You guys are grasping for straws now (wait, thats what's been happening the whole time). It sure isn't an accident until it happens, but what does that have to do with teaching yourself to fly? It's kinda like "You'll shoot your eye out kid". If a person is alone out in a field somewhere in the middle of no where they wont have to worry about even coming close to hitting anyone. If a club has a new person come to their field they have a responsibility to their members to make sure said piliot is skilled enough to be safe. Whether you're taught by an instructor or yourself you can still be safe. If the world was the same in the early 1900's there would be no planes for us to fly cause you people would have to Orville and Wilbur "you can't fly that thing you don't have a license".