Knotting brain washing, and the bowline.

[X1]

   I read at the Wikipedia article about the tying of the bowline :TyingA mnemonic used to teach the tying of the bowline is to imagine the end of the rope as a rabbit, and where the knot will begin on the standing part, a tree trunk. First a loop is made near the end of the rope, which will act as the rabbit's hole. Then the "rabbit" comes up the hole, goes round the tree right to left, then back down the hole.

• The rabbit hole.
• Out comes the rabbit,
• runs around the tree,
• and hops back into its hole.

   There is a potential with beginners to tie what is known as an Eskimo bowline. This faulty knot stems from an incorrect first step while tying the rabbit hole. If the loop is made backwards so that the bitter end is on the bottom, the resulting knot will be sideways. The final loop of a sideways bowline will slip. This makes it particularly dangerous in the case of an inexperienced sailor, who, in addition to having an insecure knot, is also less familiar with what to do should it come untied on the water. ( Red underlining by me )
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 With THIS  BS, no wonder people believe that there is ONE tying method for the bowline,  already carved in the first Stone Tablet...( which was later smashed ). And that there is ONE front view of the bowline, which has been imprinted in their brains, or, better, in their DNA. Generations of knot tyers have been brain-washed by the parroting if this "rabbit hole and tree trunk" junk !
   Following this method, one will never understand which is the function of the bight component. in general, and the reason that the eye leg of the Tail penetrates the nipping turn as it penetrates it, in particular. Also, people that have been brain washed by this method, would tend to consider the "Eskimo" bowline faulty, and insecure - and, of course, they will never see that there are four (4) different variations of the "Eskimo" bowline ! They will never understand that there is a variation of the "Eskimo" bowline, where the continuation of the eye leg passes in between the rim of the nipping loop and the eye leg of the Standing part, and the Tail is tucked "under" it, which is probably more stable and safe than the "Common" bowline - indeed, this variation can be considered almost as a "safe bowline" !
   Well, I will not try to convince knot tyers that they have been brain washed, because I know this would not be good for their jammed ego.. . However, I will show two pictures of a different, more revealing mental image of the bowline, which explains the structural role of the legs of the bight component in relation to the nipping turn : a mental image which shows why the nipping turn can not be unwinded, open up and degenerate into an open helix. Next time knot tyers will teach the bowline to a boy scout, they would be able to sing a different Looney tune, and show something more than Bags Bunny !
   ( The ruler plays the role of the eye leg of the Tail )

[James Petersen]

The rabbit, the hole, and the tree aren't all that bad. You just have to make sure that the standing part is understood to be the tree. When you form an Eskimo bowline, you have simply confused the tree with a root.

[X1]

   I see you have read this post, too...ALL of it, I can hope...?
   So, you should have understood what I mean. The "Traditional" mnemonic helps the knot tyers remember, for ever, how to tie the bowline, and remain ignorant, for ever, of its structure, at the same time !
   If you understand that the (tensioned) eye leg of the Tail has to be inserted between the rim of the nipping turn and its limb that is about to collar, SO THE NOPPING TURN WILL NOT BE ABLE TO TWIST, AND OPEN UP, AND DEGENERATE INTO AN OPEN HELIX, then you will understand the structure of the bowline, and why the eye leg of the collar enters into it from the side it enters into it !
   The image with the ruler, playing the role of the tensioned eye leg, tells all that generations of rabbits and trees never did ! See the nipping loop as I show it in the second image, from "above", and tell me which is the "front" side !
   There is this convenient mistuned song, from the members of the choir, which you seem to sing also very well : That there is nothing here but "semantics", "conventions", "silly" things ! Of course, they are hiding into their hole, because in the light of the day/truth, things were never like this ! We do not have to just label two views, and consider the issue solved...We have to decide if there is one of those two views that can convey more useful information about the " most important part of the most important component of the most important eye-knot "(sic), as I have written THREE times, but your headache had not enabled you to read or understand...
   We may well use both views, and, why not, a third one, too, and a fourth one, a fifth one...ad infinitum ! However, we have to decide what we will do if/when we have to use ONE view, and ONE view only ! IFF we will agree that one view shows the area of the nipping turn s crossing point better, will we ignore it ? And why we would use the other view ? For reasons of "semantics", convention", that is, "silly" reasons ?
   I listen to the silence of the choir s absence of ANY argument ! That made me think that the brain washed members have been in this sad state years now, from when they were children, and played with Bags Bunny.. It is not mere parroting and repetition as I first thought ! It is something deeper, brains washed with a childish mnemonic, that is in perfect accordance with the "front" ( ! ) view it uses : It hides more than it reveals !
   

