Steven Garofalo
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THE TITON SUB TRAGEDY: A Lack Of Wisdom & Knowledge
By Steven Garofalo, June 30, 2023 (Copyright 2023)
June 30, 2023

THE ESSENTIAL COMPONENTS IN CHOOSING LEADERS: WISDOM AND KNOWLEDGE

On June of 2023, the The 22-foot carbon-fiber and titanium craft, called the Titan, was deployed by a Canadian expedition ship, the Polar Prince, to travel nearly 13,000 feet down to the infamous TITANIC shipwreck site. The Titan lost contact with the surface ship an hour and 45 minutes after it started to dive, the U.S. Coast Guard said. It was later discovered to have imploded due to the enormous pressure of being over 13,000 feet below sea level.

A major flaw in this tragedy was the lack of WISDOM AND KNOWLEDGE in that the leadership for the company who built and run the Titan sub program was selected on the basis of diversity at the cost of wisdom, knowledge, and experience. Instead of hiring retired military personnel with decades of experience in submarine engineering and operations, they selected people based on diversity.

I would submit that such thinking reflects back to RUSH as attaining to EARTHLY, SECULAR WISDOM over GOD’S WISDOME. The sheer lack of experience in choosing employees for such a critical mission based on diversity as opposed to wisdom, knowledge and experience reflects back to the top -namely the CEO, RUSH, who lack wisdom as the key, foundational flaw in this terrible tragedy that ended with the loss of life for five people, including himself. The central point is that true wisdom comes from God, not man.

PROVERBS 2:6-8 says:

"For the LORD gives wisdom; from his mouth come knowledge and understanding;  he stores up sound wisdom for the upright; he is a shield to those who walk in integrity, guarding the paths of justice and watching over the way of his saints." (Proverbs 2:6-8)

It appears from the outside that the leadership at the top, who ran the Titan SUB tragedy lacked godly wisdom which in turn, lead to their lack of proper knowledge-which ended in death. According to an article entitled, “TITANIC TOUR LEADER LOVED RISK AND CALLED SAFETY A ‘PURE WASTE” in the Business Section of Bloomberg.com, by Laura Nahmias and Guillermo Molero, Published June 21, 2023 at 12:24 PM EDT and Updated June 22, 2023 at 9:41 AM EDT, said this. “Stockton Rush, founder of the company that owns the missing submersible craft that was on its way to view the Titanic wreckage, has said-“safety” is a pure waste…I mean if you just want to be safe, don’t get out of bed, don’t get in your car, don’t do anything,”. CEO and Founder Mr. Rush said that in a 2022 podcast with CBS reporter David Pogue.

In an article by www.m.slashdot.org entitled “Titan Sub CEO Dismissed Safety Warnings as ‘Baseless Cries’, Emails Show”, they wrote that warnings over safety over OceanGate’s Titan submersible were repeatedly dismissed by the CEO of the Sub company. This was made evident through email exchanges with a deep sea exploration specialist by the name of Rob McCullum who was involved with the company. According to BBC, Deep Sea Specialist Rob McCallum told Oceangate CEO Stockton Rush that he was potentially putting his clients at risk and urged him to stop using the sub until it had been classified by an independent body.

>>> Mr. Rush responded, saying that he was: “tired of industry players who try to use safety arguments to stop innovation”. The tense exchange ended after OceanGate’s lawyers threatened legal action. Mr McCallum had told Mr. Rush. “I think you are potentially placing yourself and your clients in a dangerous dynamic,” he wrote to the OceanGate boss in March 2018. McCallum went on to say this to Mr. Rush: “In your race to Titanic you are mirroring the famous catch cry: ‘She is unsinkable’.”

I would submit that FIRST: Mr. Rush appear to have had a sizable ego that clouded his better judgement. SECOND, He lacked the true, biblical wisdom and knowledge to be a true success in this specific endeavor. And THIRD: As a result, he along with four others perished as a result. But it didn’t need to be that way. God’s Wisdom and Knowledge is TIMELESS, SIMPLE and ESSENTIAL to life.

In an article entitled, “WATCH: ‘OceanGate’ CEO’s DEI Rant-Hiring ‘Old White Guys Not Inspirational” by Jack Montgomery, Friday, June 30, 2023, quoted Stockton Rush, CEO of OceanGate as saying that he “prioritized diversity over experience when putting together crews.

