Summations Only

The impression I got from all the newspaper articles was that Ahmed had cobbled together a clock mounted inside a case of some kind from salvaged parts, and that's what this looks like, with the display mounted in the lid and the electronics and power supply mounted inside: It's easy to see now why no one thought it a real bomb - the pencil case is obviously empty.If this is a hoax bomb then anything homemade with a digital display is a hoax bomb.--Percy

In all the comments from Ahmed, I don't see any claims of fabricating or modifying a PC board. It would be unfair to draw conclusions from Ahmed's way of referring to his clock (he says that he "built" it and calls it an "invention") that assume things he never said. I confess disappointment that Ahmed's achievement was only to move the innards of a digital clock into a modified case, but he never made specific claims that later turned out to be false. I imagined something a bit more challenging, maybe taking an existing PC board and making a few modifications, maybe a few changed connections and an extra component or two, something reasonably within the capabilities of a member of a middle school robotics club. Agreed. But now he has, through no fault of his own, become a symbol for squashed initiative and must follow it where it leads. He seems to be navigating the maze well.--Percy

When I was 13 I participated in a science fair. Our group had constructed our own amplifier (from plans from scratch using parts purchased at Radio Shack) that took a microphone as input and ran the sound into a flashlight lightbulb. About a yard away was a photocell whose output fed another amplifier (that someone in the group just happened to have at home) that drove a speaker. Speaking into the microphone caused the lightbulb to glow, the light fell on the photocell, and sound came out of the speaker. We were transmitting sound with light. During setup our constructed amplifier failed, so we borrowed a reel-to-reel tape recorder from the vice principle and used its amplifier. We didn't use it as a tape recorder, we never recorded anything, there wasn't even a tape in it.We didn't win anything, but our picture appeared in the local paper with a description, "When they speak into the microphone the sound is recorded and a light flashes." I was embarrassed to think that people would think our group was so lame that that's all we had done, and this is back in the sixties. I'm a little puzzled why Ahmed thought that mounting the innards of a digital clock inside a pencil case was worth mentioning to anyone. Seems pretty lame, even by the standards of the sixties.--Percy

Hi NoNukes,I can't for the life of me figure out what you're going on about. Are you bothered because Ringo used the term "proactive indignation" back in Message 4152, believing this requires him to add action to his indignation else be subjected to endless nipping at the heels? Is it something else?Whatever the reason, it can't possibly justify this extended critique spread over five messages.--Percy

Well, as is said here from time to time, it isn't what you think of your ideas, it's what other people think. So if you're right about being clear and it's a point worth pursuing then other people must know what you're on about and can fill me in. I'm not moderating the thread, and seriously, I don't know, even after reading a back and forth of about 10 posts having something to do with whether Ringo had a right to his indignance.--Percy

All you say in Message 4192 is that you couldn't find support for it then, either.--Percy

This morning one local talk radio show was advocating better mental health screening to lock away dangerous people before they commit mass murder. Time to state once again that psychology has no demonstrated ability to pre-identify mass murderers.The only known effective approach to reducing the incidence of mass murders, and of murders in general, is to reduce gun ownership.--Percy

You now want us to accept an argument based on evidence you once posted but can't find, even though the argument was thought absurd at the time?Would this list of drugs include paxil or trazodone or zoloft or zyprexa or gabapentin?Actually, if the gun lobby would accept your proposal, maybe this would be a great thing, eliminating guns from 90% of households.Will people on these psychotropic drugs still be able to buy whatever they want at gun shows?--Percy

If the idea has already been debunked, and you know it, then why did you repeat the argument in this discussion? Even more weird, you think people would be interested in more information about an idea you concede is debunked?--Percy

Let's not turn this into a religious discussion. You could offer prayer as a solution to any problem being discussed in any thread. "Let's pray that terrorists groups wane away, that climate change is manageable, that resistant strains of once treatable diseases don't wipe us out, and that by next year we'll all be shaving with lasers." If you want to discuss the power of prayer I suggest you propose a new thread.--Percy

Cementing his position as the leading whack job amongst Republican presidential candidates, Trump yesterday weighed in on the Umpqua tragedy:

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"The Second Amendment of our Constitution is clear. Every time something happens, they don't blame mental illness -- that our mental healthcare is out of whack and all of the other problems."

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Both sides in the gun debate make this mistake, believing that psychology somehow has the power to detect murderers before they murder. They don't and never will.Trump continues:

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"And by the way, it was a gun-free zone. I will tell you -- if you had a couple of the teachers or somebody with guns in that room, you would have been a hell of a lot better off."

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In case no one on the anti-gun side has ever made this clear let me state that Trump is correct. Armed students and teachers could have averted or diminished the catastrophe. What goes unnoted by the gun nuts is that increasing the number of armed citizens by several times will also increase the gun death rate by several times. The cost of this approach to gun massacres would be an increase in annual gun deaths from the current 30,000 per year to something closer to 100,000. According to Wikipedia there have been an average of 1.05 mass shootings daily in 2015, where a mass shooting is four or more people shot. Increasing the number of guns in the hands of citizens going about their daily lives would increase shootings of all kinds, including mass shootings.We also need ammunition control. Obviously the ammunition used in many mass shootings is extremely deadly. Those gun nuts who want to carry their guns everywhere and who have perfect split second judgement can choose hollow points and risk facing murder instead of attempted murder charges when they make a bad decision, but for defense, particularly if the gun will be carried everywhere, a .22 loaded with round nose is plenty good enough, and they'll be less likely to kill someone.--Percy

