[pct-l] Bear danger on the PCT - put in perspective

[Brandon McGinnity]

That's true; there's a hell of a lot more bees out there than bears, both in
town and in the back country. Hell, there's more HIVES than bears. Per
capita, bears might end up coming out to be the more dangerous of the two.

Either way, I ain't scared.

On Wed, Feb 2, 2011 at 12:30 AM, Ryan Hull <rynos1234 at gmail.com> wrote:

> Fundamentally I agree with what the author of grizzlybay is trying to show.
>  However, I feel obligated to point out several things.
>
> 1:  The authors of this website cite no sources for their stats, nor do
> they
> explain how they were derived if they happen to be the result of the
> authors' own research.  After all, 76% of all stats are made up on the spot
> -- just like this one :)
>
> 2:  Assuming that these stats are accurate, consider exactly what they are
> saying and the populations they assume.  Take the dying from a bee sting
> statistic.  Sure, you may be 120 more times likely to die from a bee sting
> than from a black bear attack in general.  But how many of those people
> dieing from stings or bears are in urban settings?  If you were to compare
> the # of deaths by black bear per # of people with the potential to be
> mauled to the # of deaths by bee stings per # of people with the potential
> to be stung, and I suspect that the numbers would be much closer.  In other
> words, for the general population the ratio may be 120:1 but for regular
> outdoorspeople, maybe it's closer to 40:1?  I'm just guessing.  It's hard
> to
> say, especially since people who play outside are more likely to be stung
> by
> bees to begin with.
>
> 3:  I, for one, consider it to be substantially misleading to publish black
> bear attack statistics when trying to prove that grizzly bears are not
> going
> to eat you ;)
>
> Again, I agree, based on my own anecdotal experience and the general wisdom
> of other avid outdoorsmen and women, with the author's premise that bears
> are unlikely to injure you.  I just don't think a skeptic educated in
> statistics would be convinced by a presentation like this without more
> detail.
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-- 
~ Moccasin