StunRay Incapacitates With a Flash of Light

Hugh Pickens writes "Scientific American reports that a newly patented method of non-lethal incapacitation can render an assailant helpless for several minutes by overloading the neural networks connected to the retina with a brief flash of high-intensity light. 'It's the inverse of blindness—the technical term is a loss of contrast sensitivity,' says Todd Eisenberg, the engineer who invented the device. The device consists of a 75-watt lamp, combined with optics that collect and focus the visible light into a targeted beam, which can be aimed like a flashlight to project a controlled beam of white light more than 10 times more intense than an aircraft landing light with a range as far away as 150 feet. Recovery time ranges from 'seconds to 20 minutes,' says Eisenberg. 'It's very analogous to walking from a very bright room into a very dark room.'"

Comments

...liabilities

[SpiralSpirit]

...and I'm sure the long term effects of overloading your sensitive, incredibly difficult and costly to regrow optic nerves to this degree are well known, and this represents no long term danger. right?

Re:...liabilities

[stonewallred]

If tasers were used to prevent someone from harming themselves or others, then I would be AOK with them.

But they are used as offensive weapons to enforce compliance by most police departments.

And it is so much less paperwork to fill out if you enforce compliance with a taser, as opposed to if you actually had to beat the fucktard's as with your billy club, ASP or baton.

I personally have seen an inmate hit with a taser, and then get beat because he refused to lay stils ordered.

Ignoring the fact that the CO with the taser kept jolting him, which lead to muscle contractions, which lead to four other COs hitting him with 4' long hickory riot batons.

This went on for almost 5 minutes until a Lt showed up, seen me and a co-worker obviously writing down the names of the officers involved.

Re:...liabilities

[Unoriginal_Nickname]

Because Taser International is extremely litigious, going so far as to sue the government of B.C. for even studying ESW safety. Because Taser makes more money if the weapons are misused, and microeconomics therefore predicts that they will recommend overuse as a rational agent. Because they aggressively market their weapons as a non-lethal* general-purpose alternative and prove it with bait-and-switch like product demonstrations on physically fit, passive police officers.

There's nothing inherently wrong with tasers, as long as people understand what they are, how they work and how they should be used safely. Taser International is a god-awful company of evil people and their products will continue to be misused as long as they have a say in how they should be.

Re:...liabilities

[clang_jangle]

I'm a middle-aged woman who was leaving a university lecture and had four blocks to walk to get home. They acted like I had a weapon or something, because I had the nerve to ask "how can I get around this, I live one block that way?" instead of just saying, "oh ok officer, I don't really need to go home". So yes, I was most definitely an innocent bystander in the wrong place at the wrong time and AFAIC the police had absolutely no excuse to behave as they did. Furthermore, I was far from the only innocent party wronged by Seattle PD that day. Do some reading about it, there's plenty of info online about how poorly the police behaved during that entire event. It was truly shameful, and I'm afraid also quite representative of how US police forces have changed.

Re:...liabilities

[hairyfeet]

Where have you been? The new hotness is "non lethal weapons" because after all it is hard to beat the shit out of someone later if you kill them up front. Plus it sounds better to the press, you just leave out those pesky blindness and/or electrocution issues.

You see that way you can say "and then they were brought down with a taser/phazelight" and leave off the "and it killed him" and it sounds like you were just trying to stop them! Whereas "and then we whomped the shit out of them with a rubber hose" just doesn't give it the whole "Star Trek" vibe. I'm sure the main street media will be making star wars/ star trek comparisons so the public thinks you are using a phaser on stun not a torture device which looks MUCH better in the papers.

It is all about spin now my boy, didn't you get the memo?

Re:...liabilities

[davester666]

Yes, everyone who died during or shortly after being tasered [and generally more than once] were all wusses. With weak hearts, small bladders, and obviously in the middle of a cocaine high.

Because if it's been established that for most people without a heart condition can take being tasered a single time without lasting affects [which is what Taser International has established].

Of course, in real life, cops:
1) have no idea if the person they are tasering has a heart problem
2) believe if you can tase them once and they don't die, you can tase them as often and as much as you feel like it

For example, google "vancouver airport taser death" for an example of someone dying because:
-he was elderly
-he didn't understand english
-he didn't comply with instructions in english within 25 seconds [not that he was attacking anybody, he just didn't flop onto the ground immediately]
-he was tased 2-4 times [police claim they only got him twice, witnesses say 4, including twice after he was cuffed and on the ground]

Hell, even the "don't tase me bro" guy, who was a dick, got tased multiple times, despite being held face-down on the ground by 4 cops.

At least there is SOME accountability, in that the device supposedly keeps a record of when it has been triggered, and there is something either physically pressed against you or is shot towards you indicating who fired. I can't wait until they perfect the long-distance heat ray, also a 'compliance' device, which burns your flesh from a significant distance. You can just be wandering around in a crowd, and suddenly your skin [including your eyes] is burning. Not just the sensation, but is actually burning. And you have no idea how or why it is happening. And no way to prove afterwards that any specific individual or group did anything to you [other than yes, you appear to have second degree burns on your face and upper body].

Good times.

isn't this is an old idea?

[volkerdi]

I remember advertisements in magazines in the years before Tasers for a magic-sounding non-lethal weapon that would instantly incapacitate an attacker. The ads were vague about how the device worked, but I recall hearing (reading?) somewhere that it was a super-bright flashlight. Perhaps a strobe.

Maybe the difference is that it's effective this time.

can I avoid the stun effect...

[Anonymous Coward]

...by wearing sun glasses?

Clancy?

[thynk]

Didn't Tom Clancy use this in one of his novels to blind the Japanese pilots like 15 years ago?