Billy Beane uses the same evidence-based approach called sabermetrics to manage the Oakland Athletics. The A's haven't won the World Series since 1989, and Billy got a movie made about him with Brad Pitt in the starring role. Maybe you'll have better luck with your "evidence-based approach"...
You remind me of Billy - touting the benefits of objective sabermetric analysis over that of a traditional subjective evaluation, and thoroughly convinced of the validity of his position. Meanwhile, the A's haven't won the World Series since 1989...
Trust me on this - there isn't a scientific instrument made that could measure how little I desire to "stand out" from the herd! You should read "Moneyball" by Michael Lewis - you'd probably find his insight into quantative analysis and "... insiders vs. outsiders (established traditionalists vs. upstart proponents of sabermetrics), the democratization of information causing a flattening of hierarchies, and the ruthless drive for efficiency that capitalism demands. The book also touches on Oakland's underlying economic need to stay ahead of the curve; as other teams begin mirroring Beane's strategies to evaluate offensive talent, diminishing the Athletics' advantage, Oakland begins looking for other undervalued baseball skills such as defensive capabilities" to be right up your alley. Just think of baseball as a more advanced form of cricket, and you'll figure it out in no time!
I know you have no desire, else you wouldn't be trying to bore me with twaddle designed only to hide from the scientific process
Believe me Reiver, trying to bore you is like trying to talk a truckstop waitress into a little hanky-panky after she gets off work. It's so simple, there's no fun in it anymore!
"Be not afraid of greatness: some are born great, some achieve greatness and some have greatness thrust upon them" - Wm. Shakespeare -- Twelfth Night
Gun control is not needed. It is incompatible with a free society and fatally flawed as a concept. The second amendment does NOT "give us the right to bear arms" but instead outlines a right that is preexisting. It is also NOT archaic, but instead still painfully relevant in today's world. Sadly, the way most people ignore their right to be armed - and ignore their responsibilities for their own personal security - is part of the crime problem we deal with here. The police are not there to "protect us". They are a reactive force who can mostly be summoned only after the fact. The Supreme Court has already ruled that police have ZERO obligation to protect individual citizens; the person responsible for your security and self-protection is YOU. That is a totalitarian viewpoint incompatible with personal freedom and liberty. Guns are the leading method of personal defense, and there are literally millions of instances of people successfully thwarting criminal assault through the use of firearms. This is nonsense. I spent time in law enforcement and I've trained extensively in security and self-defense techniques. In short.... you just don't know what you are talking about. Personal security is all about layers of security, of which dogs and alarms are part, but not the final solutions. In the end, when all of the deterrent approaches have failed and the predator is facing you from across the room and the police have still not arrived there is only one reliable way to defend yourself, your home, and your family... and that is with a firearm. More nonsense. Again, I was in law enforcement so I feel pretty safe in pointing out that most police barely know which end of their weapon the bullets come out of. Most cops are not "gun people"; they take the bare minimum level of training offered and only use their weapons at the mandatory qualifications... and most barely manage to pass that qualification. Firearms training in most academies is bare minimum safety training and rudimentary handling education; it does not engender skill. It is MY job to protect myself and my family. Police forces are undermanned and spread thin. I might trust the police to do the best they can but I cannot trust them to be able to respond in time. Besides, how can I ask a police officer to be willing to put their life on the line to protect me if I'm not willing to do it myself? Banning guns would cost more lives than it would save. Again, it is incompatible with the idea of a free society, and either way people like me would never submit to such an authoritarian policy without a fight.
Evidence strongly suggests that more guns is as relevant to more crime as precipitation is to volcano eruptions. If people are going want to commit crimes they are going to do it one way or another.
My wife is scared of guns, so i dont own one. but i know lots of people that do, so when the poop hits the fan, i will bunker down with them... all jokes aside. i am a constitutional activist. i wish my wife would see things my way. but she wont turn off the tv, so all she sees is criminals shooting eachvother... I try to tell her that law abiding citizens, owning guns, prevents crimes. but, all she sees is the violence on tv...
My wife too was initially scared of guns and never thought that she'd be living in a household with one. However, I feel that I've changed her perspective, at least somewhat. I feel this way because, in my 15 months of marriage, she has never even seen the firearm, and thus her initial biased liberal view of a "typical paranoid" gun owner stroking his gun all day and night was immediately rendered false. She probably will never like guns, and that's perfectly fine (just like I will probably never like art history). However, liking something and having an irrational fear about something are two totally different things. A healthy marriage is one that engenders trust and understanding, and a spouse with fears so irrational that they cause their husband/wife to change their actions/habits can hurt the marriage. I'm sure that your wife is reasonable, and would be open to a fair discussion. You should tell her that the stats are very clear that a law-abiding citizen owning a legally purchased firearm is at no greater risk of harm or death than those who do not own guns.
The gun doesn't change the intent. If a person wants to kill someone, he will do it, gun or knife or hands if necessary. Plus, if guns are banned, bad people will always find ways to get them illegally. So when they have them illegally while people can't protect themselves with legal guns, what do we do? Wait 5 minutes for the cops to show while you get shot in the head?
