High School Stabbings

[BStrong]

I never really understood this argument.

The anti's are implying that the 'Founders' could not have envisioned the lethality of modern firearms. Wouldn't it be reasonable to say that the gist of the RTKBA was to be able to arm oneself against an enemy?

Today's guns might be deadlier but a modern 'enemy' will be at least as well armed...

At the time the Second was written, there were already technological improvements in firearms technology, in particular ignition systems and the rifling of barrels, and there were also heavy caliber firearms, multi-shot firearms from concealable to battery guns using the then state-of-the-art technology, mortars, cannon, etc.

No differentiation was made at the time between any of these known types of firearms as certain levels of technology being restricted to government use only and regulating civilians to lesser powerful or lesser reliable forms of firearms technology.

 

[fuelair]

Fine; but how does that translate to a knife being less effective for self defense? Is that an actual fact, or is it a prediction?

The point of a knife after all, when used as a weapon, is also to negate physical ability disparity.

The gun has the advantage of range. However, as recent events have certainly highlighted, greater range in self-defense introduces this problem of a person having to make a subjective and typically pre-emptive judgment about whether he's actually in a self-defense situation, because in order for the gun to confer its advantage one must make use of that "range" while it exists (i.e., immediately, before the assailant has a chance to close the distance). When the person makes an incorrect judgment - that is, a self-defense situation did not actually exist - the consequences can be disastrous.

Whereas, with a knife or similar weapon, before it can be used, the assailant has to be close enough that the judgment as to whether a self-defense situation exists is much more objective.

Point of a knife is fine - if you are really accurate with it. Properly used and more optioned edge is better. If the knife is kept sharp.

 

[Peterson]

Two years ago I killed five deer and the meat lasted us well into last year's season. We supplemented it with store bought chicken and occasionally pork for variety. I haven't bought beef in quite a while. Last year I killed five deer and actually gave two of them away to friends. My daughter also killed a deer. I still have quite a bit of venison in my freezer. It's sad that some people think this is not a legitimate use for a gun.

I don't hunt personally but am very grateful that some people in my family do because I get the meat without the work.

Also regarding Bambi, the purpose of that book was not to show that hunting is wrong, it's actually the opposite. It placed man in nature as one who kills and gets killed just like all the other animals that kill and get killed. I think Disney skipped the scene where Bambi's father shows him a hunter dying in the bushes to show that humans are not gods, but die just like all the other animals. It was a pretty honest book regarding nature.

 

[I Ratant]

Disney also pushed those lemmings off the cliff for the "true life adventure" film.
Somewhat selective about what nature really is compared to Bambi.
"Red in tooth and claw"!
.
I did like Thumper's description of the ice-covered pond..
"The water'ths thtiff!"

 

[Autolite]

We had a thread a while back where it was heavily implied I was making up for something because I almost always have a pocket knife with me, and that the general carrying of a knife is not only uncalled for, but should be criminal.

So don't be surprised when people don't accept the 'but knives are common place' argument, because many honestly believe that they should not be.

45 years ago I was given a small pocket knife at the age of seven and have carried one ever since. I wasn't even aware that someone might consider it to be a "weapon" until a teacher commented on it during my last year of high school.

Today a student would likely be punished for a drawing of a knife shaped Pop-Tart...

 

[Kestrel]

We had a thread a while back where it was heavily implied I was making up for something because I almost always have a pocket knife with me, and that the general carrying of a knife is not only uncalled for, but should be criminal.

So don't be surprised when people don't accept the 'but knives are common place' argument, because many honestly believe that they should not be.

Some people like really simple rules. No knives is a lot easier than coming up with rules that differentiate between your pocketknife and the stiletto a street punk keeps in his boot.

 

[fuelair]

I don't hunt personally but am very grateful that some people in my family do because I get the meat without the work.

Also regarding Bambi, the purpose of that book was not to show that hunting is wrong, it's actually the opposite. It placed man in nature as one who kills and gets killed just like all the other animals that kill and get killed. I think Disney skipped the scene where Bambi's father shows him a hunter dying in the bushes to show that humans are not gods, but die just like all the other animals. It was a pretty honest book regarding nature.

