Skip to main content

Via Ferrata in Italy

I am back from the Dolomites. Did some great via ferratas in good weather with friends. Here are a few clips. HD video using the pocket Vado. For full screen view select 720p at bottom right corner of frame.

Top of Tomaselli again:

Start of Tomaselli:

Trincee:

Comments

Jim Hamlyn said…
Fantastic - I'm so jealous. I was there last year with my partner but we didn't have the guts to do anything near as vertiginous as that - looks great! Unfortunately when we came back I had our VF harnesses in my hand luggage and the security guard insisted that we weren't allowed rope. We were in a hurry so I had to get him to cut the carabiners off so we could at least keep those. Really annoying that Ryanair didn't make it clear that even a short rope isn't allowed in hand luggage, especially when this must happen quite a lot.

Great site BTW.

Jim
Stephen Law said…
Thanks Jim. I did not know that about Ryan Air. Won't make that mistake next time...
Jim Hamlyn said…
Hi again,

Not sure where to leave this link for you but thought you'd be interested (no need to publish this comment) - it's about some research that was completed this year into how superstition improves performance: http://pss.sagepub.com/content/early/2010/05/27/0956797610372631.abstract

Might be worth linking to from your site and seeing what folk think.

Best

Jim
Billy said…
Looks Awesome. I understand there is Via Ferrata at Honister that I've been meaning to check out. Do you know anything about it?

Jim

Interestingly your link mentions an increase in self efficacy (I'll need to read the full article sometime though). Anyway, I found that as I lost my faith, it made me more confident in my abilities without the superstition of prayer. This was most impressed upon me in a day on Beinn a Chrulastie. I worte a rather long winded account of the day here if you are interested (you may have to stick the link back together)

http://basketofpuppies-
billy.blogspot.com/2008/07
/atheists-on-icy-mountains.html
Kosh3 said…
Stunning scenery, but the climb does not appeal to me at all
Jim Hamlyn said…
Billy,

Thanks for the link. Seeing your blog has really made me consider starting to regularly post images of my Munro experiences on my own blog.

On the point of self-efficacy and your gripping and sometimes hilarious blog post, I totally agree. When you're caught up in the moment, there's very little else that you can think of but the task at hand. It's a very different story though, when you're in a situation which allows pause for reflection, especially situations where you have no control, like being on a aeroplane in the middle of a rough storm. Such situations can really test your beliefs (or lack of them) and bring out all of your deepest and most irrational superstitions. In a recent study: http://psycnet.apa.org/?&fa=main.doiLanding&doi=10.1037/0022-3514.95.2.293 it was found that people do indeed “have the intuition that actions that tempt fate increase the likelihood of negative outcomes.” Mix that with the positive effects of self-efficacy and what do you get? A perfect disposition for religious faith!


Stephen,

I just read a very interesting series of articles on New York Times.com about the Dunning Kruger effect and all those “unknown unknowns” out there. It's perhaps a little tangential but seemed to throw some light on your intellectual black holes - if you'll pardon the pun!

Best

Jim
Jim Hamlyn said…
Oops - I almost forgot the link to the NY Times article:
http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/06/20/the-anosognosics-dilemma-1/
Paul P. Mealing said…
Just brilliant.

Takes me back to my youth, but I never climbed anywhere as grand as that.

Yes, I'm jealous.

Best regards, Paul.
Stephen Law said…
Thanks Jim - final quote from Dunning is v useful.
Stephen Law said…
Just been reading John Loftus's Why I Became an Atheist. Very good!
Paul P. Mealing said…
I checked out the NY Times article suggested by Jim.

I not only saw Errol Morris's movie The Fog of War, but, after the movie was shown, I was audience to a 'meet the director' interview via an internet link to the cinema. An excellent movie in its own right - certainly deserved the Oscar - I highly recommend it for an insight into political myopia when it comes to war.

Whilst reading the interview in the NY Times, I was reminded of an epiphany I had whilst studying physics in high school: true knowledge is knowing how much you don't know.

Both Socrates and Confucius make reference to wisdom coming from knowing how ignorant we are.

I like the exposition on 'unknown unknowns' and the realisation that it's actually not knowing what questions to ask.

Regards, Paul.
Jim Hamlyn said…
Paul,

You raise something really interesting there for me which has been on my mind since reading the NY Times article myself and it centers around the role of skepticism and critical doubt. I've not quite put my finger on it yet (which in itself is interesting) but the idea of circumspection and not being satisfied with simple answers, or rather keeping all truths under scrutiny is both a weakness and a strength.
Paul P. Mealing said…
Hi Jim,

I have a favourite saying: only future generations can tell us how ignorant the current generation is.

Regards, Paul.

Popular posts from this blog

EVIDENCE, MIRACLES AND THE EXISTENCE OF JESUS

(Published in Faith and Philosophy 2011. Volume 28, Issue 2, April 2011. Stephen Law. Pages 129-151) EVIDENCE, MIRACLES AND THE EXISTENCE OF JESUS Stephen Law Abstract The vast majority of Biblical historians believe there is evidence sufficient to place Jesus’ existence beyond reasonable doubt. Many believe the New Testament documents alone suffice firmly to establish Jesus as an actual, historical figure. I question these views. In particular, I argue (i) that the three most popular criteria by which various non-miraculous New Testament claims made about Jesus are supposedly corroborated are not sufficient, either singly or jointly, to place his existence beyond reasonable doubt, and (ii) that a prima facie plausible principle concerning how evidence should be assessed – a principle I call the contamination principle – entails that, given the large proportion of uncorroborated miracle claims made about Jesus in the New Testament documents, we should, in the absence of indepen

Why I won't be voting Labour at the next General Election, not even to 'keep the Tories out'.

I have always voted Labour, and have often been a member of the Party, campaigning and canvassing for them. For what it’s worth, here’s my feeling about voting Labour next General Election:   1. When the left vote Labour after they move rightwards, they are encouraged to just move further right, to the point where they are now probably right of where e.g. John Major’s Tory party was. And each time the Tories go further right still. At some point we have got to stop fuelling this toxic drift to the right by making the Labour Party realise that it’s going to start costing them votes. I can’t think of anything politically more important than halting this increasingly frightening rightward slide. So I am no longer voting Labour. 2. If a new socialist party starts up, it could easily hoover up many of the 200k former LP members who have left in disgust (I’d join), and perhaps also pick up union affiliations. They could become the second biggest party by membership quite quickly. Our voting

Aquinas on homosexuality

Thought I would try a bit of a draft out on the blog, for feedback. All comments gratefully received. No doubt I've got at least some details wrong re the Catholic Church's position... AQUINAS AND SEXUAL ETHICS Aquinas’s thinking remains hugely influential within the Catholic Church. In particular, his ideas concerning sexual ethics still heavily shape Church teaching. It is on these ideas that we focus here. In particular, I will look at Aquinas’s justification for morally condemning homosexual acts. When homosexuality is judged to be morally wrong, the justification offered is often that homosexuality is, in some sense, “unnatural”. Aquinas develops a sophisticated version of this sort of argument. The roots of the argument lie in thinking of Aristotle, whom Aquinas believes to be scientifically authoritative. Indeed, one of Aquinas’s over-arching aims was to show how Aristotle’s philosophical system is broadly compatible with Christian thought. I begin with a sketch of Arist