[DDK]

. . . With THIS  BS . . .

Are you seriously saying that the use of a mnemonic to teach beginners how to tie a knot is BS?  I suppose you must really hate the "right over left, then, left over right" for teaching the Reef Knot to a beginner.  And lets not get started on the use of letters for loops like b-d and b-q, interlocked or not, for producing the various interlocked overhand bends.  By the way, as one who has taught many knots to boy scouts, you need to understand that we find it helpful to first teach them how to "walk" before attempting to teach them how to "run".  The twisting your wrist method of tying a bowline is also taught to boy scouts since it is a much faster and safer method (no wrapping of the nipping turn around your fingers).

I wonder what tying method you use to tie the bowline, ABOK #1010.  You don't like the rabbit hole.  You don't like the twisting your wrist method.  Does your method, perhaps, require the use of the ruler you show above?

DDK

[X1]

Are you seriously saying that the use of a mnemonic to teach beginners how to tie a knot is BS?

   When we have indications that it brain washes them for the rest of their lives, as it is indicated by the kind of the replies on the "Best view of the bowline" thread, YES !
   I do not wish people learn to parrot one knot, and be blinded for all their life about any other knot ! Or to know one knot, and do not understand how it works, as a structure ( as roo , with the Zeppelin bend...). I do not wish people to learn knots, I wish then to learn what a knot is, and why it works, why a knot is better than the other, and how they can search and find new knots.
   In short, I do not wish to offer ready made, chewed fish to young people, I wish to teach them fishing.

  "By the way, as one who has taught many knots to boy scouts, you need to understand that we find it helpful to first teach them how to "walk" before attempting to teach them how to "run". 
   
   "By the way"  , as one who has seen how mature knot tyers, that like to be present themselves as "teachers",  do not understand a thing about the knots they are parroting for decades, I disagree !
   I prefer somebody who knows nothing, but still has the curiosity to learn, than somebody who knows half-things, and he is sooo proud because he believes he knows everything ! People that have been brain-washed are dangerous for themselves and for the others. Knowledge should be offered, right from the beginning, as a procedure, by which the critical thinking can approach things, not as forced swallowing of the things themselves. We have enough of devoted fanatics in knotting, let us promote free thinking, so people will UNDERSTAND many things, and not just REPRODUCE the same few things

Does your method, perhaps, require the use of the ruler you show above?

   
   My dear DDK, your humour is worse even than mine s !    Do not use it too often...
 
    I have explicitly said that the ruler plays the role of the tensioned eye leg of the Tail - but you tried to hide it under the rug, just to "provide" this "clever" one-liner...
   So, YES, "my" method uses the eye leg of the bight as a line that should be positioned in between the nipping turn s rim and the leg which is about to collar. Read it again : "my" method uses the eye leg of the bight as a line that should be positioned in between the nipping turn s rim and the leg which is about to collar...Or have I said it again ? ( I start to lose numbers by repeating the same things so many times...because nobody really reads anything !  People like to show of how "clever" they are, by "providing" rhetoric questions, and they do not reply to anything they have been told !  )
   HAVE YOU MEASURED THE AMOUNT OF THE HALF-RIM OF THE NIPPING TURN THAT CONTAINS THE CROSSING POINT, AND IT IS HIDDEN IN YOUR "FRONT" (!) VIEW -  OR NOT ?
   When/if you will, THEN start making "humour" again...( Perhaps you will also notice that the ruler is on scales of centimetres, and not of inches, as the "International" audience here would prefer. If you can not understand what I write, please, ask me specific questions, and I will reply at once - or use the Google Translator - the very successful "international" method suggested to me by roo.)
 
