> Andy: "An alternative would be to look at what serious research has been
> done on
> the subject, which near as I can tell is based on statistical methods"
>
> [WS:] My problem with applying statistical methods to this problem is that
> homicides are rare events whereas statistical methods depend, ultimately,
> on the law of large numbers. Small samples are notoriously unreliable,
> because small changes can produce large differences in sample parameters.
> Pooling broader areas together may increase sample sizes, but also brings
> more variables to be considered, which makes the exercise
> counterproductive.
>
> Another - and far more serious in my opinion problem is the so called
> fallacy of composition
>
What you describe constitutes possible caveats to conclusions, not reasons to summarily dismiss consideration of the problem as a mess of personal anecdotes. You know quite well that the uncertainty of a sample can be at least partially quantified. No one to my knowledge is arguing that gun ownership alone causes homicide or suicide, only that it makes it more likely when the other ingredients are there.
On Fri, May 10, 2013 at 1:34 PM, Jordan Hayes <jmhayes at j-o-r-d-a-n.com>wrote:
> In the mean time, I think we already have a "natural" experiment for you:
> give ~50M otherwise-non-criminal adults in the US guns, have them go about
> their normal lives; see how many of them shoot people just because they've
> come under some kind of unusual stress.
>
> I think you've [Woj] already said: this is a very rare event, and thus not
> much of interest can come from "studying it carefully" ...
>
>
I presume, in part from what you've written before, that what you mean here
is that criminal acts by legal gun owners are rare. One problem with this
is that legal and illegal gun ownership don't live in separate universes
with nary a wormhole between them. Is it not the very very rare gun in
illegal ownership that doesn't begin its life in legal ownership?
Your focus on the difference between legal and illegal gun ownership seems like a way to wash your hands of the problem of gun homicide. In the absence of some reliable way to keep guns in legal hands -- effective background checks could be only a partial solution, and witness the fate of attempts at that -- I don't see how widespread legal gun (at least handgun) ownership can be separated from illegal gun ownership and use in homicide.
What the focus on criminality also elides over is suicide and accidents. Public health researchers also find extra risk of suicide from gun ownership, it being easier to impulsively put a bullet in your head than to open a vein. The acquaintance who worked for the research team I linked did work talking with gun dealers in NH -- fertile ground, right? -- to watch for signs of suicide risk among their customers.
So back to Andy: even if the research "proves" that "more guns equals more
> homicides" (I have to say, this this almost seems tautological), what point
> are you trying to make with it?
>
Last time this subject came up, you seemed to think the notion absurd. Now it's tautological?
> I don't see much use for fast food (not even to hunt with!), and it causes
> the vast majority of preventable death in the US.
>
> How about some "shitty food control" laws?
>
We already have food safety and labeling laws, however poorly implemented. My understanding is that junk food gets a big boost from subsidies for corn and soy, and if you want to do something about that, sign me up.
If guns cause preventable death and injury, then surely we should examine to what extent and how.
With regard to relative rarity, consider 2010 stats from the CDC:
http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/injury.htm Mortality All injury deaths
- Number of deaths: 180,811
- Deaths per 100,000 population: 58.6
Motor vehicle traffic deaths
- Number of deaths: 33,687
- Deaths per 100,000 population: 10.9
All poisoning deaths
- Number of deaths: 42,917
- Deaths per 100,000 population: 13.9
All firearm deaths
- Number of deaths: 31,672
- Deaths per 100,000 population: 10.3
If you dig into the tables about 20k of firearm deaths are suicide (about half the suicides), 11k homicides, and the balance accidents. The total is comparable to motor vehicle deaths -- should we disregard those as statistically insignificant, especially since the number of legal drivers is a multiple of that of legal gun owners? IIRC there were something short of 5000 workplace deaths last year. Time to pull the plug on OSHA?
(NB: Golly, I didn't know you could die of a hernia.)
-- Andy "It's a testament to ketchup that there can be no confusion."