Swimming with Crocodiles
How dangerous is it to swim with crocodiles? To do so would you be the idiot of the century? Is the notoriety worth it?
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Transcript
Hello and welcome to the Cognitive Engineering Podcast, produced by TellMeStudios for Aleph Insights. In this series of podcasts, we take a look at interesting topics and discuss what we think they tell us about analysis and decision making. I'm Fraser McGruer and I'm here with Nick Hare, Peter Coghill and Chris Wragg of Aleph Insights and this week we're discussing how dangerous or not it is to swim with crocodiles. Chris, how dangerous is it to swim with crocodiles?
Speaker B:Well, very dangerous if you would believe the Australian press and politicians recently because there was this well-publicised case of three Australian men swimming out to a trap that had been set for a crocodile and had been baited with whatever it is crocodiles eat, small children or something. And they swam out to this and then they posed for, you know, pictures and were videoed.
Speaker A:Were there, I seem to remember in the pictures, were there pictures of them holding a drink in their hand as well or something like that?
Speaker C:Yes, it's plausible to imagine lager may have been involved. Yes. Without wishing to perpetuate any kind of stereotype about Australian men.
Speaker A:Yeah. Sorry, continue.
Speaker B:And so this caused a furore in the Australian press and then subsequently the international press and they were dubbed the idiots of the century by an Australian politician. And it got me thinking, well, how dangerous is what they did?
Speaker A:And actually, sorry, before you continue, I think in reports it was saying just two weeks before either, yeah, that someone had been killed and eaten by a crocodile. That's why the crocodile trap was set.
Speaker C:A 79 year old with Alzheimer's had been killed by a crocodile.
Speaker A:Right. Okay.
Speaker C:Draw from that what you want.
Speaker A:Yeah. And in exactly the same spot a couple of weeks before and then they were swimming there.
Speaker C:A nearby spot. Remember, this is Australia, so nearby could be 200 miles.
Speaker B:So I started sort of, you know, thinking about this a bit more critically and, you know, I was having a look at sort of statistics to do with crocodile deaths. And it turns out that of the species of crocodiles that exist in the world, only a small minority of them are actually dangerous to humans or at least fatally dangerous to humans. There's always a bad apple. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. Yeah. You might get a toe bitten off by some of the others. But the point is this, the most dangerous kind of crocodile is the Nile crocodile. And most of those deaths occur in sub-Saharan Africa. And maybe, you know, it's very difficult to get reliable estimates on these things. But perhaps between 300 and 750 deaths per year from that species. But in terms of the saltwater crocodile and Australasia and Asia more generally, they obviously do take and kill humans. But it's estimated to be about 30 deaths per year or rather 30 attacks per year, 50% of which are believed to be, you know, fatal. Again, very difficult to get reliable statistics on these because they're not always reported and so on and so forth. But, you know, without the case, if you then look at Australia, you know, there are only really sort of a handful of these kind of attacks per year. And most of the attacks occur on people swimming, obviously, in water. But even given that, it's a small number of cases per year.
Speaker C:But we can do, I went, I did a bit of maths of my own.
Speaker A:Before you go ahead with the maths. But one of the things it might be that in Australia, for example, there are less crocodile deaths because people pay attention to stay away from crocodiles.
