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Smart Guns are Coming
wikinerd writes "Eurekalert reports that smart gun technology actually works. According to the press release, smart guns demonstrated by the NJIT, can recognise authorised users utilising "sixteen electronic computerized sensors embedded in the gun's grip" and "Under New Jersey law, passed in Dec. 2002, only smart guns can be purchased in the state three years after personalized handguns become commercially available. Lautenberg said New Jersey's legislative effort to introduce smart gun technology should be a national model for the country"."
... a cop's partner or even a private citizen needs to use the cop's gun to defend themselves and the wounded cop? Will the "smart" gun recognize someone trying to help the owner or will it not function?
Tongue: A variety of meat, rarely served because it crosses the line between a cut of beef and a piece of dead cow.
If you're dealing with someone who has the foresight to use an EMP pulse, and has the equipment necessary to do it, you have bigger things to worry about.
- oZ
// i am here.
Wow I couldn't think of a stupider idea, luckily, you can! Because finger print readers always work every time..
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"Sixteen electronic computerized sensors embedded in the gun's grip distinguished known from unknown users. "We've only just begun and we're pleased to say that we're getting 90 percent reliability when scanning users," said Sebastian." So either 1 in 10 times or 1 in 10 users can forget it. Sorry, but when you need a firearm in an emergency situation, the odds are going to have to be much, much better than that.
And the NRA will claim this is an infringement on the 2nd amendment because a State Law is superceding the Constitution on this key part " the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed"
Good idea, but you can just see the challenge coming.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
This is a patently bad idea with regards to general usage. While this idea is great in theory, there is one major drawback:
More components mean more points of potential failure.
The problem in this is, should you need the firearm, at any time it may be unreliable no matter what you're using (even Kalashnikov recognized this in his design): when in a life-or-death situation, Murphy's law usually decides to rear its ugly head, and at that point you're playing the odds: I have x components, y components stand a chance of failing. If any one of y components fails, the firearm fails to function, and you may quickly wind up dead.
Now: that said, if we had a society where firearms weren't necessary for home protection or policing (I rarely ever see the latter in action where I live, so I require the former), then this would be great. On sport firearms, this would be great, because you don't need the reliability you would in a protection scenario. However, in any situation to where you have a life-or-death scenario, as many firearms are manufactured for in the first place, you do not EVER want extra complexity that may cause failure in function of your sidearm.
I think the issue is that your right to bare arms is just incase the government turns bad and everyone needs to overthrow them - if guns can be disabled like this on mass with a single high altitude nuclear blast for example, it would pretty much negate any chance of an armed uprising..
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Read the "biometrics" that the article mentions. The way you squeeze the trigger and hold the weapon is used to drive the id mechanism. I'm pretty damn sure that I won't be holding a pistol the same way under life-or-death stress as I would under target shooting.
The sensors add orders of magnitude more complexity (pistols themselves don't have to be very complicated) bringing more cost and points of failure.
I certainly wouldn't stake my own life on one of these pieces of crap working. Why would anyone willingly buy one of these toy guns?
Smart guns would be great in a setting were kids are around, but I could see this actually being a hiderance in certain situation, like if someone is breaking into your house. Imagine trying to get your gun to recognize you are you when seconds count would defintely be a hinderance. Bad Idea
" One EMP pulse and you're disarmed. Thanks, but we're not interested."
Ditto for any other inopportune failure of the electronics. When a computer, iPod, etc. fails--even at the worst possible time--at most you are severely inconvienced. When your firearm fails at an inopportune time--say, I dunno, when a knife- or dumb gun-wielding intruder breaks into your bedroom maybe?--you are dead.
Ignorance is curable, stupid is forever.
I'm afraid I can't let you do that Dave.
Depends on your definition of "works". From the article:
Sixteen electronic computerized sensors embedded in the gun's grip distinguished known from unknown users. "We've only just begun and we're pleased to say that we're getting 90 percent reliability when scanning users," said Sebastian.
There's no sane cop in this world that would carry a weapon for self-defense that worked reliably 9 out of 10 times.
why is it good for guns?
