United States to fund gun-violence research after 20-year freeze • Hacker News Board

Re: United States to fund gun-violence research after 20-year freeze

#261

Post by CompanionCuuube » Tue, Dec 17, 2019, 5:16 PM UTC

everdev wrote: post #250

finnthehuman wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Wether your pro or anti-gun no one wants the reality we have now where kids grow up with this kind of fear. The level of fear instilled into the population is wildly disconnected from the realities of risk and we've known this for decades. Whether it's the security theater at the airport, modern day duck-and-cover, or whatever the 6pm news is scaring old people with this week; the line of reasoning that goes somethi…

> "we taught people to fear risk X, the way to alleviate the fear is to reduce the likelihood of X" is the most asinine bullshit in the world. The US was a scary place after 9/11. I'm sure a lot of money was wasted in domestic security that didn't do anything, but I'm glad we made an effort to reduce the likelihood of future terrorist attacks rather than just reinforcing how incredibly rare they are. We can't stop te…

The Post 9/11 security theater is not a good model to follow, and to compare your plans for gun control to that in any sort of positive association is a good reason for any person who has the slightest of care toward civil liberties to just flat out ignore you.

Re: United States to fund gun-violence research after 20-year freeze

#262

Post by CompanionCuuube » Tue, Dec 17, 2019, 5:20 PM UTC

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #157

tptacek wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm really tired of this argument that people are irrationally afraid of black rifles and simply don't understand the machines they're purporting to regulate. These are devices that were designed to be field stripped by 18 year olds in a jungle. They're not that complicated. The Mini-14 (for example) has a wooden stock, and looks like something out of Little House On The Prairie, in part because it was brought to mar…

> The Mini-14 (for example) has a wooden stock, and looks like something out of Little House On The Prairie, in part because it was brought to market at a time where the M-16, a descendant of the Stoner AR-15 design, had acquired a reputation for dreadful unreliability. In an urban environment, it's just as problematic as an AR-15; what's your point? That you don't see pictures of the Mini-14 on the evening news as a…

> Which is to say the significant majority of all rifles. So straight forward but not sane, because it would be enormous overreach rather than anything that could actually pass or survive judicial review.

I'm amused that this is an actual argument. "We're not idiots who don't understand guns, if we had our way we would have had a ban for an overreaching category of firearms!"

Re: United States to fund gun-violence research after 20-year freeze

#263

Post by CompanionCuuube » Tue, Dec 17, 2019, 5:38 PM UTC

tomlockwood wrote: post #219

masonic wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Similarly, having a syringe in your house correlates to increased death risk by opioid poisoning, so... ban syringes?

Imagine if you bought a syringe into your house to prevent syringe related deaths.

Imagine if you bought a strawman into your comment. Or maybe we don't have to imagine.

How many people do you know who brought a gun into their house solely for protection against someone with a gun?

Re: United States to fund gun-violence research after 20-year freeze

#264

Post by CompanionCuuube » Tue, Dec 17, 2019, 5:40 PM UTC

tomlockwood wrote: post #214

jMyles wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having perused the EveryTown material on this topic, which I (perhaps wrongly) assume contains the most convincing material, I see that a major critique of this methodology remains unanswered: that the increased risk of completed suicide is so tightly coupled with military servitude that the role of guns cannot be convincingly established in either the univariate or multivariate analysis. What do you say to this?

Are you talking about this everytown, which again proclaims the 3x risk of gun deaths? https://everytownresearch.org/firearm-suicide/

> a major critique of this methodology remains unanswered: that the increased risk of completed suicide is so tightly coupled with military servitude that the role of guns cannot be convincingly established in either the univariate or multivariate analysis.

> What do you say to this?

Re: United States to fund gun-violence research after 20-year freeze

#265

Post by EForEndeavour » Tue, Dec 17, 2019, 5:41 PM UTC

remarkEon wrote: post #248

kasey_junk wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is literally untrue. 9mm ammo comes out of a longer barrel at higher velocity than out of a shorter. http://www.ballisticsbytheinch.com/9luger.html

Velocity isn't really what you care about though. I understand the point you're trying to make, but that table really points out that the type of the round you're using has a greater effect on velocity than the barrel length itself. The linked muzzle energy plot, which is what you really care about, shows this quite well, where we stay fairly stable for all tested rounds and fall off significantly at barrel lengths s…

Muzzle energy is defined as the bullet's kinetic energy upon exit, which is proportional to the square of velocity, which means barrel length necessarily affects muzzle energy more than muzzle velocity.