Yeah, right. Charles Whitman murdered 16 people from the clock tower on the campus of the University of Texas in Austin in 1966. Poking around a bit on the Internet it's easy to go further back in time. Neinz Schmidt killed 5 at a school in 1913. Mass shootings have increased along with the increase in gun prevalence. Stop bringing this up if you're going to refuse to support it. This is just your groundless, unsubstantiated and unwarranted opinion. There has been no death of Christian morality. There's no evidence of conspiracy or some mysterious influence. Mass murderers committing suicide has been a common outcome. Look at this list of school massacres, with two suicides in the 1920's. And that's just school massacres. You'll find suicides in massacres at other locations, here's a more general list for the America. Notice that mass killings are not unique to the US, but over the past few decades we have had many more of them than countries with strong gun control. That's absurd. Anyone who thinks America will be defended by an armed citizenry lining the beaches is delusional. Defending America is appropriately the responsibility of the military. Once the 2nd amendment is properly interpreted we'll be much safer. The gun death rate is proportional to gun prevalence, so reducing gun prevalence is key to reducing the gun death rate.--Percy

That's not what you said. You said, "These mass killings are recent, began in the 90s with Columbine," but it's easy to find mass killings before the 90's. I just happened to mention only two. Mass killings have increased with the increasing prevalence of guns, and the increased ease of their acquisition. What you say is never what you're talking about, is it. Anyway, if there's been any death of BIBLICAL Christian morality then it's been much greater in Europe, so why don't they have more mass killings? Anecdotal data? From Ammoland? Well, I guess that's the best you can expect when someone thinks any information is trustworthy without further evidence. To believe what you do you must think America is the only nation in the world with psychotropic drugs. You need studies demonstrating people become more likely to commit murder when under the influence of psychotropic drugs.What we know is that the more guns, the more gun deaths. Eliminate the guns and you'll eliminate the deaths.--Percy

Many fewer Americans are atheists than Europeans. Roughly 20% of Europeans are atheists, but less than 10% of Americans. If mass killings were correlated with atheism then there would be far more mass killings in Europe than in the US, yet the reverse is true. Well, yes, precisely. We know eliminating drugs is very difficult, because addiction is a powerful force. Are gun nuts addicted to their guns? Where addictive forces are involved banning isn't an effective approach, but I don't think it's a factor with guns.And I'm not arguing that banning guns is a practical approach. I'm just emphasizing something that should be self-evident and eminently obvious but somehow isn't to the gun nuts: guns are central to the problem of gun deaths. Gun deaths aren't caused by atheism or a decline in Christian morals or a scientific conspiracy or anything else like that. Each murderer has his own reasons, his own pathology. There's no pattern. No one knows who's going to snap or why they're going to snap or where they're going to snap, but when they do snap if there's a gun available then murders will happen. The gun death rate will decline when the availability of deadly guns declines. Yes, absolutely. More precisely, the more automobile miles the more automobile deaths. The government reacted by mandating increasingly strict auto safety standards beginning around 1970 (in reaction to increasing deaths during the decade of the 1960's), and auto deaths per vehicle mile have dropped: Wouldn't it be wonderful to have a similar graph for gun deaths? Of course, but instead gun deaths are increasing. Possibly gun deaths might pass auto deaths soon: So how might we reverse that rising line for gun deaths? Ban guns? Sure, but the gun lobby says no. Stronger gun control? Sure, but the gun lobby says no. Stricter gun safety standards, analogous to auto safety standards? Sure, but the gun lobby says no. More studies on how to reduce gun deaths? Sure, but (incredibly and damningly for something as innocuous as efforts to increase our knowledge) the gun lobby says no.The gun lobby blocks all efforts to reduce gun deaths, and blames gun deaths on everything but guns. That's crazy.--PercyEdited by Percy, : Wordsmith first paragraph.Edited by Percy, : Fix minor grammar issue.

I didn't think you had said, "There had never been any mass killings before the 90s." I thought you said exactly what you said: "These mass killings are recent, began in the 90s with Columbine."You've been told many times over the years that you often don't say what you later claim you meant. You and Buzsaw (may he rest in glorious peace) were legendary for making misstatements followed by voluminous arguments that you really meant something else. Until you start having some "Doh! How could I have said that!" moments you're never going to correct this problem. Yes, agreed (mostly), but that's not what you originally said. Anyway, it's not "every couple of years of so." It's hundreds of incidents per year that 4 or more people are killed in the US. From Wikipedia: " As of September 8, the U.S. was averaging 1.05 mass shootings per day in 2015 (defined as incidents in which four or more people are shot)." Makes a nice evasion, I guess, of something that happens to be true. Gun deaths will rise and fall with rising and falling prevalence of guns, because it's guns that cause gun deaths. In other words you're just making things up. You have no evidence for your claim of a link between BIBLICAL Christian morality and gun deaths, nor even any evidence of any link to anything in other more atheistic cultures such as Europe. There was no ad hominem. All you provided are lists of murderers who were taking some form of psychiatric medication. How many weren't? How many were people who'd gone off their meds? We don't know, because the one's who weren't taking medication aren't listed.What you need is what I already said you need: studies showing that these drugs make people more likely to murder. You've made a claim and have no evidence supporting it. It's actually a complex issue. Certainly the drug warnings indicate that some patients might become worse, but does that mean more likely to murder? A study might find that among people with a certain psychiatric condition under a certain medication, 5% become more likely to murder and 95% become less likely to murder, with the net result of less murders. Or it might find the opposite. Or it might be inconclusive. But you don't have a study. You have only woefully incomplete lists. I don't think we're going to eliminate guns, either. I'm just making the point that it is the guns that are the cause of gun deaths, not something else.--Percy