Comment by gryphonshafer
10 years ago
>90% of fatigue in basic (based on a scientific study I just made up in my head) is mentally induced because recruits have a belief of their limits that's short of reality. Part of the drill instructor's responsibility is to demonstrate these limits are just mental by pushing recruits beyond them. Of course, that still leaves the <10% of times when the limits are real and someone gets hurt, but that's just collateral damage, I guess.
I wonder if it's really 10%. The instructor most likely doesn't actually know the person's limits. They're setting a baseline and hoping everyone has good enough genetics to meet that baseline. The rest are injured/kicked out/may have actually been filtered out earlier. Remember that the military turns down many people, and that often includes a lot of people who have hidden medical issues or just bad genetics.