Do you have a favorite shark?

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

Well, Brian lives in the US, so we'll use those figures.

Out of a population of 330 000 000, about 180 000 000 Americans make a combined 2 billion beach visits every year (on average). Obviously, not everyone who visits a beach goes into the water on every visit, so let's reduce that number. Let's reduce it a LOT and take out the people who are there to lie in the sun or play frisbee or collect seashells and so on. Let's reduce it by a factor of ten (that's probably too much, but I want to be as generous as possible) and say that only 1/10 of everyone who visits a beach goes into the water and is at risk of a shark bite. That leaves 200 000 000. Out of those two hundred million, the average number of people in the US who have the potential to be bitten by a shark andARE actually bitten is...50.  The average number of fatalities from shark attacks is 2. This means that the percentage chance you have of being bitten by a shark while in 'water that are actually known to be frequented by man eating sharks' is 0.000025.

While I agree that that this is an infinitely greater chance of a shark bite than that of someone who never leaves, say, Kansas, it's still a small enough percentage that it's bloody silly to spend any time worrying that it might happen.

What's disingenuous about that?

Boru

Sadly, dying in a vehicle accident on your way to any beach renders all those shark statistics irrelevent. /thread

Well, it becomes pretty relevant if the shark you're transporting to the beach jumps out of its carrier and startles you so much that you lose control of your car and crash headlong into a bus carrying the road company of 'West Side Story'.

Boru