[rootedbox]

I didn't wear cleats until I was almost 14 playing baseball.. I just used tennis shoes.. some of my friends gave me a hard time about it. I could hit dingers all day so no big deal.

But you know what. I wore a helmet at every at bat. Did I really need it for every at bat?? No; But I had it.

There's a long list of dead people who went into the wilderness or hiking under prepared. Just because it didn't happen to you doesn't mean the same outcome for others.. I know this is supposed to be a metaphor for when to buy and upgrade the tools you have. But safety should always come first.

[dfee]

Know how many 9 year olds I’ve seen hit in the head with a baseball, while at bat? (Many. One kid on my sons team was hit in the head for four consecutive tournaments last fall.)

Always wear a helmet when you’ve got a bat in your hand.

[garbagewoman]

Obviously your idea of safety coming first is based on your exact specifications, which are unclear and known only by yourself, which isn’t actually very useful

[paulcole]

> But safety should always come first.

No it shouldn’t.

Safety is almost always a trade off of real (or perceived) risk and reward.

If safety came first, you’d never swim, hike, or drive a car.

[mvdtnz]

I agree with you completely. My country has an out-of-control safety culture that has many unintended effects. For example we are one of only a handful of countries on earth with a cycling helmet law. As a result, fewer people cycle and drivers take less care around cyclists. Lots of studies have shown that at a population level it's quite possible helmet laws have a negative impact on health and safety. I am currently travelling Japan and I have seen thousands of cyclists and not a single helmet (and very little in the way of dedicated cycling infrastructure). To my knowledge Japan doesn't have an epidemic of head injuries.

[pacifika]

Soccer players would benefit from wearing helmets though, but they don’t.

[florbo]

Safety first doesn't mean "don't do anything unsafe," it has a broad meaning. With your interpretation I suppose it could mean if you're going to do something, be sure to consider your safety tradeoffs first.

[paulcole]

I think “safety first” generally means that you should put safety first when you’re doing something but that I should consider the safety trade offs first when I’m doing something.

[nixpulvis]

Used to raid 25 man World of Warcraft dungeons with a Death Knight tank. His slogan was: "Safety first, then teamwork." That really stuck with me.

[calmbonsai]

From the pilot's world: Aviate, Navigate, Communicate

[Aeolun]

But how many people died even though they had the ‘right’ gear?

[valbaca]

I too like to hold my safety gear to the standard of whether it grants invulnerability. That's a productive way to approach nuance.

[Aeolun]

I was more interested in the relative likelihood. Most people don’t die from good or bad gear, but from risky or stupid things, gear or no gear.

[mvdtnz]

Sorry can you explain the situation where jeans lead to the death of a hiker? I don't buy it.

[calmbonsai]

I've never experienced any deaths on hikes, but I have experienced folks suffering the initial stages of hypothermia (and not realizing it) when wearing jeans on a multi-day excursion when the weather went from dry and sunny to rainy, to icey-rain to sleet.

Unwaxed cotton absorbs water, stays wet, and shrinks when wet to make close contact with skin--three properties that one does not want when its wet and cold.

[Aeolun]

So taking your pants off would work? Seems superior to wet clingy cold pants anyway.

[calmbonsai]

That depends on the specifics of the environment, trail, and your pants.

Indeed, going "pantsless" for short periods can be less risky if your pants are already soaked-through, it's very humid, there's ice build-up, and there's little to no risk of skin abrasion from terrain traversal.

[saagarjha]

In the cold?

[calmbonsai]

If you're wearing "wet ice", convective heat loss from air is preferable to conductive heat loss from water.

Water on skin is a really, really good mechanism for heat transfer (both ways)--hence why we sweat in the heat.