   Oh, my KnotGod, what sins do I pay ?    Please, show me a new knot, to be able to continue singing against a whole choir !  

[Ruby]

I'd like to tie a bowline 1010 in bight without threading the working end

So what's  your  tying method indeed? Just cannot get it.

[X1]

I'd like to tie a bowline 1010 in the bight without threading the working end

   
   You have to visit the fourth dimension to achieve this. In four dimensions the topology of the bowline is different ! 

So what's your tying method indeed ? Just cannot get it.

 
   You have to try, just a little bid, to understand what I am talking about in the previous posts...It is all there, if you notice that I use the ruler in the place of the eye leg of the Tail - and if you notice that I had said it, explicitly, although it was completely redundant.

   If you understand that the (tensioned) eye leg of the Tail has to be inserted between the rim of the nipping turn and its limb that is about to collar, SO THE NOPPING TURN WILL NOT BE ABLE TO TWIST, AND OPEN UP, AND DEGENERATE INTO AN OPEN HELIX, then you will understand the structure of the bowline, and why the eye leg of the collar enters into it from the side it enters into it !

   
  To achieve this, you can hold the nipping turn any way you wish, and look at it from any side you wish - even from "above", as my second picture shows... Where is the supposedly privileged "front view" that lies in the brain-washed brain of the beholder... ?
   When we imagine people tying bowlines, we also have to imagine under which circumstances they do this... The uniqueness of ONE tying method, involving a rabbit, a dinosaur, or an Alien, is a myth ! There are MANY tying methods, that do not presuppose the "sacred" "front" view that has been imprinted in the brain cells or the DNA of knot tyers for generations...and which hides more than it reveals  ! No wonder that most knot tyers refuse to even to think about the real issue, of which view shows the area around the crossing point of the nipping turn...They are simply brain-washed, and they like to believe that all other people are just like them - or that they should become like them !
    The bowline is a simple knot, but it has a few twists of its own... Very few people have read any of the many posts at the " Bowlines..." long thread, because they imagine they know, or they do not even imagine that one needs to "know" something about the bowline - and not just keep playing with Bags Bunny the hide-and-seek-the-crossing-point game !   
 

[Ruby]

Well, actually I do tie it without threading the working end. I grasp the SPart and tail in left hand, and do it using right hand, by twisting the SPart leg to make the nip loop, and finally pull the eye leg through the loop to complete the bowling. When tying bowline posting eye, not tying it posting nothing, I find this method easy and interesting.

[X1]

When tying bowline posting eye, not tying it posting...