Maybe I'm cynical, but if every gun sold has to have electronic/computer receivers, might governments have keys to disable guns with those receivers? In some cases, that would negate the rights that gun ownership is supposed to secure, by removing checks on the ability of governments to take those rights. If government became despotic (as it often did when the words you quoted were written), the only mitigating factor was the ability of citizens to arm themselves against it. Negate that, and governments could do whatever they want, a state of affairs that the Constitution was designed to prevent.
The technology has good and safe uses, but it puts a lot of powers in the hands of people who can't be trusted with that much power - which is to say, anyone.
The article claims they have 90% reliability? MY gun shoots every single time I pull the trigger. So now we have:
* A gun I cannot loan to a friend on the range
* A gun which is going to be more expensive, due to all those fancy features, yet will be harder to SELL, even to another law-abiding citizen, because of the added difficulty in "transfering" the gun to the person so they can use it.
* A gun that is far less reliable
* A gun that is mandated by law (in New Jersey)as the only sort of gun I'm allowed to have
* A gun with complex electronic parts that will be much less durable, and will probably require some sort of energy source (such as batteries).
* A gun that will weigh more
* A gun that criminals WILL NOT USE. They will bypass the security of stolen guns, or just trade in "non-secure" guns. So, only law-abiding people will be stuck with these crappy things.
Why is it these lawmakers trust technology more than the people they represent?
--This sig is in beta. Please let us know abut any errors you find.
As to A you're wrong (The Mujahadeen beat the Soviets, the Vietminh beat the French Foreign Legion, Nicaragua, etc.)
And as to B the government will exempt themselves from having to use them.
Signing off from the Damaged Worlds
Good idea. Criminalize carrying a gun. That will stop the criminals -- they always obey the law. If this actually works, I say that we pass a law requiring all criminals to report to their nearest police station for arrest. That will clean up the streets.
People who fill out the paperwork for a conceled permit, take the manditory safely training course, pay the rather large fee, and get fingerprinted (I have been through this process) are the ones most likely to obey the law. A criminal will NOT go through all of this trouble, and a criminal would not be stopped by a law criminalizing concealed carry.
"-1 Troll" is the apparently the same as "-1 I disagree with you."
While handguns with this feature should be an available option for officers who fear losing their gun during a struggle with a suspect, the thought of making these mandatory is absurd!
What we need more is to make sure that these computerized sensors can't be _hacked_ to alter who has the authority to use the weapon. Unauthorized use is only good if you can keep the criminals from using stolen weapons (or purchased on the black market).
What good is it if the average upstanding citizen can't bear arms to protect themselves because of this, but the average criminal can get around it?
"Hard work never killed anyone." -- Some Dead Guy
Because these laws aren't meant to solve the violent crime problem, they are meant to make it look like our elected officials are TRYING to solve the problem. Hell, if the did solve the problem, they would not be able to run on it anymore...
Should we do the same thing with Automobiles, Computers, adult beverages and steak knives?
More people are killed by cars than guns...
No, it wouldn't:
http://www.ccrkba.org/pub/rkba/press-releases/CC-M aryland-boon.htm
In its progress report on the Integrated Ballistics Identification System (IBIS), the Maryland State Police Forensic Sciences Division recommends that "this program be suspended, a repeal of the collection of cartridge cases from current law be enacted and the Laboratory Technicians associated with the program be transferred to the DNA database unit." So far, Maryland has spent $2.5 million over the past four years, with nothing to show for it. The report admitted, "Guns found to be used in the commission of crime...are not the ones being entered into" the system.
A similar program in New York has had exactly the same results, after spending $4 million.
Well, so long as it's non-trivial to bypass, it will stop the problem of "I got shot with my own gun by an intruder" or "my kid shot his friend when they got into my sock drawer."
Sounds like it's an extra "saftey." Though if it's anything like "child-proof caps" it'll have the opposite result...
"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge"
- Charles Darwin
That's actually a very interesting point. How would first time shooters ever get into the sport (assuming these kinds were all that were left), without actually buying their own guns? Maybe they'll have special liscenses for ranges to rent out "old style" arms? I bet the liability and hoops for that would be a little much, could this be the end of the sport?
The snow doesn't give a soft white damn whom it touches. -- ee cummings
When I read the summary I immediately thought, what a good idea, this will prevent a lot of accidental killings in the home.
