tom brown ?

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Magnussen said:
Where I live the temperature will only drop to about -17C.... Where I train(Northern Ontario), temperatures can drop to -45C. I regularly train in -15C to -35C during the winter and can tell you as a witness and from personal experience that these things are humanly possible.
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The way Mr. Brown talks, you could get the idea that you can survive "living off the land" in almost any environment, without proper clothing and gear. Certainly there are places where such an idea is absolutelu ridicilous, and dangerous, as well as there are places where people with some luck could survive years eating cononuts :) Training and experience can move that thin line, so you can survive in more hostile environments.

What Im saying is, that the idea of "living off the land" without a lot of experience in navigation, nutrition, first aid, and hypo/hyperthermia is dangerous. It's fun to train primitive skills, (why else would we be on this forum?), but to really go hiking without adequate gear is stupid, and is IMHO against the very idea of "surviving". For example, in the temperatures you mentiond, would you consider going hiking without a pair of good warm gloves?

But, as I said earlier, after reading about the environment mr. Brown inhabits, a lot of things make more sense to me :D

Offtopic: By the way, maybe we should make a new thread for survival techniques in extreme temperatures? I see there is some experience of the subject here :thumbup:
 
"I'm just glad the situation has come about that people who teach survival schools can now make some money because now no matter whether we think they are poseurs or what, it's a hell of a lot better job than cutting forests down, working at a chemical plant, or pushing paper in a cubicle."

I think that's a point where we differ. Better for whom. Personally I'd rather see the man dragging the toilet cart through the streets of Bombay than making money gilding the lily with fanciful tales of mysticism, clairvoyance, and spirituality. In fact, I lean to the point at which if a man is going to make money off the back of other people peddling such mystical stuff they should be made to stand trial under the trades descriptions act and forced to give evidence. No evidence and it's no more than snake oil, the con, the bunco, and the flim-flam. He needs incontrovertible evidence that what he is selling is what it purports to be.

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For my part, I find it difficult to imagine what anyone could take away from such courses that they could really hold any worth in as a skill. To heavily bend a phrase from Rita Carter; “Natural history is more marvelous than anything we could dream up”, so by descending into fantasy you're not getting the picture, not really getting any skills at all. You may just get some comfort, but it is an illusion. How much better it would be to stick to sound data, referenced, peer reviewed, and well practiced. How much better it would be to learn plant skills from a botanist, and your medical skills from a medic, your tracking skills from hunters, hunter forces, and search and rescue teams... and on and on. What's with the need for the guru, and a guru that cobbles together the entire bucket that is their story with an eternal brown braid.

I am also very aware of a thread that was running on the Swamp Rat forum in which several SAR members participated. Essentially, they were musing over the fact that for a man that has apparently found several people with his SAR skills there was exactly zero, repeat, bugger all, documented evidence of this in the SAR community. That was extremely conspicuous as it is not the case with others. I have no understanding of how the SAR community in the US operates documentation, but when several unrelated guys working in the field all tell me the same thing my ears go up.
















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To whomever – feel free to disagree, but whoever you are note that activating rudeness with the w4nker emoticon is just a challenge to me to race to the bottom of the bucket. I'm willing to be banned not to lose a game of that, so if you start it be sure of your brinkmanship 'cos you'll need it.
 
baldtaco-II said:
I am also very aware of a thread that was running on the Swamp Rat forum in which several SAR members participated. Essentially, they were musing over the fact that for a man that has apparently found several people with his SAR skills there was exactly zero, repeat, bugger all, documented evidence of this in the SAR community.
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Maybe they were black op CIA operations, like the one to which the movie "The Hunted" is based on. That would explain the lack of documentation... You see, black op operations cannot be mentioned in any documents. Luckily it's ok to do movies about them :D
 
attej said:
Maybe they were black op CIA operations, like the one to which the movie "The Hunted" is based on. That would explain the lack of documentation... You see, black op operations cannot be mentioned in any documents. Luckily it's ok to do movies about them :D
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Happily I've never seen the movie, but I get ya ;-)
 
baldtaco-II said:
"
I think that's a point where we differ. Better for whom. Personally I'd rather see the man dragging the toilet cart through the streets of Bombay than making money gilding the lily with fanciful tales of mysticism, clairvoyance, and spirituality. In fact, I lean to the point at which if a man is going to make money off the back of other people peddling such mystical stuff they should be made to stand trial under the trades descriptions act and forced to give evidence. No evidence and it's no more than snake oil, the con, the bunco, and the flim-flam. He needs incontrovertible evidence that what he is selling is what it purports to be.

.....
How much better it would be to stick to sound data, referenced, peer reviewed, and well practiced. How much better it would be to learn plant skills from a botanist, and your medical skills from a medic, your tracking skills from hunters, hunter forces, and search and rescue teams... and on and on. What's with the need for the guru, and a guru that cobbles together the entire bucket that is their story with an eternal brown braid.
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Not talking about the mystic aspect there. I think you got a little too hung up on my use of the word guru.