And, it's author also wrote a book that was published in Austria IIRC called Josephine Mutzenbacher which was turned into seven or eight movies. Oddly none of them were by Disney (would have been truly inspired if they had been though). It was not about animals in the forest though. Fortunately Xrodent (not it's real name) has most of them I have been told.

 

[ABC10]

Most people would say your main problem is the quite common lie you ended the paragraph with. The highlighted one, though, is even worse.

Odd how a nation with a Bill of Rights such as as you portray became, in the eyes of many scholars, one of the greatest nations in the history of the planet Earth.

Right On! Clearly the danger for the people is when only the Government has guns like the Nazis.

 

[I Ratant]

I'm kinda unclear on that.
Dad brought home a few shotguns and other civilian weapons from his tour of Yurp, '44 to '45..
And a very nice officer's weapon.. a Luger with the fancy molded holster and the belt with that buckle with the verse on it.
(Gotta find that. It's been unseen for 20 or so years.)
And when we went there for 3 years, the jaegermeisters all had their shotguns.
Although, it was interesting watching the reactions of the Germans to my brother's and my expertise with the air-rifles at the local fairs.
10-12 year olds that shot that well were rare in West Germany, 1950 ish.
Early membership in the NRA marksmanship programs to thank for that.

 

[12AX7]

These are images of a cop who tried to talk to a guy with a knife instead of shooting him. They are very graphic. You don't have to see them if you don't open the links.
http://mjm.luckygunner.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/Knife-wounds-chest.jpg

http://www.dlsports.com/knife_danger/knife_danger_3_small.jpg

http://forum.gon.com/showthread.php?t=603534

Ah yes, the same tired set of slash pics that are on every gun forum on the Internet.

Prove that this was a cop. Trace the origins of this story and pics. Hint: Cops don't usually have prison tattoos like the guy in the second pic.

 

[Checkmite]

That's a very shallow reading of the article, and also misses the reason I used it in the current discussion, namely, as commentary on the issue of whether or not guns are superior to knives for self defense.

It's not a shallow reading:

Only two options exist. The first is that we accept that,
under exceptional circumstances, common sense
might be applied when considering the potential risks
and benefits of interventions. The second is that we
continue our quest for the holy grail of exclusively
evidence based interventions and preclude parachute
use outside the context of a properly conducted trial.
The dependency we have created in our population
may make recruitment of the unenlightened masses to
such a trial difficult. If so, we feel assured that those
who advocate evidence based medicine and criticise
use of interventions that lack an evidence base will not
hesitate to demonstrate their commitment by volun-
teering for a double blind, randomised, placebo
controlled, crossover trial.

The article, in its very own text, makes fun of demanding evidence for medical interventions. The pretext is ridiculous; parachutes as mechanical devices could not be further from medical treatments when it comes to reasons and conditions for "testing".

Now, is this point still a matter of contention, or do you concede this as being true? Because if you concede that it's true, then the link doesn't matter, and we can move on. And if you don't, well, what would actually convince you? A double-blind study of the outcome of knife versus gun attacks? Because, good luck getting that past an institutional review board.

Of course it's a matter of contention. In the forum surely you will have encountered before the axiom that one who makes a claim bears the burden of providing evidence. Do you have anything other than this special pleading by opponents of evidence-based-medicine to argue for why your particular claim should be accepted as "just so", exempt from needing any kind of evidence?

There's these things called statistical analyses. They are conducted by gathering data from incidents which have already occurred (the aforementioned "statistics"), and comparing and contrasting (analyzing) that data. I'm not asking for someone to perform a present experiment or a trial, I'm asking for historical evidence that knives have been less effective when they've been used for self defense than guns have been.

Being physically weaker than a potential assailant is not merely a "special situation". It's an incredibly common condition. Furthermore, the only situations you have found which can "rob" a gun of its effectiveness also do the same for knives, while the reverse is not true.