Then I read the comments, most of which seem to say it's a bad idea because it the gun might fail when you actually need to shoot somebody.
It reminded me of the recent fatal shooting of Dimebag Darrel (Pantera guitarist) at a gig in Ohio (IIRC). My first thought was that if guns weren't so readily available, it might not have happened. Then it occurred to me that many Americans probably thought, if everyone in the audience had a gun it might not have happened.
What we need is to get this law overturned and reclaim our rights that were guaranteed under the 2nd amendment. Crippled weapons like these will only serve to get their owners killed or maimed due to a failure at the critical moment.
At the bottom of the endless pile of paper work which characterizes all regulation lies a gun.
Alan Greenspan
First of all, more points of failure makes for a less useable/reliable weapon. Second of all, it supposedly verifies you partially by the way you pull the trigger. This sounds like the worst poossible idea. Isn't that going to change appreciably when you're nervous, pursued, in an awkward situation, etc? I mean a person on the test range will fire it the same every time within measureable deltas, but in a real life-or-death situation? No thanks.
The criminals will still have non-smart guns, with the serial numbers filed off just like they do today. Citizens should be prepared to counter whatever they should expect to run into in a self defense situation.
The past forty or so years of data have shown us that an encounter with one gun is significantly more likely to result in a casualty than an encounter in which both parties are armed. Also keep in mind that most incidents that are terminated without shots fired go unreported.
Also keep in mind that when Florida changed their laws to allow concealed-carry their murder rates went down about as much a the rates in the rest of the country went up. If you're concerned with protecting children from the hazard of a gun in the house, keep in mind that many more children per year die in plastic buckets of water then due to a gunshot wound.
Can someone explain to me why this is a good idea?
Why rely on a hardware interlock to protect your kids? So they find your pistol and have a grand time pointing it at each other, they're "safe" because of the interlock, right? What happens at a friends house, someone who has firearms without the interlock (Of course it won't be the end of that for a few generations since there's -a lot- of guns out there already. )?
I was brought up around firearms, as were my brothers and most of my friends. Dad's service revolver was loaded and in an accessible location from the time I was young. Was it a miracle all three of us made it to adulthood? Far from it, we were taken out at a young age, shown what it can do, and taught how to safely handle all manners of firearms. 25 years later, those habits are so deeply ingrained as to be involunatary - like breathing or swallowing. I'm only nervous around firearms when someone else, someone that I don't know well (most cops I've met), with unknown or outright dangerous habits are handling firearms.
The point of the above ramble is that those who are safest with firearms are the ones who were exposed to them early and often, those who learned a respect for them from a young age. People who keep them stashed away, or worse, rely on mechanical devices, are setting their offspring up for a huge incident.
At the bottom of the endless pile of paper work which characterizes all regulation lies a gun.
Alan Greenspan
The reason kids would do that in the first place are because it's mysterious and forbidden. If they were taught how to use the gun and just what it can do at an early age, not only would it no longer be mysterious, but they'd know exactly what it can do and how to handle it. I grew up with unlocked guns around the house. A cousin didn't, and he didn't make it past his teens either.
Does it happen often?
That gun-wielding intruders enters your bedroom?
So often that the extra electronics in your gun will seriously lower your chance of survival for the next 50 years?
It only has to fail that one time that it happens for you to die.
But can I assume from your statement that::
1) Don't wear a seatbelt
2) Don't have ANY form of insurance
3) Don't lock your doors, EVER
4) Never took a single self defense course
5) Don't wear a helmet when riding a bike
6) Don't use surge protectors
7) Don't use a firewall
8) Don't own any fire extinguishers
9) Deactivate your airbags
Since making sure you are adequately protected from a dangerous situation is so insane to you.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
Why rely on a hardware interlock to protect your kids? So they find your pistol and have a grand time pointing it at each other, they're "safe" because of the interlock, right? What happens at a friends house, someone who has firearms without the interlock
;)
Oh absolutely not, by no means was I implying that we need to rely on mechanical locks to protect the kids, as I said kids find their way into that stuff, the electronic lock is just an added safety feature. I still think that education should be mandatory for a household with kids and a gun, but smart-gun type safety locks are a nice added piece-of-mind to prevent any accidents. Afterall, in a perfect world we wouldn't even need the primary safety.