He quoted CEO RUSH as having said, “WHEN I STARTED THE BUSINESS…OTHER SUB OPERATORS [WERE] OUT THERE BUT THEY TYPICALLY [HAD] GENTLEMEN WHO ARE EX-MILITARY SUBMARINERS…A WHOLE BUNCH OF 50-YEAR OLD WHITE GUY,” HE SAID DURING A 2020 INTERVIEW”.  “I wanted our team to be younger, to be inspirational…25 -year-old who’s a sub pilot or a platform operator or one of our techs can be inspirational”. I think it’s abundantly clear that Mr. Rush choose UNWISELY. UNWISELY is different from the lack of wisdom in that sense that Mr. Rush not only ignored God’s wisdom and knowledge, but that he chose to go all in with Human WISDOM.

Job 12:12 says, “Wisdom is with the aged, and understanding in length of days”. While this was most likely a sarcastic response by Job to his friend Bildad’s assertion in 8:8, it was nonetheless true that wisdom comes with age, a true the widely accepted in the ancient east an all cultures throughout the ages.

I would submit that RUSH lacked both WISDOM and UNDERSTANDING. The tragedy is under investigation. If true, this shows a lack of UNDERSTANDING. Sadly, history has tragically repeated itself once again. I am reminded that God’s formula for good leadership is essential for us to follow in that:

  1. A leader must be WISE.
  2. A leader must be UNDERSTANDING meaning one who is EMPATHETIC.
  3. A leader must be experienced in their area of expertise and at some level of leadership.

IN CLOSING I WANT TO TAKE ANOTHER LOOK AT WHAT THE BIBLE SAYS ABOUT WISDOM AND UNDERSTANDING IN AN EFFORT TO HELP YOU AND I MAKE WISE DECISIONS HERE FORWARD AS LEADERS AND PARENTS.

Deuteronomy 1:13 says, “Choose for your tribes wise, understanding, and experienced men (LEADERS), and I will appoint them as your heads.” The key words are “WISE AND KNOWLEDGEABLE” WHY ARE THEY KEY? Because these words reflect attributes of God. Leadership that reflects the attributes of God IS REAL LEADERSHIP and leadership that fails to do so does not. Let’s break down this passage in Deuteronomy:

FIRST: Moses, in Deuteronomy speaks to WISDOM in the sense that it reflects the ability to bring harmony even when great differences exist. RUSH failed in ignoring his most experienced employees. He failed to listen to the person who brought great concern in order to eliminate the laborious and time consuming work to make the sub safe in light of bringing harmony to himself over that of the mission. That’s number one.

SECOND: Moses is speaking to an UNDERSTANDING in choosing leaders: Scripture here refers to one’s ability to penetrate the realities of life from God’s perspective, and to deal fairly with all parties in a dispute. CEO RUSH Not only failed in this regard, but he was actually repulsed by God’s UNDERSTANDING and WISDOM in light of his earthly understanding. And it cost the deaths of five people-including himself.

IN CLOSING: KNOWLEDGE is the broad experience gained by living life, by watching people, and by making correct choices based on God’s word. Sadly, on June of 2023, the The 22-foot carbon-fiber and titanium craft, called the Titan, was deployed to nearly 13,000 feet down to the shipwreck site and imploded due to the enormous pressure of being over 13,000 feet below sea level-instantly killing all on board. I submit that Mr. Stockton Rush, founder of the company IGNORED, or didn’t posses GODLY (TRUE and REAL) knowledge and wisdom to begin with. Instead, he chose EARTHLY WISDOM according to human EGO in putting innocent lives in the hands of young, hip, inexperienced young people with no real experience and rejected experienced “white men with decades of experience”, who possessed the wisdom and knowledge of having run, engineered and operated, deep sea subs over decades for the military. And we can only conclude  the very best education and those with the most wealth mean nothing without God’s WISDOM and KNOWLEDGE. And this is SADLY the REASON FOR THIS TRUTH.

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His answer was short but the animals not having souls maybe up for debate.

We can use general biblical principles to develop some clarity on the subject though Housman wrote. The Bible states that both man (Genesis 2:7) and animals (Genesis 1:30; 6:17; 7:15 and 22) have the “BREATH OF LIFE” that is, both man and animals are living beings. Furthermore, the primary difference between human beings and animals is that humanity is made in the image and likeness of God (Genesis 1:26-27), while animals are not.