Speaker C:Yeah, the issue, you can't just look at the whole population attacks figure and conclude, therefore, it's safe to go swimming. It's a, you know, it's a bit like saying, you know, if I bring a bomb on a plane, I'll be safe because it's very unlikely to be two bombs on a plane. You know, you have to ask, well, what's the probability given that you're undertaking some activity or other? And that's what I was interested in. I thought, well, actually, OK, let's make some conservative, really conservative estimates at how many. So the figure I found was 0.6 deaths a year on average in Australia from crocodile attacks. And I said, well, population Australia is about 20 million. I reckon maybe 1% of those people ever have contact in a given year with with crocodile infested waters. And I said, OK, really conservative. Let's assume that that 1% are very careful. And on average, they're in crocodile infested waters for a minute a year. Right. So effectively, we have sort of 200,000 minutes a year of of man time. Now, if it's more, that is going to make crocodiles even safer. Right. So I'm assuming that people are really on average only in crocodile infested waters for a small amount of time. Well, what it turns out that, you know, that with 0.6 deaths out of 200,000 minutes of activity, that spending a day in in crocodile infested waters would would work out as still about around about seven times safer than climbing Everest, for example. So so I think Chris is absolutely right when he says it's unfair that these people are labelled idiots of the century. Idiots, maybe I'll go with that, but not of the century, because, you know, climbing Everest and you don't get headlines about how stupid that is necessarily is fantastically dangerous.
Speaker D:And there's quite a bit left to go. Yeah.
Speaker A:Are you sure you don't have a some tenure with the Australian Tourist Board? And so this is because these are just lighthearted larrigans having a having a.
Speaker B:Well, I think what it what it under or what it overlooks is that, you know, so the reason I think it's sort of viewed as supreme idiocy is because there's nothing to be gained from it. It's not like they were sort of crossing the river to pan gold or something like that. They were going to pose for a photograph.
Speaker C:Well, come on. Internet notoriety. Exactly.
Speaker B:So in the same way as we sort of understand the allure of Everest as a, you know, because of the kudos that's gained by, you know, scaling the world's highest mountain. These guys are way more fair. Who climbed Everest this year? But but we know what we've seen pictures of these guys. So, you know, in their circle of friends, they probably now have bragging rights. Now, where it becomes a difficulty is when you then get copy copycat. So in an isolated incident, an individual doing this is is fine. But if you if you then send the message, right, this is this is a great thing to do, everybody. You increase the number of, you know, minutes spent in Australia in crocodile infested water. Then suddenly it goes up from 0.6 to whatever, you know, you you expand it.
Speaker C:Yeah, I think it's probably worth saying from a legal point of view that we certainly don't urge people to go and spend time in crocodile infested waters.
Speaker A:Unless you're an Australian. It's not highly advised. Unless you're Australian, it's a really hot day. Peter, let's hear from you.
Speaker D:Well, that was my point. That was the only point I had really was the Internet notoriety. And if their aim was to get 15 minutes of fame, then they've totally succeeded. I don't think they really had an aim.
Speaker C:I mean, look, the reason that men particularly take pointless risks is, you know, from an evolutionary point of view, is it's a status. It is. It gets you status, you know, which I think probably you could make an argument that this is because because, you know, being able to take risks shows that you're stronger and braver, etc. And women find risk taking attractive. So, you know, it all makes sense. The circle is complete. They probably are going to be considered to be more attractive now as, you know, as to the average Australian female to the average female anywhere. And that's, you know, that's pretty, pretty well borne out in studies. You know, people, women find risk taking attractive, which is why so many young men do really stupid things.
Speaker A:I want to come back to that in a moment.
Speaker B:Yeah, no, I was also going to say, I think it sort of it draws out nicely this this separation between our emotional sense of fear and our cognitive assessment of risk or, you know, perceived perceived risk and that we conflate the two very, very regularly. That something that makes us think, you know, something like being eaten by a crocodile generates emotional fear in us. And that, you know, bleeds across into our sort of, you know, our estimation of the risk. And we, you know, we very often think that actually perceived risk is what drives fear. But very often it's it's the other way around. They're interchangeable. It's fear drives our perception of the risk.
Speaker A:Okay, I mean, actually, I think quite swiftly, we've kind of got to the heart of the matter there. I'm quite satisfied with where we've got to. And so, again, as I want to do, let's sort of personalize this a little bit. And I want to ask what the most stupid thing is that you've ever done. Now, obviously, it could or if we're talking about risk, it might just be the fact that time or every day when you drive around the M25. Okay, but if we put that stuff aside and I'm thinking of, you know, in the sort of vein of going deciding it's a good idea to go swimming with crocodiles, things like that. Is there anything that springs? I mean, Chris, surely you you're far too sober and and risk averse to have ever done anything stupid or are you? Well, yeah, we do this.
