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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"."
This technology has very little merit. Since there are over 100 million weapons in North America, there will never be a problem for a criminal to find a gun that does not contain this "smart" technology. People that legitimately acquire weapons are not the ones that mis-use them.
.22 calibre hunting rifle. It is very likely the continued importation of illegal automatic assault weapons will be used for crimes though.
In Canada, there has been National debate over their new control registry that has legislated that all gun owners must now register their weapons. It's not very likely that legitimate gun owners are going to commit a crime with their
The only place this technology has any applicability is in the hands of police if they feel they may lose their firearm to a suspect and have it used against them. And you don't hear about that happening to often because police have training. Develop smart people, not smart weapons.
Actually, they don't.
The good guys - assuming firearms are legal (and in Europe, for the most part, they aren't) - can go to the range and practice any time they want. Most of us do, because we enjoy it. Putting holes in pieces of paper is easy. Putting holes in the right part of the piece of paper, however, is hard.
The bad guys don't.
If you're more than around 20 feet away from a bad guy with a gun, turn around and run like hell. Odds are pretty good that he won't hit you. Odds are very good that if he hits you, he won't hit you anywhere that'll kill you.
In fact, if he's holding the gun sideways ("gangsta style"), I'd personally cut that down to ten feet. We got temporary special dispensation from the range officer (who was as curious as we were), and tried it. Even for an experienced shooter, it's goddamn near fucking impossible to hit jack shit that way, even if you take time to aim (which - if you're running away - the bad guy won't have time to do).
In an ideal universe, there'd be no guns on the street. Maybe your part of the EU is part of that universe, but the US is not part of an ideal universe. Britain tried the experiment (banning firearms after legalizing them) after the Dunblane massacre -- and has discovered that the level of gun crime went up, not down, since doing so.
It's sorta like drinking: No physician will ever tell you to start drinking... but most physicians will agree that if you drink, enjoying a glass or two of red wine a day is healthier than abstaining from alcohol completely.
Next time you're in the States, if you visit a friend who owns firearms, ask him or her to take you to the range!
You're right, of course. Seeing as how "dumb" knives are freely available and virtually unregulated, I wonder how long it will be before knife weapons attract the same attention :-/. If someone calls this absurd, that's the point.
.45 auto has provided.
It is hard enough getting a fully mechanical gun to function reliably every time; a 10% failure rate in today's handguns would be not only unacceptable, but dangerous by providing a false sense of security. The worst handguns today probably have a 1% or 2% failure rate at most, and even that is horrible. Personally I prefer a 0% failure rate, which is what my
The only application I see for this technology that would be accepted by the marketplace (without the NJ law...lol) is a firearm kept in a semi-public place or insecure location like in a car trunk or office, or used by a bartender or bouncer.
A 10% failure rate is unacceptable for self/home defense. Note that the police are exempt from the new New Jersey law, despite that they are perhaps the group most likely to be shot and killed with their own weapons. They don't trust this technology, so why should I?