Hell, it’s not like you have to learn in the deep end. You only need about 3 feet of water to swim, preferably about 4 feet. It’s pretty hard to drown (and I would think even panic) in water you can stand up in. I learned in the shallow end when I was a kid, and then slowly got over my fear of going to the deep end. Before long, I could swim down to the bottom of the 12 foot pool.
Whack-a-Mole, it does not follow from the fact that babies can swim instinctively, that adults can swim instinctively as well.
For example, infants can acquire languages instinctively, but adults can not.
Acquiring language is a learned behavior, not an instinct. Infants are just really good about it because their brains are extremely plastic and they’re eager to find a way to communicate.
I can’t remember not being able to swim. Must have learned early.
My daughter did not like to not have a life vest until about 10, then took up competitive swimming… go figure.
Sow was always a fish. As a baby, he would crawl into the ocean unafraid before he could walk.
I got him a little 11’ Styrofoam sail boat called a ‘Snark’ and him and his sister would sail off all afternoon. People would come and screaming about seeing the kids 2 miles down the lake. I would ask, “Were they wearing their life jackets?” Reply was always “Yes.” Me: “So they are fine.” He was 10 maybe and she would have been about 6.
When I was about 12, the 4 oldest of the 7 kids, My older sister14, little brother, 8-9 and the next sister, 7 maybe had to swim across the lake and back each morning before we got breakfast. About .6 or .7 mile round trip at our place. We did get to jump off the cliff in front of our cabin though and that was always a blast. 45’ into 45’ of water. Absolutely no wading at our place. Later some of our high school friends found out the hard way that we were not lying and that their lies about being able to swim would be found out instantly.
Interesting times…
A good visual example of a drowning person panicking and grabbing onto someone else and pushing them down to try to get above the water is in the movie Titanic, right after the ship goes down and all the people are floundering in the water. The guy is pushing Rose down, she can’t get him off, but luckily Leo comes along to punch him and save the day.
Back in my life saving classes they always taught us to approach a person from behind and under water in that situation.
I took swimming lessons every summer of my childhood starting at about age 4. I HATED it. I loved swimming, but the teachers were so mean and strict, I would sometimes cry in the middle of the winter at the thought that I had to go back for two weeks in the summer. But my Mom made me and my sister go, because she thought learning to swim was so important and this was the best school in the city. We spent a lot of time at the lake and in pools as kids, and she didn’t want to have to worry about us.
The hardest thing to learn was definitely disrobing and inflating the jeans to use as a floatie. Took me two times to pass that class, because the first time I tried it I panicked. (And by then I was a pretty experienced swimmer, so it can happen to anyone.) But that lesson could potentially save my life someday, so I’m glad I went through it.
Grateful to Mom now…I’ll be making my own kids go to lessons, too.
Not to derail the thread, but you have this exactly backwards. Probably better to pick another example.
I think SenorBeef has it right.
Instinct is something you just do. It is not taught.
Babies need to learn language. This is clear because depending on the language spoken to them they may end up speaking English or Spanish or Russian or what have you. The baby does not “know” language.
Perhaps you could say the desire to acquire language is instinctual…that may be stretching the definition though.
On the other hand babies swim from the get go. No one teaches them. No one tells them to hold their breath. They just do it. It is programmed in. Check YouTube and you can see babies less than two weeks old swimming.
To say adults cannot swim “instinctually” is wrong. Unless we can lose our instincts. More it is an issue that our intellect overrides our instinct (we do that all the time which is generally a good thing). You fall in the water and your cognizant mind tells you, “OMG! I can’t swim! I’m gonna die!” and you understandably freak. Nevertheless the instinct to hold your breath and paddle is still there (indeed most drowning people do actually manage to stay on the surface…instinct…just in their panicked frenzy they thrash about so much they exhaust themselves quickly and then drown).
Again, I cannot think of another mammal that will drown if you throw it in the water because it has never been in water and “can’t swim” (barring the overbred dogs). They may not like it, they may be scared, but they will paddle themselves out of the water just fine (assuming there is somewhere safe to paddle to).
Humans are animals. Why should we be different in that respect?
For one thing, most other mammals have a configuration that allows them to easily keep their nose and mouth above the water while the rest of their body is submerged. Obviously humans are capable of doing the same, but to me at least, it looks a lot easier and more obvious for a dog. I would think this is why people are prone to panic. If you naturally started floating in a way that allowed you to keep breathing, you could just paddle toward shore like the dog does. I don’t think that usually happens with humans.
And no cite, so I would welcome more information, but it is commonly said that chimps and other great apes are at best, very poor swimmers.
How about armadillos? I bet they can’t swim. 
That’s part of it. the rest of it is that for other animals swimming and walking using exactly the same motions. IOW if an animal panics and tries to run to shore or simply climb out of the water it will swim to shore by accident. I’ve seen numerous dogs that swam by quite obviouly trying to climb out of the water, lifting each paw free at each stroke. Humans, because we are bipedal, can’t do that.
Which also explains why babies can manage to swim. They aren’t doing anything more than trying to crawl out of the water.
As for the idea that animals don’t panic when dropped in water, that’s utter bollocks. I’ve seen dogs, cats, chickens, cattel and pigs fall into water, and jeez do they panic. Their first reaction is to thrash around and try to walk over the surface. It’s only after they realise that they are in water that they try to swim. It’s the fact that there normal mode of locomotion drives them across the water rather than under it that prevents them from drowning. Not remaining clear headed.
