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At some point you have to make an ethical decision -- what is the best allocation of society's resources? It would be expensive to outfit all tall buildings wit
by sulam 10y ago
At some point you have to make an ethical decision -- what is the best allocation of society's resources? It would be expensive to outfit all tall buildings with parachutes in the exceedingly unlikely event that they would be useful -- and that's before you factor in the low probability that they would successfully save people with little to no training in normal parachuting, much less BASE jumping, a sport which often kills trained participants jumping under far more favorable conditions.
You might as well ask why people who work in tall buildings don't take parachutes to work themselves. The answer is obvious, and I hope it's equally obvious why buildings don't do this.
On a related note: having to send your shoes through the x-ray machine in an airport security line is almost as bad of an idea. :/
- jsprogrammer 10y agoYou would only have needed to outfit the tallest buildings being built. Do you know how many individual paratroopers have jumped out of planes? There is no way the cost is prohibitive. Parachuting is one of the last ways I'd want to go down, but, why wouldn't I want one if my only choice were to splat or char?
- drjesusphd 10y ago> why wouldn't I want one if my only choice were to splat or char? That isn't your only choice because the scenario is exceedingly unlikely to happen. If safety is your thing, you'd be much better off spending the several thousand dollars on doctors visits, healthier food, gym memberships, and/or public transit throughout the year.
- jsprogrammer 10y agoif It's unlikely a seatbelt will save my life, but every car I go in has multiple. The original argument presented here is equivalent to arguing it's too expensive and useless to carry enough lifeboat capacity for everyone on a ship after the Titanic sunk. It's extremely unlikely that I'll ever impact an iceberg.
- danso 10y agoHow many times do you practice putting on your seatbelt, and how long does it take to put it on? For me, I put on my seatbelt every time I enter a car, and it takes me seconds. I've never put on a parachute or practiced deploying one. Lifeboats are not just for iceberg collisions. There are many reasons for a boat to sink that don't involve a collision.
- jsprogrammer 10y agoPractically no one had put on a seat belt before they were introduced either. The cost of parachutes and placards to describe their proper usage is absolutely trivial in consideration of the budget of any building from which parachutes could actually be deployed. Buildings don't just collapse from airplane collisions; fires, bombs, earthquakes, structural failure, hostile takeover, and more could all be scenarios where you might only survive if you have a chute.
- sulam 10y agoHow many people have died in building collapses over the last 50 years? Alternatively, how many people have died in car crashes? Large boats getting sunk? Lightning strikes? Obviously these are rhetorical questions: it is far, far more likely to be hit by lightning than to die in a building collapse. If you truly believe this risk is worth mitigating I would put my money/time where my mouth is and not depend on some building supervisor to keep enough parachutes around and keep them in good condition. Instead you should get some training*, buy a BASE jumping parachute and take it with you when you go above 60m. As you say, they are relatively inexpensive. [1] Note: be careful -- you are much more likely to be killed in your training than you are to need to use it.
- jsprogrammer 10y agoIt's far more cost efficient to just avoid entering such areas.
- 10y ago