More on Guns

It is pretty unusual for me to make 2 posts on the same subject. So it is a good indication about how I feel about something.

Greatbong, in his blog Random Thoughts of a Demented Mind, makes a great point in his post: The Idiot's Got a Gun!

I quote below the last 2 paras of his post. He makes his point far more eloquently than I can hope to do - I just wanna say ... yeah, that! :-)

"In USA, however that is not the case. Propped up by the billions of dollars from the powerful gun lobby and provided protection by the literalism of conservatives who consider the Second Amendment of the US constitution (A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the People to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed) sacrosanct even though the historical reasons (the prevalent lawlessness of the times) for which the founding fathers advocated such a measure has long ceased to be relevant, objective conditions continue to exist in the country for loons like Cho Seung-Hui , after being subject to minimal background checks, to get their hands on enough hardware to fight a small war.

And for this reason, I am unable to decide who to despise more: the rambling idiot holding the gun and looking into the camera, or the vested interest fat-cats who put the gun in the pervert’s hand and profited off the lives and families destroyed by this most random and senseless act of violence."

Guns and roses

In late eighties and early nineties, one of my favorite bands was Guns 'N' Roses. But I'm writing not about them this time but about the terrible tragedy at Virginia Tech. It is a tragedy too hard for me to describe in words. What I want to focus on is guns. To be clear right off the bat, I'm completely sold on the idea that weapons such as guns should be extremely hard to get. Extremely tight gun control, if you will. And pre-empting my argument by saying it is a knee-jerk reaction is not going to alter the facts.

So let's look at the facts:

1. Guns are weapons meant to kill. And the fact is that guns do kill. What is the logical justification to possess a gun? Clearly it's not to dry hair! Then why must society be so accepting of a gun? And if gun is ok, why stop there? Why not small shoulder missiles and maybe other assorted military weapons. This is incredibly stupid. Yeah, I know there's the second amendment. But I believe it was a medieval extension to our constitution when systems and law enforcement were not in place like they are today. Today, who settles an argument using guns?!

2. All societies and indeed the states in the US that have the tightest gun control laws have the lowest level gun related crimes. This is a fact.

3. More than 90% of gun related deaths happen to be either homicides, suicides or accidents. Only about 2% of gun related deaths are for genuine self defense. Again, this is a fact. If one fine day we all wake up in a gun-free society, even this 2% figure would drop dramatically since there would be so few guns around!

The pro-guns lobby and NRA often cite an argument of deterrence. Today I even heard some nut argue on NPR about situations where some guns prevented other gun crimes. The argument is so ludicrous and so fundamentally flawed that I'm really dismayed at the argumentative incompetence of these otherwise smart people! Anybody familiar with basic Game Theory knows about Nash equilibria and the fact that there is always an inferior Nash equilibrium and a superior Nash equilibrium (NE). E.g. take the case of traffic rules, if everyone decided to disobey all traffic rules, it would be mayhem and all traffic would be in an inferior NE - accident rates will be high, speeds will be extremely slow and many, if not all, intersections would be gridlocked. Just see the inferior NE at work on Indian roads! Here in the US, we are in a superior NE at least as far as traffic is concerned. If everyone had a gun, we would, as a society, definitely end up in an inferior NE. Why, oh why would we, as a society, want to be a collection of gun-toting cowboys and condemn ourselves to a sub-optimal, anarchic existence of fear and distrust?

Where did my money go?

I was listening to NPR on the radio on my way to work today as I usually do. There was a fascinating though not an earth shattering discussion on health care issues facing America. While neither the subject nor the ideas were refreshingly new, my attention was drawn to a question one caller posed. She said (and there was no disagreement from the panel experts so it must be generally true) that over the last few years (maybe decades), there have been 2 consistent trends. Costs of insurance premiums (charged to consumers) have been going up. At the same time, benefits paid out (to doctors and other health care practitioners) have been going down. So where is the money going? Somewhat of a rhetoric question if you study the health care value chain and forces in play but still makes you wonder ...

Obviously the health care practitioners have to be in the game by raising their charges - which causes the insurance premiums to go up even more and this vicious circle goes on. How do we ever get out of this mess? Any thoughts anyone?

As for me, I take refuge in Einstein's brilliant observation: "The significant problems we face in life cannot be solved by the same level of thinking that created them."

Until the next quantum leap in thinking, adieu.