It was not my intention to provide a concise atlas of all the special situations where guns lose their advantage; merely to call attention to the fact that said situations do exist.

If they are within arm's length, then (by definition) they can strike you, and your knife cannot prevent that. Why is this not obvious to you?

Oh dear.

It's perfectly obvious; I'm just not sure why it matters. If their arm is capable of striking you, you are capable of striking it (or another part of their body) with the knife. You don't even have to strike particularly hard; it takes surprisingly little pressure for a blade to penetrate skin and clothing.

Of course you're going to be attacked. If you weren't being attacked, you couldn't possibly be doing "self defense". If a potential assailant is in range of your gun, and they're carrying a gun, you are also in range of their weapon and they can shoot at you and wound you and your gun can't stop that from happening either; so what do you do? You just keep defending. It's not like someone somewhere is deducting "points" or something when your assailant lands a blow.

So... probabilities don't enter into your moral calculus? Only worst-case scenarios matter, less severe but far more likely ones are irrelevant? That makes no sense.

They're not necessarily "irrelevant"; but in my opinion they do not nullify the worst case.

The "best case" scenario - you stop the assault without anyone being injured - is the same for either weapon. The negative outcomes are where the greatest disparity between the methods lies.

Oh, and even absent probabilities, your moral calculus is still wrong. There is also the risk that other people could be killed by an attacker that you failed to stop with your knife. You know, those innocents whom you so nobly esteem as more valuable than yourself (an estimation I will not second-guess), and whose number of deaths could also exceed one because of your impotence. Isn't that worse than what you claimed was the worst-case scenario?

No. For one thing, this is just as possible an eventuality when you defend yourself with a gun and the assailant gets away from you.

For another, I'm not about victim-blaming. If an assailant leaves one victim and runs off to assault someone else, it's not the victim's fault for not having transformed into a hero despite having been assaulted and killed the assailant. That's preposterous. What kind of person would go up to the victim of an assault and accuse him/her of being responsible for everything their attacker did afterwards?

 

[BStrong]

Some people like really simple rules. No knives is a lot easier than coming up with rules that differentiate between your pocketknife and the stiletto a street punk keeps in his boot.

In 15 years, I never once encountered any bad actor w/ any knife, let alone a stiletto, in a boot.

I did run across all sorts of fixed blade kitchen knives w/ taped scales in waistbands though, and folding knives of every inexpensive type.

 

[Ziggurat]

The article, in its very own text, makes fun of demanding evidence for medical interventions.

No. It makes fun of the insistence on one specific standard of evidence for all situations.

The pretext is ridiculous; parachutes as mechanical devices could not be further from medical treatments when it comes to reasons and conditions for "testing".

And do you know why?

For a lot of medical research, we're basically in the dark about mechanisms. Double blind studies are effective ways of establishing causal relationships in cases where we do not know the mechanisms which might create correlations. But when you know the mechanisms involved (such as aerodynamic drag), double-blind studies are not necessary.

Here's a hint, Checkmite: we know how weapons work in self-defense. It's not some deep mysterious process.

It was not my intention to provide a concise atlas of all the special situations where guns lose their advantage; merely to call attention to the fact that said situations do exist.

Again: the mere existence of such edge cases is irrelevant to my argument.

Oh dear.

It's perfectly obvious; I'm just not sure why it matters. If their arm is capable of striking you, you are capable of striking it (or another part of their body) with the knife. You don't even have to strike particularly hard; it takes surprisingly little pressure for a blade to penetrate skin and clothing.

In other words, your idea of defense is to be able to retaliate against an attacker. I do not consider that an adequate standard. I think a good defense should allow you to prevent your attacker from harming you, not simply harm him back.

Of course you're going to be attacked. If you weren't being attacked, you couldn't possibly be doing "self defense".

Once again, you miss the point. In your knife scenario, you aren't merely being attacked: you can expect to be injured. And you cannot expect to actually prevent injury.

