Re: BBC News Item

PeterC wrote:

That and the absence of a GPS and mobile phone.

I've never taken either, and never intend to.
If they're that important how did people manage without dying all
the time before 15 or so years ago?

Not this tired argument again...

How did people manage to do anything before anything was invented?

People managed without beer before that was invented and we wouldn't
want to do without now would we ?

People managed without *everything* before it was invented. Do we really
want to go back to living in caves?

But beer is necessary!

Food, water and shelter (including clothes in bad weather) are the only
things in life that are truly necessary, everything else is optional.

The word "need" doesn't really mean *need*, it means anything that's
necessary for any activity that a human *chooses* to do.

For example, a photographer needs a camera. Nobody *needs* to be a
photographer, but if you are, then a camera is essential for that activity.
Likewise a person who wants to communicate with other people whilst on the
hills needs a mobile phone. That person doesn't usually *need* to
communicate with anyone else whilst on the hills, but if they choose to,
then a mobile phone is essential for that activity. Similarly I need a GPS
to do the things that a GPS can do that nothing else can. A compass can't
record a track of a walk or give you a grid ref in zero visibility if you
haven't kept track of where.

In short, anything is essential if you want it to be. It all depends on what
you choose to do and how you choose to do it.

Some things are so useful, or potentially so, that they become widely
regarded as essential. This will happen with mobile phones and GPS one day.
It'll probably happen with GPS in cars too. We live in a safety-paranoid
society. The safer the world gets, the safer humans will try to make it,
trying to reach the unattainable goal of making everything perfectly safe,
and spoiling a lot of people's fun in the process.

Paul
--
http://www.wilderness-wales.co.uk
http://www.wilderness-wales.co.uk/pg/nedd-fechan-falls/nedd-fechan-falls.html


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Relevant Pages

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