    It would be nice if the knot tyer is familiar with more than one tying methods for the bowline, so he can chose the most convenient each time... It is a different thing to tie a bowline when the standing part comes towards you and you have to keep it tensioned while you form the nipping turn, and a different thing to tie a bowline when you have to pass the working end through a rusted ring on the face of the dock at your arm s length. It is a different thing to tie a bowline on a thin flexible cord, than on a thick stiff mooring line - which might also be wet and filthy ! 
   The issue of which should be the main mental image a knot tyer has to have for the bowline ( so, which should be the main, "face" view, either we will call it "front" view, "Convenient" view, or whatever ), is a different one, not necessarily connected with the tying method it happens to follow. We can have more than one convenient tying methods, according to the orientation, the size and the stiffness of the line, but it is natural to prefer to have one only mental image of it. When I was speaking about the main view, I was always  speaking of this mental image, which is not necessarily corresponding to with a certain tying method. The brain-washed knot tyers, by the rabbit-around-the-tree mesmerizing stereotype, tried to turn attention to the tying method, because this was helping their cause - to retain the present status quo of what happens to be the "front" view of the bowline, at all costs ! So, they made the linkage between the main mental image and the tying method seem too tight - and they deliberately ignored the fact that there are more than one tying methods.
   On the contrary, I do not need / wish to base the mental image I prefer to a particular tying method, but on un understanding of the relation between the eye leg of the tail and the nipping turn. The bight component, in general, and the eye leg of the Tail, in particular, has to stabilize the nipping turn, by preventing it from opening up and degenerating into a open helix. How can it achieve this ? By passing in between the rim of the nipping turn and the strand which the eye leg of the Tail should collar - either in the case of the Common bowline, or in the case of the "Eskimo" bowline". The picture which I show in this thread is symmetric, it corresponds to BOTH bowlines : The ruler / eye leg of the Tail has to play the same role in the Common and in the "Eskimo" bowline. ( The fact that at half of the 2 variations of the Common bowline and the 4 of the Eskimo bowline this role is also played by its continuation, the Tail itself, is of secondary importance. When we "see" the eye leg of the Tail, we see it as the one member of the bight component pair of parallel legs, so it is a minor issue if it is the eye leg of the Tail or the Tail itself that is in contact with the collared strand, in between this strand and the rim of the nipping turn ).
   The brain washed knit tyers do not wish to accept that they have been fooled by Bags Bunny all those years, of course !  They will never admit that they just have one particular mental image their mind, which they can not erase from their brain cells or their DNA, because it corresponds to the one particular tying method they have been taught when they were boys ! Had the person or book which brain-washed them used a different animal than a rabbit  , to portray a different tying method where the eye leg of the tail does not come out of the hole, but dives into it, they would had a different mental image - and they would had understood who was "simple-minded" and "silly" all that time !  
   I have shown a mental image based on the logic of the bowline, and not on a particular mnemonic. The so-called "teachers" of knots - we have more teachers than students in this Forum !  - will fight with their teeth and their nails to protect their privileged "front" view - just because it corresponds to the one particular tying mnemonic the had been forced to parrot when they were boys, and now wish force anybody else to parrot and sing with them, in a harmonious choir...Well, I, for one, I will not sing this song, not because I do not like to singing along with other people, but because I do not like repetition, when it is not beneficial to some understanding of how things work.
   Of course, any knot tyer has the right to remain in the brain-washed state of mind he is, for as long as he wishes. However, he has NOT the right to try to brain-wash all the other people around him in the same way - or to behave to the people that were lucky to avoid brain washing, or to be brain-washed by a different animal  , the way they behaved during those two threads !

[xarax]

I am not brain-washed, and your suggestion is offensive.

   It is not a suggestion, it is a theory, the only one I am able to think of that explains the FACTS :

   That knot tyers keep repeating / parroting only tying methods that involve only the so-called "front" view - even after they had accepted that the bowline, as every other knot, can well be tied with different methods by different people.
   I do not see any environmental or social reason they keep doing this - and they themselves had not been able to offer any, either. So, the only thing I have to suppose, as a working hypothesis, is that their brain just does not allow them to do this, because it is brain-washed when they were young. They had been brain-washed, and they are brain-washing other peole now - the "poor" "novices", who are supposedly completely stupid, and they can not understand how the bowline works ! Like the understanding of the  bowline is some kind rocket science, for KnotGod s sake ! So, they have been treated as parrots, and start parroting - parroting does not kill the parrot, so the reproduction of yet another not-critical knotting myth will continue for ever !
   Of course, nobody would ever been left free to understand and admit that he/she has been brain-washed for sooo long, without even noticing it ! THAT is the raison d etre of the brain-washing, otherwise human history would had followed a completely different course...
   I beg any person that thinks he knows why the particular tying methods, that involve only the so-called "front" view, are the more "natural", "better" in any regard outside obedience to the washed out brain cells, to falsify my theory ! When confronted with an un-explained situation in life, it was always a good starting point to " cherchez la femme". When confronted with an inexplicable convention in knotting, it seems reasonable to suppose brain-washing of knot tyers by yet another self-reproducing non-critical knotting myth.   