If a potential assailant is in range of your gun, and they're carrying a gun, you are also in range of their weapon and they can shoot at you and wound you and your gun can't stop that from happening either;

If your attacker has a gun and you have a knife, you're in a far worse situation. Yes, it's bad to be attacked by someone with a gun. But that does nothing to change the fact that, in order to defend yourself, you are still better off with a gun than a knife.

It's not like someone somewhere is deducting "points" or something when your assailant lands a blow.

When your attacker lands a blow, you get injured, possibly fatally. To characterize that as "points" is pure silliness on your part.

They're not necessarily "irrelevant"; but in my opinion they do not nullify the worst case.

They should, because you can always invent less and less probable but more and more catastrophic "worst case" scenarios..

The "best case" scenario - you stop the assault without anyone being injured - is the same for either weapon.

But the probabilities of a best case outcome are not.

The negative outcomes are where the greatest disparity between the methods lies.

That, and (once again) the probabilities.

No. For one thing, this is just as possible an eventuality when you defend yourself with a gun and the assailant gets away from you.

No, it is not "just as" possible. It is possible, but not with the same probability.

For another, I'm not about victim-blaming.

Neither am I. I am merely talking about the probabilities of various outcomes which, regardless of moral culpability, have intrinsic positive or negative value. You are cherry picking which outcomes to consider on this basis, but ignoring the probabilities involved. It's not surprising that you can force such a consideration to match your preconceptions, but it's also meaningless.

 

[Gallstones]

Ah yes, the same tired set of slash pics that are on every gun forum on the Internet.

Prove that this was a cop. Trace the origins of this story and pics. Hint: Cops don't usually have prison tattoos like the guy in the second pic.

It doesn't matter who it really is in the images. What matters is that the injuries were inflicted by a sharp, bladed instrument--AKA knife.

A bullet is worse than these kinds of slashes because the bullet came from a gun?

 

[Checkmite]

No. It makes fun of the insistence on one specific standard of evidence for all situations.

No, you are wrong - it applies specifically and solely to the evidence-based approach to approving medical interventions, and is an attempt to undermine that standard.

There is a reason why medicines and medical treatments must be subject to double-blind and placebo-based studies, and should not be approved for use without their efficacy having been verified thus.

And do you know why?

For a lot of medical research, we're basically in the dark about mechanisms. Double blind studies are effective ways of establishing causal relationships in cases where we do not know the mechanisms which might create correlations.

Yes, that's exactly the reason - medicine is a special situation and requires this standard approach.

But when you know the mechanisms involved (such as aerodynamic drag), double-blind studies are not necessary.

That's true; but using this fact as an example for why medical treatments shouldn't always have to be proven using evidence is a non sequitur, because it's apples and oranges. Despite the article's fallacious and amusing attempt to re-define parachutes as "medical interventions", parachutes are no such thing. They are machines, devices designed to do mechanical work (slowing the fall of a load using friction). Their function can be proved mathematically and tested on inanimate objects, unlike medical treatments.

The article is flawed. It uses a flawed premise, and argues a flawed conclusion that not all medical interventions should have to be proven effective via an evidence-based standard. It can only support this conclusion by using an example that isn't a medical intervention and treating it as if it were.

Again: the mere existence of such edge cases is irrelevant to my argument.

They are sufficient enough to counter it. All self-defense methods have "downsides".

In other words, your idea of defense is to be able to retaliate against an attacker. I do not consider that an adequate standard. I think a good defense should allow you to prevent your attacker from harming you, not simply harm him back.

It has the benefit of establishing that you're defending yourself against an actual attack, rather than allowing you to kill a person at a distance based on an arbitrary judgment about how probable it is that you may be attacked.

Once again, you miss the point. In your knife scenario, you aren't merely being attacked: you can expect to be injured. And you cannot expect to actually prevent injury.

No; that I can "expect to be injured" is an assertion you're adding unilaterally. But it hardly matters; I don't find that the possibility of being injured to be a more undesirable consequence than the possibility of killing someone who wasn't actually going to attack me. I thought I already made that clear.

