciting kind of adventure. I I embrace the chaos of let's just see what happens. I love that when I was touring, there was a night that we only had one night in Paris. When we were there and I knew that we were going to need to leave the next day, so I ended up just staying up all night and I just started walking.

Doug: 58:23

I dropped a pin on my phone I didn't have GPS on it at the time because I didn't even have enough money to have international uh service on my phone, so I could just drop a pin and then walk back to it, essentially, and I just stayed out all night. I ended up running into my keyboard player like three hours later he had done the exact same thing and then we went to a whole bunch of different places and I just explored, kind of aimlessly and still, one of the most memorable evenings of my entire life, just meeting different people. And yeah, it sounds instantly like it's debaucherous and it wasn't at all. It was really just nice being able to go to different restaurants and bars and meeting people, but I really enjoyed it.

Ron: 59:04

And I think what you're saying actually taps a little bit into one of my theories of why this is actually an attractive sport for certain people. So I was thinking like, okay, what kind of people cave dive right?

Don: 59:12

And I was able to find some statistics and if you had to guess, are there any commonalities in most cave divers, like nationality income, social class, I would say the income has to be in the upper levels just because the equipment is so expensive, plus the privilege of being able to take that risk and know that your family is not a threat because you're not coming home. That has to be wealthier.

Ron: 59:41

Yeah, starting out, equipment is like 30 grand. You got to drop that up front right.

Ron: 59:45

So it's like most of them, uh like 40 of them, make more than 100k a year, like it didn't get more specific than that, which I thought was a little misleading. So, um, almost like 98 of them are white. Uh, they all live in either, uh, north america, uh, like mexico, australia, um, and south africa, mostly because these are the places where the holes are at. They're North America, like Mexico, australia and South Africa, mostly because these are the places where the holes are at. I found some interesting quotes. This is from a dissertation by William Oygarden.

Ron: 1:00:14

Many cave divers have similar lifestyles. They choose to live near the cave diving sites, either in Florida, georgia, missouri, australia. The Bahamas are in the northern part of the Yucatan Peninsula. Once hooked, many cave divers will move their entire families to one of these locations. The areas where the caves are located are either remote or rural. Jobs are typically not high paying in these areas, unless the family's lifestyle is limited by the local economy.

Ron: 1:00:35

Since the risk of cave diving is so great and the sensation or experience is so thrilling, the day-to-day interactions of the cave diver begins to change. Many cave divers become more direct and almost overbearing to others who do not see things their way. Unfortunately, this behavior even affects members of the cave diver's own family. Historically, cave divers have had multiple marriages or relationships or choose to stay single after multiple attempts at failed relationships, and I think there's a that part I can kind of understand where it's like. Cave diving is an escape from like what we might call like the banality or like repetition of of life that reaches a certain tempo, right like when you have the job, when you are married, right like I understand. I was talking to a friend the other day and you know he was telling me like yep, I've got my schedule you know, like I hadn't talked to him a long time.

Ron: 1:01:25

He's like I get. He recently had a kid and he was essentially. I could hear the sorrow in his voice.

Ron: 1:01:30

He was like my my day is very planned, it does not deviate. One day blends into the other Right and um, I understand, like the cave dive, is that reclaiming you know something new, something novel, something exciting, something to live for, If you don't find that lifestyle enough joy in it or peace or whatever, I think I just am a guy who is made for that lifestyle, though Like I'm like what are you talking about? Like that's fine. I'm happy to like make dinner every night.

Doug: 1:02:02

Can I counter and ask a question? I'm curious where this leads, Because I know that you enjoy video games when you're playing something. We'll take Skyrim as an example. Do you have many hours logged in Skyrim?

Ron: 1:02:16

No, but I have a lot of hours in other games.

Doug: 1:02:19

I don't get addicted to stuff a lot.

Ron: 1:02:20

Is that where you're leading?

Doug: 1:02:22

No, I'm looking for, like an open world RPG, a game that simulates the sense of adventure or discovery or something like that. Yes, yeah, that for me is.

Ron: 1:02:31

Euro truck simulator too, I discover a digital version of Europe. Is it open world? Yeah, I mean you're on roads, but you can go. I could go from vienna to budapest in one of seven ways, like there you go.

Doug: 1:02:48

Fair enough, I just was interested, so like with uh, I know you're at least familiar with skyrim. In that context, um, do you find yourself as a guy who's like you're looking for the main quest, but you'll take a side quest as it goes along?

Ron: 1:03:04

Oh, yeah, yeah, a hundred percent, yeah, yeah, I'll always take the side quest over the main quest.

