Carrying Firearms

[zenithSmil3]

You beat me to the punchline, Hobby. =)

Guns was not what exactly helped us reach the top of the food chain as you so eloquently put it. Though they do have an interesting history of their own. They gave a society economic advantage compared with existing technology. Social value and prestige, which can override economic benefit also played a part. People today do buy designer jeans for double the price of equally durable jeans because of the social value.Vested interests was also what made guns a part of our society. In simple terms, look down at your keyboard. Most likely, it is qwerty. Interestingly, it is a keyboard layout designed as a feat of anti-engineering. Employing a whole series of perverse tricks designed to force typists to type as slowly as possible, such as scattering the commonest letters over the keyboard rows and concentraing them on the left side, where most people are actually right handed. The reason? Typewriters of the 1873 got jammed if adjacent keys were used too quickly so they had to slow people's typing speeds down. That was why guns rose in popularity.

A lot of technology rose because of need. Look at the ancient empires. They were pretty much successful against the 'animals' despite not having guns. Perhaps guns were made for protection against animals, however like dynamite, turns out that they are best for 'protection' against other humans.
[Guns, Germs and Steel]

Well Hobby, I suppose option 2 or 3. Mostly 2. I say yours is 2 as well?

[Ewok94]

I believe in people being able to defend themselves without having to rely on the police or the Government. I also believe that "they have them so we need them" is not a good argument for legalising all firearms.

I'm going to approach this issue from a different angle. What goes through somebody's head when they plan to kill somebody? Is there a reason they're doing it? Revenge? Anger? Do they need money? Then you go onto: What are they getting revenge for? Why are they angry? Why don't they have any money? Can we do something to solve the situations that cause these feelings of aggression?

In my opinion we should focus less on fighting crime, imprisioning people etc and more on improving peoples everyday lives to reduce negative emotions and make sure people don't want to, nor are they forced to do these things in the first place. Otherwise the prisons will carry on being overcrowded, people will carry on getting shot, stabbed and beaten up, Governments will keep promising to "get tough on crime" and all that BS, so then the police will go beat up the people that did it and put them in jail. Okay, the bad person isn't around anymore. But what has that solved when the conditions that made them that way still exist?

We need to think about the effect we are having on people by what we do every single day. We might shout at someone in a car in front of us, tut at a shop assistant, leave a hurtful comment on someone's Youtube video - whatever it is, however small, we are making their day a little bit worse, causing them to feel the same anger or frustration or annoyance that we were feeling when we did whatever we did to them, and them going and doing the same to someone else. And so the cycle continues

Or we can all start being nice to eachother and the good feeling will spread like a well-written worm virus

[aNewHobby4me]

@zenithSmil3 : I would say 10% of #1, and then equal parts of #2 and #3.

Or we can all start being nice to each other and the good feeling will spread like a well-written worm virus

Nice sentiment, but running with the analogy, I think too many people have anti-good-feeling software installed. After all, if that was all it took then humanity would have done it by now.

[Edit--dragging my post back on topic]

Watched an episode of "Best Ever" on the Military Channel, and they came up with this list:

10 katana
09 Walther ppk .380
08 the pike
07 arquebus
06 war boomerang
05 Thompson submachine gun
04 Barrett 82 .50 sniper rifle
03 Longbow
02 AK-47
01 unarmed combat

So apparently in their expert opinions, the most dangerous weapon is the creature man himself--without all his wonderful toys.

[Charlieace]

today technology is the main reason we are at the top of the food chain, but hundreds of years ago technology did not do much for our superior placing.

if a man was faced with a bear a gun would aid him to victory, if he had no gun, the bear would obviously eat him. this is why we got to the top so fast.

[zenithSmil3]

Nice sentiment, but running with the analogy, I think too many people have anti-good-feeling software installed. After all, if that was all it took then humanity would have done it by now.

Yea, there are times we should all just let down our anti good feeling firewalls.

today technology is the main reason we are at the top of the food chain, but hundreds of years ago technology did not do much for our superior placing. if a man was faced with a bear a gun would aid him to victory, if he had no gun, the bear would obviously eat him. this is why we got to the top so fast.

No.

So what you are saying is that it is because of guns we are on the top of the food chain? Um... guns aren't ancient. Before guns, man was already pretty much on top. Neolithic era, the agricultural revolution, already small societies were being built up. It wasn't like we were all doomed to be wiped out by animals because of the lack of guns. If guns was all that protected us from being eaten by all those big bad wolves, then we'd all be dead now. It was the intelligence, and the killing of all other subspecies of 'man'.

Maybe you should look at human adaptability and high birth rates.

[Charlieace]

Touche.

Maybe not firearms themselves have advanced us to this point, but weapons in general.
We're straying a bit off topic, so let's try and keep it on-topic, lol.

[Wootz]

If no one has guns, no one ends up shot... Mutual assured destruction is not feasible here.

If other people have guns, then that doesn't mean you should too, it means they shouldn't.

In America, the right to arms used to be a practical privelege, but nowadays, there's just no reason for the average citizen to need a shotgun (or other firearm) in their home, unless they plan on using it on someone else.

Keep guns on an absolutely need-to-own basis, so they're restricted to the armed services, armed-response police units, and government security and intelligence, and with a bit of luck, no innocents get shot.

I've used quite a few firearms in my day, not a single one against another person. Do you realize how fun they are?

Anyways, your assertion relies on the assumption that this is candy land and gangs and wars and all those bad things don't exist. But that's not the case.


Besides, before guns, there were sticks and stones. Taking away people's guns isn't going to stop them from getting killed, it'll just make it harder from them to stop that from happening.

[Charlieace]

Maybe you should look at human adaptability and high birth rates.

Human adaptability, yes. High birth rates? Hardly. Humans have low birth rates compared to a majority of the animals on the planet.

[aNewHobby4me]

Maybe you should look at human adaptability and high birth rates.

Human adaptability, yes. High birth rates? Hardly. Humans have low birth rates compared to a majority of the animals on the planet.

Perhaps, in the 21st century. But from the dawn of man until the invention of "the pill", there have been high birth rates and (until modern medicine) high infant mortality rates. Both of these still exist in parts of the world.

BTW, this also ties into your topic of 'man vs. animal'. Early man (before tools) most likely survived because he could breed year around, and he smelled bad, too. (Imagine all of humanity smelling like your old gym socks )

[The Riviera Kid]

today technology is the main reason we are at the top of the food chain, but hundreds of years ago technology did not do much for our superior placing. if a man was faced with a bear a gun would aid him to victory, if he had no gun, the bear would obviously eat him. this is why we got to the top so fast.

No.

You may not think it but guns have in fact kept 'us' at the top of the food chain, or else it would look like this:

fish -> bear -> 'us' -> japanese

Those samurai would have pwned us otherwise .

Seriously though, it all comes down to the right of any person to do whatever they want as long as it doesn't affect anyone else, and owning a gun is one of those things (you may be surprised to know i'm from england). The real problem is that killing the murderer (which is what should be done), doesn't bring back the person who they killed - this is how I know there's no god, because essentially there is no entirely logical answer to this question. Unfortunately that occurs alot outside the world of computing .
- It's a better world where no one can shoot anyone and we all live happily, maybe everyone should just live here

PS: I thought monty python references were banned, as hilarious as they are
http://www.shamusyoung.com/twentysidedtale/?p=906