If your attacker has a gun and you have a knife, you're in a far worse situation. Yes, it's bad to be attacked by someone with a gun. But that does nothing to change the fact that, in order to defend yourself, you are still better off with a gun than a knife.

It's funny that you object to my arming myself with a knife or blunt weapon rather than a gun for various "probability"-related reasons, but you have no problem throwing out this argument about "what if the guy has a gun?". I'll absolutely be at a disadvantage; but then, what's the probability of being assaulted by a guy with a gun, as opposed to a guy with fists, say?

From what I can tell, people with guns who assault people, generally don't seem to let their victims know they have a gun until they're already at very close range; and then the fact that you've got a gun pointed at your head makes trying to reach for your own weapon - whatever it is - a dubious choice. I'm not Chuck Norris.

When your attacker lands a blow, you get injured, possibly fatally. To characterize that as "points" is pure silliness on your part.

Already answered above.

They should, because you can always invent less and less probable but more and more catastrophic "worst case" scenarios..

I've presented you with what my personal math accepts as the worst case scenario for a gun and what it accepts as the worst case scenario for a knife, as used for self-defense - unrevised since then. You're the one who insists on throwing gunmen, weak old ladies, and powerful brutes who can kill with a single blow at me in various attempts to undermine my position. Perhaps ninjas with Uzis are next.

That, and (once again) the probabilities.

The ones you refuse to provide solid numbers for? Those probabilities?

No, it is not "just as" possible. It is possible, but not with the same probability.

I suppose we know this is true, as with all your other claims, because well guns are guns and they just are better?

Neither am I. I am merely talking about the probabilities of various outcomes which, regardless of moral culpability, have intrinsic positive or negative value.

That's not what it sounded like to me. Let me repost what you posted, and bold all the parts that indicate you were attacking my personal moral position, and not "merely talking about probabilities" at all:

Oh, and even absent probabilities, your moral calculus is still wrong. There is also the risk that other people could be killed by an attacker that you failed to stop with your knife. You know, those innocents whom you so nobly esteem as more valuable than yourself (an estimation I will not second-guess), and whose number of deaths could also exceed one because of your impotence. Isn't that worse than what you claimed was the worst-case scenario?

Not one word of that was about "probabilities of various outcomes"; in fact you only discussed one single possible outcome and you even started the paragraph by stating that your point was not about probabilities.

 

[Ziggurat]

There is a reason why medicines and medical treatments must be subject to double-blind and placebo-based studies, and should not be approved for use without their efficacy having been verified thus.

And that reason is not applicable here.

Your standards of evidence are hypocritical and irrational.

They are sufficient enough to counter it. All self-defense methods have "downsides".

No, it really isn't sufficient to counter it. It makes not one god-damn lick of sense. Not only do all self-defense methods have downsides, all alternatives to self-defense have downsides. Every human activity under the sun, including those necessary for survival, has a downside. This alone is insufficient to conclude anything, and yet you wave about this triviality (and it is a triviality to note the obvious and universal) as if it could just wipe away the entire debate. Well, it cannot.

It has the benefit of establishing that you're defending yourself against an actual attack, rather than allowing you to kill a person at a distance based on an arbitrary judgment about how probable it is that you may be attacked.

A benefit which is not worth the cost.

No; that I can "expect to be injured" is an assertion you're adding unilaterally.

What's this "unilateral" garbage? Are you suggesting that all of your assertions were arrived at by mutual consent? Please.

And yes, you can be expected to get injured if you are being attacked by someone within arms length. If you can expect to not get injured, then you've got no justification in using deadly force.

But it hardly matters; I don't find that the possibility of being injured to be a more undesirable consequence than the possibility of killing someone who wasn't actually going to attack me. I thought I already made that clear.

You did, but you've given me (and everyone else) no reason to decide likewise. Again, you're cherry picking specific possible outcomes with no regard to their probabilities, and using that to justify your decision. And it's absurd.

You know, I should never drive to the grocery store to get a soda: it's much better to remain slightly thirsty than to accidentally hit a pedestrian.