Like you said, 3 of you in a house with an accessible loaded gun made it without incident due solely to education. As not all parents will be as smart as yours were about the situation (which is scary, and sucks.), I think this is a good thing. Although parents who have loaded guns in plain sight of their kids who don't educate their kids should be beaten.
Again, I don't think they should be made pushed onto us by law, but I don't mind them being an option. As I said, personally I don't think I'd buy one because then you can't go out shooting with friends, but I can see its uses.
Yes, indeed it would be better to try to reason with a burglar and at the same time call the authorities than to be able to defend one self. Perhaps during the time one waits for the cops, one can ask that the criminal doesn't rape the wife too terribly hard.
Less guns in the hands of law abiding, responsible people will obviously lead to the criminals turing their guns in. Oh wait...
Wealth is the product of man's capacity to think. -Ayn Rand
You've been watching way too much Fox news. If you're really that scared of someone breaking into your house, buy some big steel doors and bars for your windows. Maybe even get an alarm system. Having a gun doesn't really stop anybody from breaking into your house. Unless you actually sleep with it under your pillow (bad idea), what are the odds that you are going to get to your gun faster than the raping gun toting burglar you described? Guns just give you a false sense of security without actually providing you with a sufficient level of protection.
Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
I'm afraid I can't let you do that Dave.
While I laughed my ass off when I read this, I think he's saying more than he knows. (or maybe he knows exactly what he's saying.) What if you're being attacked in your home, and your smart gun suddenly decides (due to circuitry failure or some other business) that you're not it's rightful owner? Your gun is now nothing more than a bludgeon.
We've already put computers into every household appliance and most forms of transportation, and now we're introducing them into our guns. Do we really need to computerize weapons, knowing that all we're doing is basing MORE of our security on electronics? I would be happier knowing that the fate of the world still lies at least partially in the hands of humans, not in the circuitry of a processor.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
If these guns are so great, why does the law exempt New Jersey Police? This is especially troublesome since gun assaults on police are most often with their own weapon. So lets get rid of the hipocrasy; lets make all the New Jersey police departments use the technology for three years before requiring it for everyone else. Let them debug it not the citizens of the state.
Under current law; they are classified as machine guns. They wont ever be available for sale to the public since machine guns are illegal to own in this country since 1986. The only exception is maching guns registered before 1986. This is an incredibly bad idea.
If you're dealing with someone who has the foresight to use an EMP pulse, and has the equipment necessary to do it, you have bigger things to worry about.
Not necessarily. If this law goes through, within a few years any person can be certain that most of the guns in any "law abiding" neighborhood will be these "smart" guns. A single individual or a group of people with ill intent can turn an entire neighborhood of armed individuals into disarmed individuals with a medium-sized homemade EMP. That's just not cool. It doesn't matter that it's unlikely. Earthquakes are unlikely too, but we still build earthquake resistant buildings because the consequences of having your building fall down during an earthquake are really bad. It's also unlikely that a whole plane-load of people would allow a couple of people armed with nothing but knives to take over their plane and deliberately fly it into a building, killing thousands. Yet it happened, what, four times in one day? No shit, huh?
Then there's the little thing that everyone always forgets about the 2nd Amendment. It's not about your right to protect yourself. That is an inalienable right that cannot be taken away by any government. What the 2nd Amendment (and the entire Constitution) is really about is the guaranteed ability of the general population to defend itself agains a corrupt government, by law or by force. By the People, for the People, and all the jazz.
Something tells me that the military and the police aren't going to be carrying around these so-called "smart" guns anytime soon, while the general population is forced to buy only smart guns and exchange older guns for smart guns. Something also tells me that the military is the one group who has easy access to EMP weapons. Follow the bouncing ball. It leads to a very dark place.
It doesn't matter that it's unlikely to happen. The point is that it could happen very easily, and the consequences of such an event are very, very bad for the citizens of this country. If you think it could never happen, you must be living on a different planet with a different world history and a completely different race of sentient beings controlling things. This is a great country, but we all know it is not run by angels. No government ever has been. Everyone who is in power always wants more power.
