🚀 go-pugleaf

[From Rick Marken (990428.1310)]

Marc Abrams (990428.1233) --

> Does anybody really believe we need _more_ laws and tighter
> control of others to "prevent" these kinds of things [like
> the Littleton shootings] from happening.

No. More laws certainly won't help. Certainly not laws that
limit gun purchases to no more than 1 per month per family
member.

What we need is to have people agree to voluntarily disarm
themselves completely; turn in _all_ their guns to be melted
down into plowshares or PCs or TVs -- so they can see more
violent videos, which are tasteless but harmless. We should
also agree to strictly regulate our access to firearms for
hunting and collecting.

Guns are devices that increase the gain of a control loop way
beyond safe limits. People will always get into conflicts with
each other, even when they all understand and accept PCT. These
conflicts are far more likely to become fatal if firearms are
part of one or both conflicted loops. That's why the homicide
rate in the US is 10 times what it is in countries that are
"disarmed". Even without guns there will be fatal conflicts,
of course; but guns are far more fatal than knives, say. And,
unlike knives, they are really not useful for anything other
than killing.

But since ideology (and/or the uniquely American way of reasoning
about guns) will prevent voluntary disarmament in the US, I
suggest that the best way for people to deal with horrible events
like Littleton is to get used to  it. Littleton massacres, like
tornados, are just going to happen every so often. Fatal conflicts
are what you get when you put a bunch of fatally high gain control
loops together in one place.

Best

Rick
---
Richard S. Marken                 Phone or Fax:  310 474-0313
Life Learning Associates         e-mail: rmarken@earthlink.net
http://home.earthlink.net/~rmarken