Re:Scientific American’s gun error
by oconnore on Sunday December 23, 2012 @09:00AM
(#4959455)
Ah yes, the old "write an article based on a model that you made up apparently without validation and then accuse everyone else of not citing evidence".
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Re:Scientific American’s gun error
by mattraibert on Sunday December 23, 2012 @09:21AM
(#4959502)
I read it that way at first too. But if you read a little further, the article centers on providing evidence for the model. Specifically he shows evidence that a a state with higher G has linearly higher D (which is exactly what the model states).
Re:Scientific American’s gun error
by aszepieniec on Sunday December 23, 2012 @09:33AM
(#4959530)
And then when the evidence does not match up, he fudges with one of his parameters, V, to "explain" it.
Re:Scientific American’s gun error
by mattraibert on Tuesday December 25, 2012 @03:07AM
(#4965451)
This seems like a non-sequitur. The gp's criticism was that the article doesn't cite any evidence for the model, which he does.
Besides, he doesn't "fudge" V. He shows evidence: that violent crime decreased over the relevant period and argues that less violent crime implies lower average tendency to violence (V).
Re:Scientific American’s gun error
by pretoriusB on Sunday December 23, 2012 @09:03AM
(#4959463)
Well, the Australian cases of drug laws / murders provides enough validation for his case.
Except that in both Australia and the UK the gun murder rates were already incredibly low before their respective gun bans. Their bans didn't actually lead to less violence than before their bans; in fact, violence actually increased post-ban.