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Why the NRA hates smart guns

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Re: Why the NRA hates smart guns

#171

Post by 8note »

larrywright wrote: post #129
exabrial wrote: post #27

Smart guns aren't going to hinder anyone but responsible people. We need a few things: 1) Funding alternatives to incarceration. People that go to jail tend to have a frequent flyer card. 2) Law enforcement sharing of critical data on offenders. 3) Funding treatment and therapy programs for drug abusers (ABUSERS, key word. I know this isn't a popular opinion on HN, but ABUSE and USE are two different things) 4) Final…

I've always thought that the arguments from the anti-gun crowd defied all logic. If access to guns was the root of the problem, then gun violence should be going down, rather than up. Far fewer people own guns now than did, say 150 or 200 years ago (when it was probably close to 100%). Solving the problem by focusing on guns is trying to treat the symptom rather than the disease.

what's your evidence that gun violence is going up?

Re: Why the NRA hates smart guns

#172

Post by 8note »

wyager wrote: post #148
superuser2 wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Computers have uses beyond hacking. Guns are for killing. Killing in self-defense, honing your killing skills as a sport/recreation activity, deterring bad behavior by threat of killing, killing things that are socially acceptable to kill (i.e. game animals), sure, but the theme is killing. Lockpicks might be a better example. Many similar arguments apply: their use is to open doors without the correct keys, which on…

Target shooting isn't just practice for killing things. That's as absurd as claiming "racing is just practice for running people over". Target shooting is a sport all on its own, and is probably the single most prevalent application of firearms in the US.

when do you run things over when racing?

Re: Why the NRA hates smart guns

#173

Post by schismsubv »

ubernostrum wrote: post #162
schismsubv wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You seem to have missed the GP's point - go scan through the admittedly silly but illustrative cartoon linked. Gun rights have been repeatedly nibbled, sliced, and cut away over the past century, all in the name of "reasonable compromises". Said "reasonable" "compromises" have progressively eliminated a large swath of gun ownership rights and put the average owner in constant risk of felony. Example: an individual ma…

Gun owners have given up rights time and again, to zero gain of their own. My question is simply: what is the thing they would like to gain ? The NRA's modern reinterpretation of the Second Amendment (and make no mistake: they are pushing a modern invention, not a historical understanding) does not appear to allow the possibility that any compromise would be reasonable. Hence anything which is not a complete and utte…

Our answer is equally simple: some of what we have lost. We perceive it is you who has reinterpreted the Second Amendment.

It appears you choose to categorically reject returns in the same space as losses; what do you wish, that we exchange something trite like steaks and sexual favors in return for all firearms? Do you believe firearm rights are somehow perfectly fungible? If so, it would appear you yourself are insisting on complete, utter victory.

I cannot begin to speak for others, but ask not for complete victory. Rather, I wish we would make steps back in what gun owners regard as a positive direction. The seven options hga gave above are not a linked list, they are several options. Even one would be regarded as a victory.

Re: Why the NRA hates smart guns

#174

Post by hga »

Frompo wrote: post #149
cortesoft wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It makes sense... People who are into something for fun are more likely to out effor into getting good at that thing. Only some of the law enforcement community are also into guns for fun, whereas all of the people who are shooting at a gun range who AREN'T law enforcement are there for fun.

Indeed, another example of this is how NBA basketball players are worse than all the amateurs on the streets! And lets not forget how the cousin of your boss that enthusiastically read some tutorials on the net is a much better programmer than you. Or maybe the argument magically only applies in the realm of gun use?

Police very seldom, and sometimes never have to use their guns, except maybe to threaten. They're paid to keep the peace and all that, the gun is merely one of many tools, although the one that all others ultimately rest on.

Re: Why the NRA hates smart guns

#175

Post by 8note »

vaadu wrote: post #66

This article is an ignorant POS. The NRA hates smartguns for at least 3 reasons. First is the government is trying to force an unreliable and complex feature onto a product that needs to work every time. Second is the government has no plans to use it themselves, which speaks volumes about what their LEOs and the US military thinks of the reliability this technology. Last is the government is trying to solve a people…

higher up in this thread, it is argued that the primary purpose of a gun is either punching holes in a piece of paper or a "tin can" or busting clay birds.

those don't seem like times when it is critical to work every time.

Re: Why the NRA hates smart guns

#176

Post by [deleted] »

8note wrote: post #172
wyager wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Target shooting isn't just practice for killing things. That's as absurd as claiming "racing is just practice for running people over". Target shooting is a sport all on its own, and is probably the single most prevalent application of firearms in the US.

when do you run things over when racing?

[deleted]

Re: Why the NRA hates smart guns

#177

Post by tootie »

fouric wrote: post #160
vaadu wrote: post #66

This article is an ignorant POS. The NRA hates smartguns for at least 3 reasons. First is the government is trying to force an unreliable and complex feature onto a product that needs to work every time. Second is the government has no plans to use it themselves, which speaks volumes about what their LEOs and the US military thinks of the reliability this technology. Last is the government is trying to solve a people…

"...trying to force an unreliable and complex feature onto a product that needs to work every time." This. This is my biggest problem with smart-gun tech. We still haven't managed to figure out how to write software for hundred-million-dollar space projects that doesn't crash (the Japanese Hitomi satellite[2] being the latest of many); how on Earth are we going to implement smart gun technology correctly? (actually,…

The plan is not to ban non-smart guns next week. Obama is calling for a push to improve the technology until it becomes reliable. Despite the Hitomi failure, we have sent a few hundred things into space pretty successfully. Half the systems in your car are under computer control. Opposing technology that could save thousands of lives a year because it doesn't work perfectly yet is bullshit.

Re: Why the NRA hates smart guns

#178

Post by mbrameld »

8note wrote: post #172
wyager wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Target shooting isn't just practice for killing things. That's as absurd as claiming "racing is just practice for running people over". Target shooting is a sport all on its own, and is probably the single most prevalent application of firearms in the US.

when do you run things over when racing?

You don't. You also don't kill things when you target shoot. You can run over things with a car, or you can race one. You can kill things with a gun, or you can shoot paper targets with one. Get it?

Re: Why the NRA hates smart guns

#179

Post by tootie »

crikli wrote: post #83

I'm an engineer, gun owner, and former NRA member[1]. I hate the idea of smart guns, but politics are a distant secondary concern. Firearms fail all the time, even the simple reliable ones. Bad primers, failure to eject, failure to cycle, stovepipes, etc. It takes education and then repeated training to know how to deal with failures. In a pressure situation you revert to your lowest level of training; muscle memory…

We're about 10-20 years from self-driving cars. Smart guns seem like a gimme.

Re: Why the NRA hates smart guns

#180

Post by cloakandswagger »

Frompo wrote: post #163
jboggan wrote: post #11

Good article, glad to see some knowledgable firearms writing in the general press. This is how I've felt as a gun owner over the last two decades, translated into computing: Imagine that someone in California hacked into a power station and caused a blackout. Police responded and found the hacker and their equipment. Shortly thereafter an "anti-hacking" bill appeared in the state legislature to prevent a repeat of su…

So, is it the Stockton schoolyard or 101 California Street shooting that you liken to a blackout? I guess its a pretty dramatic blackout since at least 5 people dies... You also neglect the detail that the police response was of little consequence as the hacker had committed suicide before they police was at the scene. I'm unsure what the web panel remark can mean concretely, exactly what did the children at Sandy Ho…

While we're on this wild and irrelevant tangent, people frequently die from blackouts. See the Northeast blackout in 2003 where a dozen people died.
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