> Interestingly offshore drilling rigs create an enormous deep water artificial reef and can attract all kinds of large fish. Great book written about it called Helldivers' Rodeo.
https://www.amazon.com/Helldivers-Rodeo-Scuba-Diving-Adventure-Oil-Platforms/dp/0871319365
Similarly the US Navy saw delivering the mail to sailors as a huge necessity because of morale. They tasked a commander or a captain to solve the mail delivery problem and promised him command of a battleship if he did despite his age normally being a restricting factor. This was when battleship command still held a lot of prestige. He solved it, was given a battleship, and retired an admiral.
I'm going to hit my dad up for the details when I can, he knows this story way better than I do.
EDIT: My dad got back to me. It was Vice Admiral Charles "Swede" Momsen. The wikipedia article doesn't get into it but it does mention him getting command of a battleship later in the war. My dad said it was in a bio done of Momsen. Going by the comments on the Amazon page it is this one.
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, a memoir written by Jean-Dominique Bauby, who lived in locked-in syndrome for a bit more than a year after waking up from coma. The entire book was written by Bauby blinking his left eyelid, which took ten months (four hours a day), according to wikipedia.
Consciousness and the Brain: Deciphering How the Brain Codes Our Thoughts, a book written by Stanislas Dehaene, a neuroscientist who works on consciousness, in which he summarizes his research and the current state of knowledge on the topic.
Although we're still very far from understanding the complexity of our brain, I think it is relatively safe to say that the "mind-body" debate is over now, you are your brain.
Second this! Also while not totally what you were asking I got a huge kick from this reef fish ID book. If you're going to be doing any snorkeling/diving this really makes it all the more interesting!
Here's a story about a boat getting swept away. There was another better one I read about a couple in the Caribbean, in this book, that involved a long night in the water, hypothermia, a damaged boat, and a fine - and they got off pretty lucky all things considered.
It's beyond my risk tolerance, that's for sure.
That’s a fair point. I guess that’s where my mind goes, because that’s the type of spearfishing that both myself and pretty much everyone I know does (i.e. the Helldivers out of New Orleans.. there’s even a book that’s worth the read for entertainment value alone)… I have a few guns, but for the bug stuff like that I use a 3-band JBL Woody Magnum with aircraft cable and custom 3/8” shafts from Temento’s (also out of New Orleans).
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It's a lot more fun if you do it yourself, and you learn more.
A visual of how I would imagine spearfishing sharks near the Gulf's oil rigs as read in the book The Helldiver's Rodeo.
It's kind of a niche genre but I too am a history buff. I'm also a certified scuba diver and my all time favourite book is Shadow Divers by Robert Kurson.
https://www.amazon.ca/Shadow-Divers-Adventure-Americans-Everything/dp/0375760989
It's the true story of a WWII U-Boat found off the coast of New Jersey by a couple of divers. The book jumps back and forth between present day while the divers are trying to figure out what the heck the wreck is and figure out how it got there, and the ships history.
I've probably read it half a dozen times now! History, real life adventure and scuba :)
It's not about suicide, but this made me think of The Diving Bell and the Butterfly.
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly is probably the book I have recommended more than any other.
> "In 1995, Jean-Dominique Bauby was the editor-in-chief of French Elle, the father of two young childen, a 44-year-old man known and loved for his wit, his style, and his impassioned approach to life. By the end of the year he was also the victim of a rare kind of stroke to the brainstem. After 20 days in a coma, Bauby awoke into a body which had all but stopped working: only his left eye functioned, allowing him to see and, by blinking it, to make clear that his mind was unimpaired. Almost miraculously, he was soon able to express himself in the richest detail: dictating a word at a time, blinking to select each letter as the alphabet was recited to him slowly, over and over again. In the same way, he was able eventually to compose this extraordinary book." https://www.amazon.com/Diving-Bell-Butterfly-Memoir-Death/dp/0375701214
I really liked this book, and it's counterparts. This one has all the related books in the "users also bought section"
Reef Fish Identification - Florida Caribbean Bahamas - 4th Edition (Reef Set) https://www.amazon.com/dp/1878348574/ref=cm_sw_r_other_apa_gkowxbSEPQ258
It's got full color pictures of fish, and a bit of information on them. It's also easy to search for what you saw, and if you want more info, it can give you a name to Wikipedia.
Shadow Divers is a great book about the discovery and subsequent identification of a U-Boat off the coast of New Jersey
I can recommend this book if you want to get into the nitty gritty of it all: Deco for Divers: Decompression Theory and Physiology
It is a tough slog to read but really does explain it all in excellent detail
As part of my Rescue Diver certification the instructor recommended we read Michael Ange's Diver Down. Its a collection of real life diving accidents and how to avoid them. http://www.amazon.com/Diver-Down-Real-World-SCUBA-Accidents/dp/0071445722
This poor fellow must not have taken this advice...
Oh, and get a copy of this book to take too. I signed off over 1/3rd of the book during my first week there.
I was thinking of that story when I saw this pic because I could have sworn this sub was involved for some reason but Wikipedia didn't seem to indicate that was correct.
Check out this book to read more about it: http://www.amazon.com/The-Terrible-Hours-Greatest-Submarine/dp/0060932775
There was also a TV movie with Sam Neill made about it.
Pretty sure the guy in The Diving Bell and the Butterfly who couldn't move anything but one eyelid still had feeling in his body.
Source: I read the book and watched the movie. It was 7 years ago though so my memory is hazy.