[X1]

   Another way of representing the bowline, foe educational purposes, can possibly be the one I describe in this post.
   Starting from the straight line,  instead of forming a mid-line bight and then twisting it around its symmetry  axis 180 degrees to form a nipping loop, we can twist it 270 degrees right away  - that is, we can twist it 90 degrees more than we are accustomed to. If we do  this, we get a nipping turn perpendicular to the line. Now, the path the working  end has to follow to penetrate this nipping turn is obvious, and for it   there is no "over" or "under", "front" or "back" - there is only "from  below"/down to "above"/up, running against itself, towards the direction the  line comes from. Then, after this working end exits from the other side of the  nipping turn, is much more easy to see how it has to make the U turn around the  Standing end to form the collar, and then return and enter into the nipping  loop, following the opposite path than before, running against itself  again.
   So, we can remove the ambiguity of the "over" / "under"  or "under-"over", or "front-to-back" or "back to front" way the working end has  to enter into the nipping turn, by just forcing the nipping turn to be twisted  90 degrees more right at the start, and remain so until the very end of the  tying. Any excessive twisting will be removed by itself during the final  dressing of the knot, when we will pull the two legs of the bight component  together, as much as possible.
    ( I can not say if and how exactly this can help to resolve the labelling problem of the different views of the bowline, but I believe that it is, conceptually, a  simplification over / unification of the two groups of the two groups of tying methods that correspond to the different views -  the conventional ones that use the so-called 'front" view, and the "other" ones  that use the "other" view, like the one I have shown in the previous post.  However, I believe it might be useful somehow...)
    Now, why not  presenting the bowline as such, with a nipping turn perpendicular to the axis of  loading ? After all, this mental picture is similar to the mental picture of the  Gleipnir, which is even more elementary knot than bowline, in that it does not  uses a collar ( it divides the tensile force on the Tail by two, using the  second wraps of the two opposing lines and the mechanical advantage they offer  ).
    I would like to listen to the opinion of knot tyers on this  idea...I believe that it would be great if we could, even for some brief moments, become boy scouts again, when we were seeing the world around us with a pure eye, and a pure soul, and we  were not afraid to ask : Why ? I believe we have not lost the ability to wonder,  and feel the joy this wonderful World offers to us.

[squarerigger]

X1,

Maybe your rhetoric could be toned down somewhat to allow the comments you are making not to get lost among the verbiage.  What you appear to be saying is that the way you perceive knot-tying instructions and diagrams to be made is that there is only one face shown of the bowline.  You excoriate others for this, by saying that they are brain-washed into thinking only one way.  Here is another explanation;  they are reducing their workload by using something that already exists and is somewhat useful for some to learn.  True teachers will recognize that not everyone learns the same way and that sometimes a different method or approach is needed for understanding.  For some students there will always only be one way that they know how to tie the bowline (which is a less-than-useful loop knot, so I am unsure why you see this as a particularly ominous event).  That being the case why do you insist that they should also learn another way?  If it works, let it be.  But whatever happens, don't let your writing run away with sense!  If it is not broken why fix it?  Are we making unnecessary waves?  Let us know.

Squarerigger
PS:  In my status as a moderator I would very much appreciate your toning down the rhetoric to something that does not get all blood boiling!

[xarax]

  Sites where the bowline is shown from the "other" side :

  http://www.sisl.ch/montreux/noeuds/16.jpg
  http://www.sisl.ch/montreux/noeuds.html

   http://www.grimper.com/article-noeuds-encordement-noeud-huit-noeud-chaise

  http://home.nordnet.fr/~jmillecamps/miznet/noeuds.htm
 
  http://www.lespassagersduvent.fr/iso_album/noeuds.pdf 
 
  http://www.lifeguardzone.fr/noeud-de-chaise/2013/04/
 
  See the attached pictures.

[xarax]

True teachers will recognize that not everyone learns the same way and that sometimes a different method or approach is needed for understanding.  For some students there will always be only one way that they know how to tie the bowline

   So, although "everyone does not learn the same way" , and "true" teachers " will recognize" this, they nevertheless will always show THE SAME way to ALL students - because for "SOME" of them, "there will always be only one way that they know how to tie the bowline". - miraculously, THE SAME way ! 
   It s all Greek to me...

   Probably because I just could nt believe in my own eyes, I have not realized till now what was written here :   

...the bowline (which is a less-than-useful loop knot....

   NO COMMENTS ! ! !    
 
   ( my blood gets boiling again...)

[SS369]

  For some students there will always only be one way that they know how to tie the bowline (which is a less-than-useful loop knot,

Snipping this out because I would like some clarity please.

How is the bowline a less than useful loop knot?

SS