[Kaijo]

Originally Posted by kyp275

That's just your bias goggle, my point is that you have studies from both neutral and biased sources, all with unclear data collection methodology, you can't simply combine them and call it a day. This isn't Gurren Lagann, you don't get to yell "Gattai!" and then kick logic and reason to the curb.

You still don't understand... if you want to knock those studies, you have to go into them. You didn't even look up those up, did you? How can you diss something that you haven't even read? Talk about judging a book by it's cover.

If you don't want to accept the numbers, fine. You don't have to. But this is how science works. Scientists study data and publish a paper. It gets peer-reviewed. Other scientists can then go through it and point out it's flaws and publish another paper on it, identifying those flaws. As a scientist, until someone else publishes a paper, or lists ways in which it is wrong, I have to accept. There are tons of papers out there on every conceivable subject, and if I were to just dismiss them because I personally wasn't involved or I didn't feel it agreed with my inner gut feeling, then I'd make a piss poor scientist.

There are a lot of smart scientists who are more than capable of handling complex subjects, such as gun deaths across multiple countries, controlling for all the variables, and come up with useful numbers. By you dismissing them out of hand, you aren't even bothering to engage. It would be like someone publishing a paper on cloning, and without even reading it, you simply go: "Wrong. You're wrong. There are a lot of factors that you obviously must not have taken into consideration." In the scientific world, how do you think such a person would be viewed.

You aren't even bothering to read them. How well would you like someone to judge you, without even reading your posts?

You are attacking science itself, and that is probably my biggest peeve. If you are unwilling to work with science, then there can be no realistic common ground with you. Because there are then, no numbers at all that we can agree on. Any number I come up with, no matter what the source (and per your words, I came up with some neutral sources), then there can be no argument with you, either. We have no ground to even start the debate. I bring up numbers so we can get an idea of the realistic picture, so we have a starting point. Thus, we have no starting point with you. There is no reality that you will agree with, other than your own.

But I guess, then, I can ignore any of your numbers (of which you have come up with none) and all of your assertions, just because I want to. Just because I can suggest the tiniest of flaws without having to prove it.

Again, I find your inability to note that every countries are different rather perplexing.

Not as different as you might imagine. They consume our same media, they had our same economic troubles, they are ruled by very similar laws. This argument that "other countries are too different!" smacks of the notion that we can dismiss any argument or observation from any other country, just because the US is somehow special. That the humans in the US, are somehow worlds apart from every other human.

Well, I suppose we're more obese. But in all my travels to other countries, you generally find that humans are humans no matter where you go.

Honestly, Kyp, at this point, it is probably pointless to continue the discussion with you. You are more than welcome to question sources, but only if you have looked them over and can point out where each study has it's flaws. At least that is something I could respect. But if you are simply going to dismiss sources because of made-up reasons, if you are going to ignore science and not even attempt to deal with it, then you might as well stick your fingers in your ears. Perhaps I've misread you, and you really aren't afraid of what these studies might say, and you'd really only accept something that someone has walked through, step-by-step, and shown you everything. That is one way to go about things.

But scientists don't have that luxury. There are many papers in many fields that we don't have the training on. We are then forced to accept the paper's conclusions on a sort of faith. I'm not an expert in biology, so if someone publishes a paper on cloning that makes a conclusion, I have two options: accept the conclusions, or go through the paper and point out where it is wrong. Since I don't have the knowledge for the latter (like most scientists do), then I have to accept the conclusion.

Especially when the numbers are borne out by not 1, not 2, not even 3, but multitudes of studies, all saying the same thing.

So, if nothing else, kyp, what would convince you? What source, or what study, would you accept? Because more than anything else, that is what I'd like to know.

Originally Posted by Solace

It's not there to prevent creep. That's not what the second amendment is for. The second amendment is there to remind the people that they do have the ability to use force if they feel it is required. I'm not saying I agree with it entirely, but I understand the reasoning behind it. To be honest, most people really have no idea what most laws say they can or can't do. They just go along with whatever everyone else is doing. Dangerous, but I never claimed humans were immune to herd mentality.

Okay, not for creep. Then let's do a thought experiment.

Situation #1: the populace is armed, and the president decides to sieze total power and sends in the military to quell the populace. Most of the military decides to obey. How well do you think a rifle is gonna against tanks, planes, drones, etc.? Not very well. The battle will only really start when some of the populace manages to steal some of those planes, tanks, and drones, and fight the military on a more even footings.

Situation #2: Like above, but some portion of the military decides to side with the populace. In which case, the war will be fought using the military's equipment. The guns we already have, won't make much of a difference. Some help, yes, but hardly the true safeguard against tyranny.

I mean, take a look at the recent uprisings in the middle east such as Iraq and Libya. The populace, armed with guns, revolted. And they were promptly smashed by military equipment much weaker than the US military has. Without the assistance provided a no-fly zone and/or other military assistance, they would have never managed to do anything. Perhaps they would have managed a very low and sporadic action that lasted decades.

The government looks at your guns and chuckles. They realize that someone holding a gun, may as well be holding a security blanket, because it makes no practical difference.

If a dictator seizes control of the US, he will have no bones about dropping bombs on cities, ordering drone strikes, etc. That is why, ultimately, whether the population has handguns, rifles, shotguns, or even assault weapons, is ultimately pointless. We'd need surface-to-air missiles, RPGs, and improvised explosives to even begin to make a dent.

That is why I don't buy the argument that our guns defend against tyranny. They don't. And as you noted from SOPA/PIPA, the real defense against tyranny, is people being actively involved in their government. And I generally find that someone who owns a gun, isn't very active. Expect maybe they have an NRA membership.