Doug: 1:03:08

So I I think just based on that alone. I think it's just risk perception that gives you that feeling, because you strike me as the type of person that would rather take the side route and see what would happen. I've never finished any like. Anytime that I get an open world game, I never finish it because I'm always taking the side pass. I've like, oh, I just spent the past 30 hours hunting in the game instead of doing what I was supposed to be doing. So I I wonder if it's the perception of what could potentially happen versus the oh, I agree a hundred percent.

Ron: 1:03:39

Yeah, I like. I evaluate the risks. I'm like, if there's any, I'm not. I evaluate the risks. I'm like if there's any, I don't care, I'm not going to, I don't want to, I'm a very risk averse guy. I think Well, as we in fields right. Sure that result in pain or losses Dignity. I don't know, maybe not even that I'll risk dignity. I got that in spades.

Don: 1:04:03

I'm wondering about the uh like. I feel like you buried the lead here a little bit Cause finding out at the at the very end that these guys have multiple relationships like. I'm wondering cause there's the like. A relationship involves obviously more than one person, so is that because of their own psychology that they are are averse from, from a commitment, or is it that the, the, the people that they are are committing their relationships to, can't stand the uncertainty of the risky behavior?

Don: 1:04:33

that their partner is engaging in. So yeah, I would. I would be curious which you know. What's the source of the multiple relationships there?

Ron: 1:04:40

So, um, yeah, the the this dissertation I wound up reading was mostly focused actually on the relationships cave divers have with their family, and so it surveyed a bunch of cave divers was the kind of methodology it utilized, and all of them were married or in long-term relationships and it was basically talking about, like, how frequently they do have unsatisfactory relationships. I also found like this interesting anecdote which says applying this to cave divers, as relational distress increases the stronger need for relief or escape and the stronger need for increased participation in high risk activity. As a fellow cave diver reflected quote I think that cave diving enabled me to deal with the stress of the relationship for a while until, ultimately, I needed to escape the duress Right, and so it would. I think it goes a little bit both ways here.

Ron: 1:05:28

I think to your question, don, which is like these are both people who are probably not super cut out for what we would consider a traditional Western, uh, married lifestyle, right, um, and. And frequently, yes, it creates duress for the family, because every weekend these guys are going out to a cave where they could shake hands with the Grim Reaper. And you know that's not probably a hobby Like I couldn't personally do that to people who love me, like I need my hobbies to be less, put them through, less of a ringer. But I also find it fascinating that, according to this guy, he would rather die in a submerged cave than just talk to his wife about what's wrong with their relationship Right like as the duress of this relationship becomes compounding.

Ron: 1:06:10

I'd rather just go into the anus of the earth and see what I'm like, which made me I had to go down this route. Also, is this a men thing? There are female cave divers, obviously, but, like, most of them are men. Like, what is it about the male psyche? That also is like I'm going to go do the dangerous thing and be the first number one baby.

Don: 1:06:39

Like well, the, the way you described the uh that, uh, the divers um understanding of how a relationship works, like it just sounds very. I was going to say sophomoric, but that might sound a little bit more pejorative than I want to, but like it's the teenager, like this relationship is suffocating me because we've been together for three weeks right.

Don: 1:07:00

There's that need to escape from anything. And right, yeah, yeah, um, that there's that need to escape from anything and and it's a funny, it's a funny term to escape, because thinking of cave diving to me is not about escape, that's about yeah, moving into an even tighter location where there is no escape, right?

Ron: 1:07:15

um, in order to escape from your escape it's the same with the skydiving right that was being measured like. Like they felt less anxiety when they are technically in a place where they have fewer decisions and fewer freedom to much more probability of death yes, exactly right, um, so um, there was another kind of thing here.

Ron: 1:07:32

A lot of these kinds of people have been linked to, uh, alexithymia, which is the inability to recognize and describe one's emotions, and so like there's a lot psychologically, I think, going on with these kinds of people. They, they need that high adrenaline hit of something you know what gives me the adrenaline hit yeah is talking with you guys about all this. Oh my god, don you're gonna make me cry by the next time that we talk around.

Doug: 1:07:57

I want to hear about what uh risk adventure no I I think that we need to set up an adventure for you. This has really brought it out.

Ron: 1:08:04

This was really what I wanted. I wanted this was my cave diving cry for help. This was me telling you guys that I'm actually in a doldrum of the soul and I do require to be shook free of it.

Don: 1:08:16

Just want to get out of here.

Ron: 1:08:23

Thank you all for being here today. Uh, I hope we had an opportunity to, to, to explore our own psyches. I hope the listener had an opportunity to explore their psyche. Uh, if there are any cave divers out there, don't talk to me. I don't want to know I want to sit far away from you and talk to pontificate on what is going wrong with you.

Ron: 1:08:43

I don't actually care, and we hope to see you all next time on the uncannery, where we will pop open another thick can of delicious thought provoking stuff. There we go.