Speaker B:Yeah, that's right. Well, as as a teenager, I was obviously subject to the whole sort of hormonal, you know, maelstrom maelstrom. Yes, exactly. And so, yes, was not not without a rational behavior. And, you know, one of the things that still gives me sort of flashbacks was a a teenage drunken night out where I a couple of my friends hung me upside down over a over a fairly high bridge over the over the river. And and they were obviously drunk at the time. And I still think about what you know, what might have might have happened.
Speaker A:Yeah. Okay.
Speaker C:Yeah, I think there's been a few. And I think before I had really got the hang of situational awareness, you know, there are a few times I look back on now, particular time where I was chatting to a friend of mine and crossing the road behind. It was a fairly quiet street around the back of the temple church. And it weren't very often any cars. And I was just chatting to this friend that I was coming out from where there was kind of scaffolding. So I couldn't see what was the traffic that was coming. And I just stepped out into the road. And there was this screeching of brakes. And this car just sort of stopped, you know, a foot away from me. And and the bloke came out and quite rightly gave me a solid ear bashing. But I just think, you know, that's that's where you look back and you think, God, you know. Brown trousers. Yeah, exactly. You know, half a second. If I'd have if I'd have sort of left school half a second earlier or later, you know, it would have been a different story. But I think I'd imagine that most people, their near misses with death are going to be going to be the things that you obviously ruled out on the basis of being quite boring, which is which is being run over, you know, or potentially drowning, which are the two very common causes of death in childhood.
Speaker D:Peter? I do a lot of mountain biking. And I've had some fairly painful but not very serious crashes. And I realized that I was riding way beyond my ability. And as soon as I sort of moderated my behavior, these crashes went away. And I enjoy it a lot more because I'm not all grazed and bruised. But, yeah, it's the kind of it's very, a very definite bit of feedback, like nearly getting hit by a car or getting shouted at extremely loudly by your parents or or hurting yourself quite a lot is a useful lesson for moderating.
Speaker C: ount Everest, which is nearly: Speaker A:So also, I'm just sort of thinking it's back as this as an off time smoker. So that means what I could probably have, you know, 200 cigarettes or more before I even start getting close to, you know, the dangers of skydiving or something.
Speaker C:Someone, someone who a massive health bore who berates you for smoking, but goes up Everest once is doing the equivalent of having 40,000 cigarettes. So shut up. Leave us be. It's much safer to smoke than it is to go up Everest.
Speaker A:OK, our path is clear. Well, look, we're close to wrapping up. Does is does anyone want to round this off with something?
Speaker D:Well, presumably being in a large metal cage is quite a safe place if you're surrounded by crocodiles. Well, it depends if it can lock or not, right?
Speaker C:That's what I was worried about. I thought, well, what if they trigger the trap and get stuck in this this crocodile cage? I mean, presumably it's designed to trap crocodiles, right?
Speaker A:Yeah, I think so. Yeah, but also it depends, like if you get trapped in it. I seem to remember from the pictures you can. It's got you. You won't drown. You won't drown. No, there's an airspace. Yeah, there's an airspace. But you don't want it to shut with a crocodile in there with you.
Speaker C:No, that would be pretty much the worst outcome.
Speaker A:I think the more the more value for that might be astronomical. Yeah, but if it shuts without a crocodile in, you're probably in a pretty safe place. Yeah, but then you've got to get out of it again.
Speaker B:You've got a lot of explaining to do at that point.
Speaker A:Okay, I enjoyed that. I think we'll stop there. Thank you, as always, for listening to the Cognitive Engineering Podcast. We've been here with perennial crocodile evaders, Nick Hare, Peter Coghill and Chris Wragg of Aleph Insights. Thank you. And until next time. Bye bye. Surely see you later, alligator. In a while, crocodile.