The great apes don’t generally like water, viewing it as a nuisance. SO no, they aren’t great swimmers but they are no worse than a lot of other animals that don’t like water.
Actually armadillos are quite good swimmers. They a have an interesting technique of gulping air so that it fills there gut and makes them float.
:smack: To say that language is instinctive doesn’t mean we have “The English Language 1.0” coded into our genes.
It simply means that our brains have sophisticated language processing ability built in.
We often like to think of the brain as a blank slate, but actually our brains are highly specialised in many ways. And a significant proportion of our brain is tasked with acquiring language, of a syntax and grammar like those of actual spoken languages (what I mean is: our brains are biased towards particular kinds of grammars).
So, what are we saying? That if I throw a newborn baby into a pool I needn’t worry about it? It will keep it’s mouth above water and take breaths, and successfully swim to the side?
All this talk of instinct is missing the point. Instinctively keeping your head above the water and flailing your arms and legs around may keep you alive for a minute or two, but it is exhausting and unsustainable. To be able to avoid drowning you need to be able to stay afloat efficiently, and that is a learned skill for some.
not only does panic kill in this situation but plain old stupid will kill you pretty quickly as well.
there was a small lake I used to swim at all the time, and every year (mostly) there was at least one death by drowning and over 20 years or so I can only remember one kid who died an accidental death. (he dove down and got tangled in some fishing line and couldnt get out)
every other death was some brand of stupid. so here are some basics
STOP SPRINTING EVERYWHERE YOU MORON!!! several deaths were people who sprinted across the lake, got out exhausted, messed around a bit on the other side then on the way back sprinted again and drowned when they ran out of steam. even a relatively poor swimmer can swim/float for a very very long time and if you are going for distance then just like running taking it slow and easy is your best bet. (my son swam this lake when he was 4 btw so its not like it was some huge marathon I would guess maybe a 1/4 mile or less)
why are you wearing your pants and SPRINTING??? yes swimming fully dressed is not the best plan but again slow the hell down.
alcohol + water = much death, lots of people who had been drinking. surprise booze kills your ability to handle aerobic activity pretty quickly and makes you a moron as well.
I would guess that on top of panic those 3 things are the top of the list for why people drown.
nt
About 10 years ago I was friends with a guy who had been in the navy in East Germany, prior to the wall coming down.
He told pretty much the same thing.
Where he was stationed, was close enough to the west ( Denmark) for people wanting to escape / defect, to consider swimming. Every couple of days their surface radar would pick up unknown blips on the display, and often it was swimmers. The response was to send out a motor boat to pick them up. The crews were trained never to dive in and approach a floundering person as they would instinctively grab you, sometimes with force sufficient to break your arm, out of sheer terror - they were instructed to circle the person until they stopped moving either from exhaustion or having lost consciousness, then swim in and retrieve them in the manner you described.
This is what I read once. Crawling babies will sort out the right configuration, so will most kids who use their bodies in all sorts of creative ways during play. But part of the problem with adult non-swimmers drowning is that as panic sets in, the non-swimmer will try to orient themselves vertically, trying to get their feet on something so they can stand up.
This may work okay of you’re 5’2" and standing in only 4’ of water, but in the deep end there won’t be anything to stand on. The instinct to stand is really strongly tied the flight or flight instincts. So non-swimmer adults and kids old enough to have been walking for awhile, will struggle to keep their feet down and stand and that’s really counter productive to flipping onto your back or stomach to float.
We used to see this with one of my young cousins who was taking swimming lessons. They were trying to teach him to float, holding him on the surface. He’d start to float, the instructor would let go, and he’d immediately try to sit up and put his feet on the bottom of the pool and down he’d go.
Back when I was 18ish, my friends and I would sometimes be drinking down at the beach. We devised an ingeniously retarded game where we’d throw out a sealed bottle of whiskey, race to it, whoever got there first would take a swig and throw it further out, and we’d race again. Whee.
I was an overly confident swimmer. I used to swim out probably about a mile by myself into the middle of lake Erie. One time I went far out enough at night that when I turned around, I couldn’t see the shore - nothing but black in every direction and I was disoriented. There was a nearby power plant with smoke stacks that had aircraft warning lights - I was able to orient myself that way.
That would be REALLY scary.
What I remember most was actually being oddly calm. It’s certainly a scary situation but I actually remember calmly thinking myself through. “Hmm. Can’t see the shore. I should be able to see street lights or something, right? Nope… uh… well, I can just turn around and swim back… except… maybe I gradually got myself turned and I’m not sure right behind me is the way to go… ok, can I navigate using the stars? Nope, I’ll probably get that one wrong. Ok, look around… aha! Aircraft lights… if the power plant is that way, then the shore must be that way…”
It wasn’t that I was immune to fear … whenever a fish bumped into my leg when I was in deep water it freaked me out for a few seconds for no good reason, but in this instance, when I realized I might’ve been lost… it was… almost serene.
People who are flailing are at least easy to see, and as a lifeguard, I appreciated that. I only pulled out one flailing person, who in fact if she hadn’t panicked could have stood up in the pool and had her head above water.
I also pulled out two kids who were underwater. They thought they were swimming, but they were sinking. Neither one of them was flailing, but they weren’t coming up. This is the myth, that people will come up and yell for help. Not in my experience. They just go under. The kids I pulled out might not have been drowning and they might have gotten everything under control, but they were little kids and who wants to risk it? I hauled them out, very calmly, not as if I thought they were drowning, but as if I thought they were doing it wrong (which they were).
Ah, you got into what I call the “Emergency Zen Mode”.