From quick Google searches, 9mm pistol barrels are around 4-5 inches long, 9mm rifles around 16". This has a major impact on muzzle velocity, and an even greater impact on muzzle energy.

Re: United States to fund gun-violence research after 20-year freeze

#266

Post by tptacek » Tue, Dec 17, 2019, 5:45 PM UTC

wl wrote: post #259

tptacek wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You've just linked to a bill that effectively allows the attorney general to designate any semi-automatic rifle with a detachable magazine an "assault weapon". There's not a barrel shroud to be found in it.

It's an I-Know-It-When-I-See-It standard that would not have survived legal challenge with carveouts for Jimmy's squirrel rifle and grandpappy's hunting rifle. Sure, it's not feature tests, but it's not any more rational. If the intent was to ban semi-automatic rifles with detachable magazines, that law does not do that. If you believe that this law is "sane and straightforward," what rational basis is there for bann…

I was going to type out a rebuttal to this, because I think you're mischaracterizing a straightforward and somewhat technical proposal. But I realize that's besides the point. You don't like this proposal, which is fine. But you had no footing to make the argument that it didn't exist at all, or that it didn't back up my argument. Concede that, and I'm happy to keep discussing.

Re: United States to fund gun-violence research after 20-year freeze

#267

Post by tptacek » Tue, Dec 17, 2019, 5:47 PM UTC

CompanionCuuube wrote: post #262

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The Mini-14 (for example) has a wooden stock, and looks like something out of Little House On The Prairie, in part because it was brought to market at a time where the M-16, a descendant of the Stoner AR-15 design, had acquired a reputation for dreadful unreliability. In an urban environment, it's just as problematic as an AR-15; what's your point? That you don't see pictures of the Mini-14 on the evening news as a…

> Which is to say the significant majority of all rifles. So straight forward but not sane, because it would be enormous overreach rather than anything that could actually pass or survive judicial review. I'm amused that this is an actual argument. "We're not idiots who don't understand guns, if we had our way we would have had a ban for an overreaching category of firearms!"

It's easy to win arguments when you make them up yourself to knock down. That comment is responding to and inaccurately paraphrasing me. I'm right here. I suggest you rebut something I actually said.

Re: United States to fund gun-violence research after 20-year freeze

#268

Post by CompanionCuuube » Tue, Dec 17, 2019, 5:49 PM UTC

joshuamorton wrote: post #70

datashow wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure how the link support your point.

GP claims that there is no correlation between gun ownership and homicide. That's a list of studies and meta-studies that directly refute that claim.

The Medium article covers why using that correlation to assume causation is a problem, using other experimental variables that were shown to have a correlation with homicides.

Re: United States to fund gun-violence research after 20-year freeze

#269

Post by Omnitaus » Tue, Dec 17, 2019, 5:49 PM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #224

c0nducktr wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You had control over that? You had the option to join a gang, and chose not to? Nobody gets to decide the situation in to which they're born.

That’s a ridiculously offensive viewpoint. Most kids born into tough circumstances choose not to join a gang.

The person you're responding to didn't say that.

Re: United States to fund gun-violence research after 20-year freeze

#270

Post by shpongled » Tue, Dec 17, 2019, 6:04 PM UTC

sohkamyung wrote: post #13

larnmar wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the other hand, shouldn’t the Center for Disease Control spend its time and focus on things that could reasonably be argued fall under the heading of “disease control”? By all means, gun violence research should be conducted by, say, the Department of Justice. Like many policies in the US at this stage, the goal appears not to be good governance but simply “pwning the other side”.

Quote from this website [1] ===== “Gun violence is America’s most preventable disease. I say that because it’s almost entirely preventable and the numbers of people affected are so high.” Judy Schaechter, MD, MBA University of Miami Leonard M. Miller School of Medicine ===== [1] https://www.aamc.org/news-insights/disease-gun-violence

Perhaps gun suicides are preventable, but murder has been a disease that humans will likely always suffer from. We did it long before we had firearms, and we'll still be doing it when we all have blaster rifles.