Sharps-shooter
Member
- Joined
- Nov 7, 2006
- Messages
- 488
so, the purpose was essentially to establish a correlation, and it appears from the presented data that there is a correlation between gun ownership and murder rates. What we don't know includes:
What role does an atmosphere of violence play in people's decision to get guns? (are people going out and buying guns because they live in dangerous areas?)
How does the murder rate change proportionally to changes in the rate of firearm ownership in a given state? (do they both increase together? or does one go up and the other down?)
and, in my professional opinion as a published research scientist , most importantly:
How reliable is the original data? In other words, can the survey of firearm ownership be relied upon?
Now, I'm pretty private about my firearm ownership. I wouldn't respond to it on a survey, especially not one in which they called my number and therefore could be assumed to have my name. I don't do firearm registration, and I go out of my way to avoid IBC's. And I'm a respectable upstanding member of society.
MUCH LESS would I answer this question in the afirmative if I were not lawfully allowed to own a firearm, or were in a situation where I felt there was a likelihood I would be committing a crime with one in the near future.
In the scientific community, surveys, and especially phone-iin surveys, are considered one of the least reliable forms of gathering data, because you can't really verify the truth value of the data so gathered.
I think that a realistic determination of the rate of firearm ownership, ESPECIALLY among the criminal element in society, would be extremely hard to determine.
What role does an atmosphere of violence play in people's decision to get guns? (are people going out and buying guns because they live in dangerous areas?)
How does the murder rate change proportionally to changes in the rate of firearm ownership in a given state? (do they both increase together? or does one go up and the other down?)
and, in my professional opinion as a published research scientist , most importantly:
How reliable is the original data? In other words, can the survey of firearm ownership be relied upon?
Now, I'm pretty private about my firearm ownership. I wouldn't respond to it on a survey, especially not one in which they called my number and therefore could be assumed to have my name. I don't do firearm registration, and I go out of my way to avoid IBC's. And I'm a respectable upstanding member of society.
MUCH LESS would I answer this question in the afirmative if I were not lawfully allowed to own a firearm, or were in a situation where I felt there was a likelihood I would be committing a crime with one in the near future.
In the scientific community, surveys, and especially phone-iin surveys, are considered one of the least reliable forms of gathering data, because you can't really verify the truth value of the data so gathered.
I think that a realistic determination of the rate of firearm ownership, ESPECIALLY among the criminal element in society, would be extremely hard to determine.