Mark my words. This type of law is evil to the core, and shows a complete lack of understanding of the meaning of the 2nd Amendment of these United States.
.
[RANT]
What the fuck is it with Americans and their "I need a gun to shoot intruders in my home" crap. No where else in the whole fucking world do people say shit like this.
Do you know how infrequently people come across intruders in their home, intruders who are actually intending to murder/harm the owner? And of those that own guns, do you know how FEW manage to get to their gun? And do you know how many have their shitty cheap gun misfire and jam, then having enraged the intruder get the shit beat out of them? Or actually shoot *someone else* they mistook for an intruder? Like their kids getting home late or their husband sneaking back into the house at 2am?
Now compare all of the above to the number of kids and owners that shoot one another accidentally, the number that shoot one another because a gun is so handy and easy to pick up when angry, and the number of people shot because there are so many fucking guns that every single God damned 7-11 robber and car-jacker packs heat and is stupid enough to use it.
[/RANT]
The second amendment to the Constitution, only definitively guarantees the right to bear arms for the purpose of a well-organized militia. The right to bear arms beyond those purpsoes is unclear. In fact, one could very reasonably consider that the National Guard meets the legal criteria of a well-organized militia, and say that no one not associated with the Guard has the right to bear arms.
No. It says: 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. It does not say "well-organized".
The meaning of the word "regulated" is interesting. I can mean to place into order, it can also mean "To adjust for accurate and proper functioning." Interesting. In a military sense, it also means well-equipped or well-supplied, and well-trained. Regulars vs. irregulars.
Aside from that matter, and probably the main reason the courts have thus far stayed away from the posession issue, is that the latter part, "the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed", is not a dependent clause. The first part, "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State", provides a sufficient condition for the second part to exist, but not a necessary condition.
The courts have ruled that the use of a weapon can be regulated. In other words, you may be able to keep and bear a weapon, but pulling the trigger could be a crime. There are also limits to to what kind of weapon a person could reasonably be expected to be allowed to keep and bear in certain situations, just as there are court-upheld laws that forbid making certain kinds of speech in certain situations. ("Fire!" in a crowded theatre, etc.)
That all being said, the anti gun-rights people often ignore another important amendment in the Bill of Rights, good old amendment number nine: The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.
Even if the guarantee for the second amendment was for the right to form a militial, good old Nine specifically speaks to rights retained by the people, and when it was enacted, carrying weapons for self-defense and other lawful purposes was certainly a right.
"Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives" should be a convenience store, not a government agency.
I'll stick with a gun that I know will fire if I follow some simple maintenance guidelines, thank you. Adding complexity to a life and death situation is a recipe for the second option.
From the article:
"This technology is similar to how electronic machines read an individual's signature upon completing a credit card transaction," said Sebastian.
Bullshit - I work as a cashier and half of the people "signing" their transaction either make a quick dash or scribble random lines. Hopefully these new smart guns aren't "similar", otherwise Police will have a false sense of security that their unsafe firearms can't be used against them.
you obvious have no idea how things work in countys where guns are illegal. while the more hardend and orginized crimanals do have guns, they dont use them on anybody but themselfs. doing anything else would atrackt far to much attention. that means there is little or no chance of ever having a gun used against you(just threat or actualy fired). and for that reason there is no reason to carry a gun. if you want self defence measures something non-lethal is therefor perfectly adequate. as for the rant being purely emotional... well the rant was but the reason wherent the only thing purely emotional is the need to carry a gun. nothing rational about it.
I know what you mean about a knife, but it's a lot harder to kill someone with a kife - you actually have to stab someone to kill them. With a gun, it's a lot less personal - one squeeze and they're dead. That's the problem. Guns are too easy to use. Normally sane, sober people can pick them up in a fit of rage or mental unbalance (like if their lover has left them, or they lost their job), and kill someone before they realise what's happened. The risk with having guns around is too great, in my opinion. I'd like to go through life knowing there are no armed people out there, running about with no training, with easy access to guns when their faculties might be impaired. If you're scared the police aren't good enough to protect you, then get the police better funding. Arming yourself doesn't correct the police department. All you end up with is a bunch of people with guns, and it only takes one of those on a bad night to kill.