What I'm saying is that anyone who gets people out in the woods and is working at a job that doesn't rape the planet and even maybe gets people to respect the planet is not a bad thing.

Just like you say you'd probably be better off learning the skills in greater detail from somebody who is really educated, but if TB is the first step for some folks, that's not so bad.:thumbup:
 
LeeCQC said:
I actually really like the movie... :o
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Yeah, it's not bad. Both Tommy Lee Jones and Benicio Del Toro are great actors. Some silly stuff in it though, but then again; which hollywood movie doesnt.

To stay on subject, heres an interview of Mr. Brown, concerning the movie.
 
I thought about renting the movie this weekend because of this thread :eek: I've seen it, but the little miss hasn't. :D (course, I also own the rambo collectors edition...)
 
hollowdweller said:
Not talking about the mystic aspect there. I think you got a little too hung up on my use of the word guru.

What I'm saying is that anyone who gets people out in the woods and is working at a job that doesn't rape the planet and even maybe gets people to respect the planet is not a bad thing.

Just like you say you'd probably be better off learning the skills in greater detail from somebody who is really educated, but if TB is the first step for some folks, that's not so bad.:thumbup:
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For my part that is a nice enough place to conclude. :-)
 
I was about ready to close this thread but I changed my mind after seeing the resoulution between Midnight Penguin and TonyM. I'm impressed with the agreement made.

That being said, I don't have to close this thread and think it should now die a slow death and fall to the bottom of the posts in the WS&S Forum.
 
I'm sceptic towars Brown's apache stories, but I do think he offers something that people are willing to pay for, and there is noone else who offers it.
I don't remember Brown saying that his school is the only way to go and I don't think he offers people to prepare them for polar exploration. I think he knows his clients and wouldn't teach them anything that exposes them to danger.

His school is not for me, but that doesn't mean it's worthless. Also I like his knife but I'm not willing to pay the price for one.
Yes, a fiskars hatchet and a mora are way cheaper and can do everything his knife can. But the idea is all about having everything in one single tool for those who want it that way.
 
No one else offers courses on living with nature? No one at all?

As for the "spiritual stuff," yes, I could believe that there are no other legitimate wilderness instructors packaging their instruction with a bunch of lies about non-existent native-American mentors.
 
Sharp Phil said:
No one else offers courses on living with nature?
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It's the combination I'm talking about.
I don't believe his stories either but I'm rather careful with the word "lie". It's just my personal believe that Stalking Wolf wasn't real but I'm not 100% sure, so I'd rather focus on Brown's knowledge, regardless how he got it.
 
OP>>
Hey, look, if you're just starting out...I think what is being lost in translation is this: TBJ's classes can become complicated quickly. If you're a beginner, start slow and learn the basics. Then after you've become more aquainted with the wilderness and more confident in your skills, if you still feel like you need more...and you want to take TBJ's class...have at it.
TBJ knows his shit, nobody'll dispute that...but lots of people don't like his attitude.

hth
 
For me the bottom line is that he pegs my BS meter. I am sure he is a better tracker than anyone I personally know, etc, etc. But honestly, for most people, me included, woods survival stuff is all just a fun hobby anyway. I don't live in the bush in a teepee, so I don't feel like I need to have his skill level at tracking or anything else. The degree to which I do find wilderness information and skills useful is mainstream enough that I can get it from a hundred sources.

So even if he is the world's best tracker (and I wouldn't know if he is or isn't) it really makes no difference to me. I can pretty easily go find the world's 500th best tracker, who could tell me everything I would ever need to know, or could realistically use. I could find the world's 500th best firelighter, and learn everything about firelighting I could realistically use, and so on.

To put this in a context most of us might be familiar with: I am probably one of the world's top five million knot-tyers. That's just a guess, maybe I am only in the top 100 million. I know about a dozen knots, and I tie them all regularly at work while rigging oddball loads on different equipment. I can tie them in the rain, in the dark, backwards. But I only know about a dozen knots.

I never even thought about how many other knots there are until I started reading the youthful DOC-CANADA's posts. Then I looked at the Ashley book of knots, and realized that there are 23403751 frillion knots I could learn. But I know I never will, because I am neither a knot collector nor the independently wealthy owner of a rope factory.

The thing is, though, with my dozen knots, I can do just about anything any person will realistically need to do with a rope. I know because I do it at work all the time!

So it's true, Ashley (and DOC for that matter) are probably world-class knot people, and I am pretty far down on a pretty gigantic podium. But when it comes to simple, everyday living in the wilderness and using ropes, you don't need to be the best knot-man on the planet, you really only need to be in the top hundred million.

So maybe Tom Brown is the best at something, but I don't need the best. I just need people who know what they're doing, and I would take someone from the top 1% of any profession that didn't peg my BS meter over a top 0.01%er that did any day.
 
I thought I was clear. Guess not. This thread is done. The original question was answered and now this thread is over.
 
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