Thanks for your reply Lolcatz. I understand your dilemma. I have been married three times ! None of the breakups were caused by firearms, but several arguments have been solved with them. Ha~ ha! Just kidding! Well, my friend you have a ‘hard row to hoe’ as they say in these hills. It does not help your case that most of the media is gun hating and that they spin the anti firearm propaganda with all their might, while rarely if ever reporting when someone saves themselves or business etc! They never fail to report everything against guns, and attempt to portray pro 2nd amendment folk as knuckle dragging morons bent on killing and eating tourists or worse getting more pro freedom interpretations from the SCOTUS ! So good luck. Please don’t take my following suggestions as being pushy etc, but if you are into prepping or think you may be interested I suggest you gently educate your wife to the wonderful life of self dependency. If you have a gun range where people her (and your) age and lifestyle attend. . If she likes music buy some popular prepping (mother earth news) and maybe one fire arm magazine that feature popular artists holding a weapon on the cover etc and sneak them on to the coffee table. Pepper publications are going PC these days, and are avoiding the bunker look and mentality as they should. it’s a lifestyle more akin to gardening and family rather than machine guns and MREs. Below a good link to the prepper thing. Its between the mother earth news and a NRA publication ha ha~ ; (Google description retained) American Preppers Network Meet Preppers near you. Network with like minded people. Lean new skills. Share what you know. The American Preppers Network forum has categories for just ... www.americanpreppersnetwork.com/ Rev A
Tomorrow you'll be focused And heading for the future With a new-found sense of optimism that Doesn't ****ing suit you
The evidence does suggest behavioural change. We see that, for example, in juveniles within gun owning households. To ignore those effects is to have a terribly simplistic view of human behaviour
Still clinging to debunked articles I see. I do recall that fantastic article however. It was certainly Harry-Potteresque (I mean the notion that guns have a magical power over juveniles that have an easy access to them that causes such juveniles to commit non-violent crimes that do not even involve the gun). Remarkable read. J.K. Rowling could not have done a better job herself.
Relying on questionable data and statictics and such is an awful way to build a model of reality. "There is a general perception that statistical knowledge is all-too-frequently intentionally misused by finding ways to interpret only the data that are favorable to the presenter.[11] The famous saying, "There are three kinds of lies: lies, (*)(*)(*)(*)ed lies, and statistics".[12] which was popularized in the USA by Mark Twain and incorrectly attributed by him to Disraeli (18041881)[citation needed], has come to represent the general mistrust [and misunderstanding] of statistical science. Harvard President Lawrence Lowell wrote in 1909 that statistics, "...like veal pies, are good if you know the person that made them, and are sure of the ingredients." Read more @ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statistics Scroll about 3/4th down the page to 'MISUSE' and read, its nothing that we haven't seen before, and describes how stats etc are misused in the usual suspect methodology and application thereof (ie the misuse of firearm crime and gun stats to reach a desired and predetermined analysis) Rev A
Empty whinge. I don't rely on statistics. You'll find that's the domain of the rpo-gun herd who are completely reliant on spurious conclusion. I rely on empirical study where all aspectd of empirical bias can be considered. I rely on hypothesis testing that appropriately rejects or fails to reject. In contrast, you have ideological bluster and a need to hide from the evidence
Translated, "I prefer to search the available "studies" to find one that fits my pre conceived notion, then I can claim to have a scientific basis for the "study's" conclusions. "
I think not read on; You have a knack for misrepresenting whats right before your eyes in black and white or what ever color your monitor displays. I said that questionable data AND statistics are not a good way to build a model of reality. I included questionable data for a very good reason, which was that they even though stats and raw data are a pure form of data, they still lend themselves to being subjectively manipulated, and even corrupted. There is still more but reasons to avoid being so ...ahhh' stirle but that is enough for now. See above. Additionally, read my lips, I do not hide from the evidence. The real problem of this farce of a discussion is that you will not even answer the most basic of questions directly. I have no concept or opinion of yours to critique debate or discuss, only a vague mumbling defense that you can not define optimal gun control. So it is not I that is hiding, thats your game. What you call ideological bluster I call describing our 2nd amendment and other rights both natural and positive which in real life forms the nucleus or of how gun control should be defined, at least in the states. Gun control is subjective and dependent on where one lives unless you are talking of a purely philosophical concept. BTW, I could define my opinion of optimal gun control etc. in about 60 seconds, you could do the same unless you are hiding something. If that is the case we have been wasting each others time. Rev A
You won't provide anything. Its only a shallow attempt to hide from the evidence. To the intelligent it won't appeal. Econometric analysis ensures that its very easy to test empirical bias created through data problems. This only demonstrates the importance of adopting an evidence-based approach which necessarily leads to critique of paper (with comparison and contrasting of data technique and empirical methodology) Playing pretend won't be useful. We both know that you haven't read the evidence, that you do not understand the evidence and the only time you make reference to the evidence is when you're confronted with a cognitive dissonance created by your ultimately authoritarian conclusion No, you would simply give an unsupportable comment (like your ramblings about freedom when your position is based on imposing coercive externalities). In contrast, I bother to define optimality (through cost-benefit analysis) and ensure an approach that is based on celebrating individualism
