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A way to measure gun violence in America

washingtonpost.com

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Re: A way to measure gun violence in America

#21

Post by sokoloff »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #2

> They noted with interest that it appears Oakland’s gunfire was at least twice as deadly as Washington’s gunfire. Although the researchers couldn’t come up with the reasons behind this difference (Were Washington’s gunmen poor shots? Did victims in Oakland get to the hospital more slowly?), the difference points to how measuring gun violence with homicides is problematic. This is posing the question wrong. If some a…

Some people might, if those fatalities were preferentially "intended targets" as that dramatically reduces the potential for harm to innocent bystanders.

Re: A way to measure gun violence in America

#22

Post by wrongc0ntinent »

oldmanjay wrote: post #14
kec wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The question is more why do we treat assault and homicide where a firearm is involved differently from other instances of assault and homicide? Dead is dead, no matter the manner in which it happened.

If that's a serious question you'll be pleased to know it has a very simple answer - to those with a political agenda, no technique is below exploitation to gain command of the emotions of the people.

Most people/groups have some kind of political agenda. It doesn't imply hypocrisy or deceit.

Re: A way to measure gun violence in America

#23

Post by kec »

astrodust wrote: post #18
capote wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was gonna say, having heard a gunshot as well as the other stated things that could sound like gunshots, I think gunshots are categorically louder and more identifiable. That said, I'm not a gun expert so I could be wrong for different types of guns, etc.

I bet if you were given six months and high quality recordings of different types of gunfire you could figure out how to do it algorithmically. It's all about having a large enough corpus of input, both of the type you're looking for and the type you're looking to exclude. This is an undergraduate level problem to solve.

I would be very surprised if you could figure out a way to reliably discriminate between the sound of a gunshot and the sound of a car backfiring given that they're basically the same thing (that is, the sound of a gas rapidly expanding in a metal tube).

Re: A way to measure gun violence in America

#24

Post by wrongc0ntinent »

kec wrote: post #12
capote wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because it's its own category of violence. Like any other category, it's not a matter of 'deserving', but rather just a statistic category so we can discuss and analyze it. What a strange question. Why do we discuss it a lot? Because it's one of the most obvious issues in the US, compared to other advanced countries. We have shootings every day in many major urban centers, we have school shootings periodically, which…

The question is more why do we treat assault and homicide where a firearm is involved differently from other instances of assault and homicide? Dead is dead, no matter the manner in which it happened.

Because they're very different things. But even if they weren't, it's not really a useful question - assuming the desired result is to reduce gun violence. See above comment again: "Because it's its own category of violence. Like any other category, it's not a matter of 'deserving', but rather just a statistic category so we can discuss and analyze it."

Re: A way to measure gun violence in America

#25

Post by astrodust »

kec wrote: post #23
astrodust wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I bet if you were given six months and high quality recordings of different types of gunfire you could figure out how to do it algorithmically. It's all about having a large enough corpus of input, both of the type you're looking for and the type you're looking to exclude. This is an undergraduate level problem to solve.

I would be very surprised if you could figure out a way to reliably discriminate between the sound of a gunshot and the sound of a car backfiring given that they're basically the same thing (that is, the sound of a gas rapidly expanding in a metal tube).

Yeah, well you'd be wrong. Anyone who's spent time around guns would instantly recognize the difference, and training a computer to do the same thing isn't even hard, it just takes a lot of patient work.

The most important difference here is a gun is pushing a projectile out and a car isn't.

Differentiating between cap guns, starter pistols and fireworks might be a little more hazy, but it's still not the same thing as a backfiring car.

Re: A way to measure gun violence in America

#26

Post by [deleted] »

vilderbar_nugg wrote: post #7

"ShotSpotter, the company behind a technology that listens for gunfire's acoustic signature and reports it to authorities." Yet another company spamming for yet another surveillance device. tl;dr Statistically acceptable and verifiable measures(homicides, suicides, gunshot injuries) of gun violence are not shocking enough - we should replace them with counts of every potential gun shot fired. "potential gun shot" = e…

[deleted]

Re: A way to measure gun violence in America

#28

Post by mindslight »

NoMoreNicksLeft wrote: post #15

What's the cheapest device one could build that isn't a firearm, but could reproduce the sound of a gunshot with enough fidelity to fool this thing? Bonus if it can do a nice AK-47 machine gun sound or something like that. Assume that the device requires electricity. It probably should be wifi-connected, so that if you can get it close enough to a Starbucks or something, you can control it remotely. Should ideally be…

How about existing home theatre systems, ideally several working together to create a false triangulation.

Re: A way to measure gun violence in America

#29

Post by parennoob »

robsears wrote: post #11

> The more telling number about gun violence might be “shots fired.” And now, thanks to broader adoption of new technologies, it is getting easier to show just how common gun violence is in America. I happened to be working with a dispatcher in a 9-11 call center on the night the bin Laden raid was announced. Over the course of a couple hours, we fielded hundreds of "shots fired" calls, which mostly turned out to be…

> sure, there were probably a few drunks firing into the air, but that's more reckless than violent

Seeing as it can lead to fatalities to bystanders [1], I would be fine calling it "violent". [EDIT: "potentially violent" being perhaps a better term].

In my opinion, this is why at last gun education would be a good bipartisan way to reduce gun accidents (if not gun crime). If a police dispatcher does not think that firing into the air is serious problem and can kill people, that in itself is a big problem.

I was browsing the ShotSpotter website, and they have a paper that talks specifically about celebratory gunfire. [2]

[1] http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-14616491

[2] http://www.shotspotter.com/system/content-uploads/MYTHS_abou...

Re: A way to measure gun violence in America

#30

Post by hugh4 »

parennoob wrote: post #29
robsears wrote: post #11

> The more telling number about gun violence might be “shots fired.” And now, thanks to broader adoption of new technologies, it is getting easier to show just how common gun violence is in America. I happened to be working with a dispatcher in a 9-11 call center on the night the bin Laden raid was announced. Over the course of a couple hours, we fielded hundreds of "shots fired" calls, which mostly turned out to be…

> sure, there were probably a few drunks firing into the air, but that's more reckless than violent Seeing as it can lead to fatalities to bystanders [1], I would be fine calling it "violent". [EDIT: "potentially violent" being perhaps a better term]. In my opinion, this is why at last gun education would be a good bipartisan way to reduce gun accidents (if not gun crime). If a police dispatcher does not think that f…

> Seeing as it can lead to fatalities to bystanders, I would be fine calling it "violent".

No, I would say "violence" requires a certain intent, whereas firing shots into the air is merely ridiculously stupid and reckless.

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