It's funny that you object to my arming myself with a knife or blunt weapon rather than a gun

I have *NO* objection to you arming yourself with a knife instead of a gun. I have an objection to you telling me that I should arm myself with a knife and not a gun.

for various "probability"-related reasons, but you have no problem throwing out this argument about "what if the guy has a gun?".

YOU brought up the scenario of an attacker with a gun, not me.

I'll absolutely be at a disadvantage; but then, what's the probability of being assaulted by a guy with a gun, as opposed to a guy with fists, say?

So in other words, you now claim that your example (and it was yours, not mine) is rare enough to not be a primary concern?

Then for FSM's sake, why did you even bring it up?

From what I can tell, people with guns who assault people, generally don't seem to let their victims know they have a gun until they're already at very close range; and then the fact that you've got a gun pointed at your head makes trying to reach for your own weapon - whatever it is - a dubious choice. I'm not Chuck Norris.

There are plenty of examples of people with guns successfully defending themselves from attackers with guns. Those people aren't Chuck Norris either.

I suppose we know this is true, as with all your other claims, because well guns are guns and they just are better?

No. Guns are better for self defense for the same reason that they're more dangerous: they are more effective at disrupting the body's ability to function. That's how weapons work when you're using them in self defense: you stop the attacker's body from working sufficiently well to continue the attack. And that's also what leads to guns (and knives) killing people: the body's functions can get too disrupted to keep the person alive as well. You have already conceded that guns are deadlier than knives, which means that they're more effective at disrupting the body's functions. It makes no sense that you would seriously contest that they are also more effective for self-defense, when you have already conceded their superiority in the very mechanism by which self-defense weapons work.

 

[Checkmite]

And that reason is not applicable here.

Then why did you post a link to this ridiculous "parachute-as-medical-intervention" article? I've been saying since you posted it that the article is both wrong and has no bearing on the topic.

Your standards of evidence are hypocritical and irrational.

What standards are those? I asked you to back up your claim that guns are "more effective than knives" at self defense. It wasn't an irrational request at all. It's a very common request in this forum, in fact, that people back up claims they make. And all you've done is repeat the claim and insist that it doesn't require support, and then throw around all this straw about me wanting "double blind tests" or some nonsense when I never asked for any such thing.

No, it really isn't sufficient to counter it. It makes not one god-damn lick of sense. Not only do all self-defense methods have downsides, all alternatives to self-defense have downsides. Every human activity under the sun, including those necessary for survival, has a downside. This alone is insufficient to conclude anything, and yet you wave about this triviality (and it is a triviality to note the obvious and universal) as if it could just wipe away the entire debate. Well, it cannot.

This particular point was made in response to a particular point of yours; it wasn't an attempt to wipe away "the entire debate".

A benefit which is not worth the cost.

I see.

What's this "unilateral" garbage? Are you suggesting that all of your assertions were arrived at by mutual consent? Please.

No; but I don't attribute my assertions to you, as in this case when you said "In your knife scenario, you aren't merely being attacked: you can expect to be injured." For one thing, I didn't really give a "my knife scenario". For another, there are scenarios - credible ones - in which a person can be attacked without being injured. If the bad guy takes a swing and misses, or shoots and misses, or throws something at you and you duck in time, you suffer no injury but this does not equate to not having been attacked - just for an example.

And yes, you can be expected to get injured if you are being attacked by someone within arms length. If you can expect to not get injured, then you've got no justification in using deadly force.

It's a reasonable possibility; but I've dealt with it already.

You did, but you've given me (and everyone else) no reason to decide likewise. Again, you're cherry picking specific possible outcomes with no regard to their probabilities, and using that to justify your decision. And it's absurd.

What probabilities already? This is like nailing jello to a wall. "The probabilities, the probabilities". Why don't you say what you think they are for once, so I have something concrete to work with. Right now these "probabilities" can be anything you want them to be.

You know, I should never drive to the grocery store to get a soda: it's much better to remain slightly thirsty than to accidentally hit a pedestrian.

