All Bear caused deaths in N america

[leaftye]

If I'm missing something here, please let me know.

I think he was referring to Colter's post that listed deaths from drowning, driving, horseback riding, etc. As Chinmusic noted earlier, making a comparison like that isn't valid because it doesn't apply to the entire population. That's the part that Colter doesn't seem to understand. It says that risk of dieing from lightning versus a bear is 90:1.3. Both are risks on the AT. It also says that death by horseback riding versus death by bear is 200:1.3. If we're to apply Colter's way of doing math, an AT thru-hiker is nearly 200 times more likely to get put atop a horse and then put to death before getting back off to resume thru hiking. Most of us would realize that the risk of death by horseback riding is precisely zero while thru hiking because the risk of death by horseback riding only applies to those that ride horses, which is a much smaller group than the entire population of the country.

[wilconow]

Oh okay, I apologize, I thought he was referring to the Wikipedia article

[Colter]

Is there a language barrier? I apologize if I'm explaining this in a language that you have difficulty with. As you just said, and as I've said at least twice previously, let people do their own math. You have already had two people explain how your math could be improved if you care to try posting a statistic that has a modicum of accuracy.

I am, of course, wasting my time debating this with you, but your argument that the odds vary depending in individual circumstances is implying that I disagree. I don't. The numbers I presented are not meant to apply directly and literally to the AT or to any other trail or any particular individual. They are gathered stats showing what actually does kill people in the U.S. No rational person thinks they are likely to be killed riding horse on the A.T., and despite your strawman argument I don't imply it.

What I am saying is that for a randomly chosen backpacker backpacking in bear country the odds of being a fatality are still one out of several millions. Certainly the odds are that low or lower on the A.T.

You profess to have a much firmer grasp on statistics, so calculate the odds of a typical AT backpacker being a bear fatality on the Trail and post them here.

[ChinMusic]

If I'm missing something here, please let me know.

I was referring immediately after the following post that had NOTHING to do with bears. It helps to read the whole thread for context.

Approximate death rates in the U.S. per year...

Motor Vehicle Accidents: 40,000
Septicemia: 34,828
Suicide: 30,000
Poisoning: 22,700
Falls: 21,600
Murder: 16,929
Drowning: 4,000
Boating: 339
Horseback riding: 200
Hypothermia: 187
Lightning: 90
Bee sting: 55
Dogs: 30
Snake bite: 5
Bear attack (average over 20 years in the U.S): 1.3

Thanks Southmark. I think it's often a difficult topic for people to be rational about.

Originally Posted by ChinMusic
While looking at stats across the country is interesting, it really does not add anything. 99.999% percent of those deaths did not occur while backpacking/hiking.

[SouthMark]

When my friends want to know why I'm not taking a gun to protect myself from bears I tell them based on the statistics there is a greater chance that I will shoot myself.

[leaftye]

I am, of course, wasting my time debating this with you, but your argument that the odds vary depending in individual circumstances is implying that I disagree. I don't. The numbers I presented are not meant to apply directly and literally to the AT or to any other trail or any particular individual. They are gathered stats showing what actually does kill people in the U.S. No rational person thinks they are likely to be killed riding horse on the A.T., and despite your strawman argument I don't imply it.

What I am saying is that for a randomly chosen backpacker backpacking in bear country the odds of being a fatality are still one out of several millions. Certainly the odds are that low or lower on the A.T.

You profess to have a much firmer grasp on statistics, so calculate the odds of a typical AT backpacker being a bear fatality on the Trail and post them here.

You gathered facts and shared them, which is great. The problem is when you turned them into poorly represented statistics. That happened when you made an assumption that the chance of getting killed by a bear is 1 in 334 million. That's what makes the strawman argument a valid comparison because to be at risk, you have to be in a situation in which you could be at risk. According to the 2000 census, 80% of the population lives in urban areas. Those people are not at risk in their homes. As you're saying now, it would be more accurate to say that the chance of getting killed by a bear is 1 in millions. Still, giving an overall figure for this isn't very helpful because bears from different regions act differently. Since you've mentioned the AT, it would be much better and easier to come up with a fairly accurate statistics just for the AT. Somewhat less accurate would be a statistic for the states in which the AT passes through. That could be improved significantly if you narrow things down to the regions in which bears live, because again, bears are not a risk in big cities. You could improve things again by determining the man hours spent in those areas, and then break things down further by season. You could refine things much more greatly if you could determine if the attack happened when running away, standing up to the bear, in the vicinity of the bear, etc. Granted, that's probably way more than you would care to do. It might be easiest just to get the populations of each state, subtract the number of people living in large cities, and then compare against the number of fatal bear attacks. The number of people going camping should be including, but that number is probably too insignificant for it to change the result...remember the comparison I did of campers nationwide to those that lived in rural areas?

Why is this important? You're trying to get rid of a fear caused by an overblown misunderstanding of the facts. Another overblown misunderstanding of the facts is not the way to fix that.

[ChinMusic]

When my friends want to know why I'm not taking a gun to protect myself from bears I tell them based on the statistics there is a greater chance that I will shoot myself.

That is one reason I do not have a gun in the house.....accidents, etc. are IMO a greater risk than being under protected.

[rhapsody98]

Everybody's gotta die of something.

[Colter]

the chance of getting killed by a bear is 1 in millions.

Thank you.

Believe it or not, I realized all along that people who will never encounter a bear are less likely to be killed by one than those that have frequent encounters. That's why I said right there on my post, in the comments "the odds aren't equal for all people."

But except for the most extreme situations, like Treadwell who thought that brown bears were his furry, roly poly buddies, the odds of being killed by a bear are very low, far too low to warrant the widespread extreme bear fear.

When I fly back home tomorrow, I'm not going to sit down and run the stats on my particular airline and what model aircraft they are flying and how far I'm going and how experienced the pilots are, I am just going to trust that the plane is going to arrive safely because I know the odds are hugely in my favor, and that parsing out and debating the exact odds is a huge waste of my time.

[DapperD]

Just read New Jersey officials have announced a black bear warning due to increased bear activity:http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/201..._warn_res.html

[SouthMark]

Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. The fearful are caught as often as the bold.

[dradius]

When my friends want to know why I'm not taking a gun to protect myself from bears I tell them based on the statistics there is a greater chance that I will shoot myself.

That's great
(Thankfully) There isn't enough data, but I'd like to see some statistics on people trying to pull out their pistols and accurately shoot (and stop!) a charging bear vs. someone with bear spray on their chest or side pocket.

[wilconow]

That's great
(Thankfully) There isn't enough data, but I'd like to see some statistics on people trying to pull out their pistols and accurately shoot (and stop!) a charging bear vs. someone with bear spray on their chest or side pocket.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/st...#ixzz1A5RlF3Vr