[jyl]

I guess climbers really take their knots seriously. Here is an interesting site. He tested knots used to join ropes by pulling to breaking point, and found that two common knots failed more frequently than you'd want. The only knot that didn't fail once (before the breaking point was reached) was the fisherman's knot.

http://www.xmission.com/~tmoyer/testing/EDK.html

Links to other knot testing too.

Apparently the figure eight is sometimes called the "instant death knot" and the flat overhand knot is sometimes called the "euro death knot". Glad I don't know either.

Also
http://www.xmission.com/~tmoyer/testing/High_Strength_Cord.pdf