We are talking about self defense weapons used in self defense situations. Also, shooting at a possible "attacker" who turns out to be an innocent person is not an accident, it's an error. Accidents are happenstance. A gun going off and killing someone because you dropped it is an "accident". You deliberately shooting at the possible "attacker" with the express intention of killing or at least wounding him/her is not, whether it turns out your judgment was right or wrong.

I have *NO* objection to you arming yourself with a knife instead of a gun. I have an objection to you telling me that I should arm myself with a knife and not a gun.

Yeah, remember way back in the thread when I never said anything like that?

It's only three pages long; go check for yourself.

As an aside, I don't like that we've focused on knives; I mentioned them, but I also mentioned blunt weapons as well like batons and saps.

YOU brought up the scenario of an attacker with a gun, not me.

Fine; but I've also handled it.

So in other words, you now claim that your example (and it was yours, not mine) is rare enough to not be a primary concern?

Then for FSM's sake, why did you even bring it up?

Again, the thread is only three pages long. But to save you time, I brought it up to prove the uselessness of your argument that "If they are within arm's length, then (by definition) they can strike you, and your knife cannot prevent that." My answer was basically, "so what?" Having a gun can't stop someone else from shooting and wounding you (and this was actually the limit of the "example" as used by me), but do you let that stop you from using the gun? Modern self defense weapons aren't like swords; the point isn't to "block" incoming blows, it's purely to deliver outgoing ones (by whatever means the weapon operates). Therefore, interjecting that "a knife can't stop you from being hit" in a debate about the effectiveness of the respective weapons in their intended use is misleading at best.

There are plenty of examples of people with guns successfully defending themselves from attackers with guns. Those people aren't Chuck Norris either.

Are there "plenty of examples" of people with guns successfully defending themselves after having been wounded by attackers with guns (or even with some other weapon)?

No. Guns are better for self defense for the same reason that they're more dangerous: they are more effective at disrupting the body's ability to function. That's how weapons work when you're using them in self defense: you stop the attacker's body from working sufficiently well to continue the attack. And that's also what leads to guns (and knives) killing people: the body's functions can get too disrupted to keep the person alive as well. You have already conceded that guns are deadlier than knives, which means that they're more effective at disrupting the body's functions. It makes no sense that you would seriously contest that they are also more effective for self-defense, when you have already conceded their superiority in the very mechanism by which self-defense weapons work.

Finally.

That looks like a perfectly reasonable argument. Using that logic, one can rationally predict that a gun should be more efficient than a knife in any given scenario at injuring an attacker.

My question is - does the practice bear out the theory? Have people who used knives to defend themselves historically been less successful at ending attacks upon themselves than people who used guns have been?

 

[Cl1mh4224rd]

No. Guns are better for self defense for the same reason that they're more dangerous: they are more effective at disrupting the body's ability to function. That's how weapons work when you're using them in self defense: you stop the attacker's body from working sufficiently well to continue the attack. And that's also what leads to guns (and knives) killing people: the body's functions can get too disrupted to keep the person alive as well. You have already conceded that guns are deadlier than knives, which means that they're more effective at disrupting the body's functions. It makes no sense that you would seriously contest that they are also more effective for self-defense, when you have already conceded their superiority in the very mechanism by which self-defense weapons work.

This sounds like an admission that lethality is not a requirement for effective self defense. So why aren't, say, tasers the preferred method of self defense?

 

[Ziggurat]

This sounds like an admission that lethality is not a requirement for effective self defense.

Correct: it's a side effect.

So why aren't, say, tasers the preferred method of self defense?

Some people do prefer them. But they have a number of serious drawbacks that make them less effective than guns in a lot of common situations.

 

[Cl1mh4224rd]

Some people do prefer them. But they have a number of serious drawbacks that make them less effective than guns in a lot of common situations.

Of course, but there's no significant effort to rectify these issues. Certainly not from gun advocates that I've seen. That, to me, says that the self defense argument made by gun advocates is less about the self defense and more about the gun.