Being made in the image and likeness of God means that human beings are like God in some ways; they are capable of spirituality; they have a mind, emotion, and “will”; and part of their “being” continues after death.

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AN ETHICAL ECONOMY IS GOOD FOR ALL
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WHAT MAKES A GOOD ECONOMY

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The Vanity of Wealth and Honor is an interesting subject in light of wealth, corruption, and the human heart. This subject effects many things, including what makes a good economy. 

In the Book of Ecclesiastes, chapter 5, verses eight to nine, Solomon says the following:

Ecclesiastes 5:8-9
“8 If you see in a province the oppression of the poor and the violation of justice and righteousness, do not be amazed at the matter, for the high official is watched by a higher, and there are yet higher ones over them. 9 But this is gain for a land in every way: a king committed to cultivated fields.”

COMMENTARY: There are two things king Solomon is saying here within the theme of the vanity of WEALTH and HONOR. Wealth and honor are two different things, as one can have wealth with or without honor or honor with or without wealth. That being said, let’s look at verses 8 and 9 independently to see the simple message God provides us today through Solomon.

BREAK DOWN
Ecclesiastes 5:8-9

THE ABUSE OF AUTHORITY & WEALTH
 “8 If you see in a province the oppression of the poor and the violation of justice and righteousness, do not be amazed at the matter, for the high official is watched by a higher, and there are yet higher ones over them." 

COMMENTARY: Verse 8 clearly illustrates that there is a corruption at every level of government, with higher level oppressors plundering the equally oppressive lower-level magistrates. This perhaps explains the st state of America and the world. With blackmail running. Rampant and the public sector unchecked, they have been robbing the everyday citizen of their hard earned money. As a result, the system became insulated and division between the haves and have nots became more defined. When the high level government officials rob and abuse those below them, someone above that person robs and abuses the higher level person himself.

In America, where we print money out of thin air for the world, in this short period of history, there is little need to plunder those under one authority because there is so much to steal that those in authority can simply pay them off or blackmail them; whichever is most convenient. Either way, Solomon makes abundantly clear that when there is nobody minding the ship, evil perpetuates to the point of overtaking the government in whole. As a result, we end up with a 2024 government, riddles with corruption, immorality, blackmail, lawlessness, and all other things evil due to the lack of God-ness which equates to “goodness”. 

Economically speaking, when this happens to a country, its own economy begins to decline into debt due to their insatiable desire and emotional need for more money and resources. When resources are stripped and money is squandered, the elite few are smart enough to collect those resources and money and we end up with a U.S. Stock Market where only 5% holds up to 80%  of the entire market wealth. 

WHAT IS THE ANSWER?
The answer and solution is to keep to return to the system we created in the first place which is free market capitalism that allows those who desire to work hard, to have a fair chance at success, making money and turning a fair profit. This is called “honor for everyone”.

HONOR FOR EVERYONE
"9 But this is gain for a land in every way: a king committed to cultivated fields.”

CONCLUSION:

Government corruption comes to the advantage of a few-but at the expense of many if not all the rest of society. Vanity and wealth, if not kept accountable, devours one’s honor and the honor or the nation in whole. Solomon (Qohelet) considered goverment to be frustrating becuase it was a necessary evil, something deply flawed but indespsnsible. On the one hand people sould "not be shocked" when they see OPPRESSION and injustice in a governmental province (v.8). After all, bloated government bureaucracy tends to frustrate justice (v.8b). On the other hand, government has it advantages (v.9). Many hold to the belief that this verse continues the negeative assessment of government. Others see this passage better understood more positively since it fits with Qohelet's normal pattern of "on the one hand, on the other.." way of teaching. 

Even a corrupt government is better than anarchy, which devastates a country, it's culture and in Solomon's time, an agrarian economy that would lead to starvation. Keeping to God's ways is the only solution to man's sinful nature; especially in governmental rule. In the end, a king who devotes himself to developing the resources of the land ushers in a systems that brings the opportunity for profit to all, not just the corrupt few.

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A Protestant & Catholic View Comparison

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Protestants view the Bible as the STANDARD for Christian morality and ethics which governs our behavior. This is called sola scripture and is one of the five Solas in Christianity. (Solas meaning "alone" in Latin. 2 Timothy 3:16-17 makes clear that "All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work” (ESV).

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