Dr. Neil DeGrasse Tyson take on guns and violence

As a world-famous scientist, Neil deGrasse Tyson is known for his dispassionate embrace of cold, hard facts...

..which makes him the right person to address a controversial topic: the abnormally high number of Americans who die from gun violence.

One of most prominent scientist, known for his love for facts posted 3 tweets that address all gun issues we have...

Yesterday afternoon, he composed three tweets where he laid out the numbers.

And they're sobering.
1.

* 1.4 Million: Americans who died in all Wars fought since 1776. 1.4 Million: Americans who died via household Guns since 1968— Neil deGrasse Tyson (@neiltyson) November 9, 2015


According to PolitiFact, this actually slightly understates the case (American war deaths were closer to 1.2 million as of 2013).
2.

* 400,000: Americans who died fighting in World War II. 400,000: Americans who died by household Firearms since 2001— Neil deGrasse Tyson (@neiltyson) November 9, 2015


This, sadly, is also true.
3.

* 3,400: Americans who died by Terrorism since 2001 3,400: Americans who died by household Firearms since five weeks ago.— Neil deGrasse Tyson (@neiltyson) November 9, 2015


Estimates vary — and Tyson's is on the high end — but 2015 is expected to see approximately 33,000 total gun deaths, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which is nearly 3,200 every five weeks (comparable to the nearly 3,400 Americans who have died in terrorist attacks since 2001).

* source: www.upworthy.com...

Sad and true... now time to yell 2nd amendment and all other gun love propaganda that somehow shadows ATS and shows what really ignorance means...

Facts are simple and to the point...

a reply to: SuperFrog

So, what you're saying is, Ban guns? All that's going to do is change a word from gun's to knives, Or other weapons. People kill people, Who cares what tool's they use. Humans are violent.

you know, at this point i don't even care.
people want virtually "no restriction" to guns (the whole don't take my guns argument)
so the by-product of that is a few innocent dead kids or people every year.
If that is considered a good trade, so be it.

They lump ALL gun related deaths together, to get the "facts" they want. The anti gun folks love to spout facts, but they never come up with workable solutions, just more blame.
And just to be clear, whine all you want, my guns are going nowhere.

He forgot to include a statistic about all the guns that sat quietly the last five weeks not doing anything.

At all.

Because they don't kill people on their own.

Oh but wait, if we magically made all the guns disappear then gun crime would cease? No thanks, I'd rather not be punished for the actions of somebody I've never met. That's not how it works.

And please, pretty please, explain how you'd make all the guns disappear. Since all you can reliably claim is you'll take the guns away from people like myself who aren't running around shooting people. You can't reliably claim that you'll get the guns away from criminals because, y'know...they're criminals.

Tired argument gets tired response. Facts don't lie, you're right. Neither do facts that disagree with you. Neither does reality.

a reply to: SuperFrog

It would be interesting to further analyse if the deaths by household firearms have any correlation with entrenched cultural standards such as gang-related violence and/or mental health issues such as the perpetrators being on prescription pharmaceuticals / psychotropics.

Interesting tweets.

a reply to: Tjoran

Wow. What a profoundly logical concept!
You're right! I think we'd all prefer mass murderers to be able to have a gun full of bullets rather than a knife or a baseball bat wouldn't we.
Because they can do so much more damage with either of the latter, can't they!

a reply to: Iamnotadoctor

A psychopath can kill more people with a can of gas than a gun with a 75 round magazine. Seriously a well placed fire bomb can trap and kill far more people but you can not restrict petrol so no one brings it up.

a reply to: Shamrock6

But, don't you know all gun owners are to blame? We are supposed to wail and feel guilty, every time some nut case shoots someone, because it's our fault.. If it weren't for our legally owned firearms, none of this would happen. It's not the poor criminals fault, we forced them to do it.
At gun point

a reply to: SuperFrog

Well two things he forgot to mention are:
1) do those numbers include only homicide deaths or do they also include suicides?
2) how many people are saved by guns each year (the going conservative estimate of defensive gun use is over 200k/year).

originally posted by: Iamnotadoctor
a reply to: Tjoran

Wow. What a profoundly logical concept!
You're right! I think we'd all prefer mass murderers to be able to have a gun full of bullets rather than a knife or a baseball bat wouldn't we.
Because they can do so much more damage with either of the latter, can't they!

And therein is the crux of ignorance on the issue.

"We need to ban guns so mass murderers can't use them to kill people! But not knives, because a mass murderer can't kill as many people with a knife so we're not going to worry about them."

And yet, the one common denominator is "mass murderer" and it's completely ignored.

How telling.

a reply to: SuperFrog

I Love NDT, but the last thing i want is another multi millionaire telling people who don't have paid security and/or followed by a media entourage, that they shouldn't be able to have access to the one tool that can make my grandmother equal to the burglar who wants to break into her house.

a reply to: SuperFrog


There's no point in posting this, even though it's absolutely right...

You'll just be drowned by cries of FREEDOM... 'Murica!!! and TYRANNICAL GUBMENT!!!

Honestly.... NDT is spot on and things need to change but they never will.

'coz ya know... cars and knives kill people and....um....12 people were stabbed in some town in China and um.... responsible gun owners.... and....blah
Just be resigned to the fact that selfish morons literally don't give a crap about innocent people dying and gun crime and gun deaths being so high, they do not care.
All they care about is owning their guns and having the right to own their guns.

a reply to: blupblup

Aw. Didn't even make it off page one before the butt-hurt was so bad we had to resort to name calling.

How liberal minded of you.

a reply to: SuperFrog

I Love NDT, but the last thing i want is another multi millionaire telling people who don't have paid security and/or followed by a media entourage, that they shouldn't be able to have access to the one tool that can make my grandmother equal to the burglar who wants to break into her house.

The real problem is the disparity between the haves and the have nots. Offer people a chance to educate themselves and Bring jobs back to america and you will see a lot less people in the desperate situations that lead to crime and violence.

If people are working and have the means to earn the things they want, they will be much less likely to try and take it from you.

a reply to: Shamrock6


But it's the same **** over and over and over.
It's boring, the debates are boring.... the responses are boring and ignorant (for you too I'm sure) and this is probably, literally, the 10,000th thread on the issue since I've been here.
Nothing changes, nobody really understands the other POV, even though we can dance around and be all courteous and civil and pretend we're all having a meaningful debate.

We're not.

Nothing will change.

Hmmmm

DP?

a reply to: blupblup

As I pointed out murder is easy, guns are useful for the purpose but not required at all. If the Aurora CO shooter had used chains and locks at entry points and fire bombs far more people would have died in that theater. It would have cost a tiny fraction, been far more terrorizing, and been more deadly had it been a fire bombing instead of a shooting.

originally posted by: machineintelligence
a reply to: blupblup

As I pointed out murder is easy, guns are useful for the purpose but not required at all. If the Aurora CO shooter had used chains and locks at entry points and fire bombs far more people would have died in that theater. It would have cost a tiny fraction, been far more terrorizing, and been more deadly had it been a fire bombing instead of a shooting.

It's not just about mass shootings though, NDT barely mentions them?
It's about deaths. homicides, accidents... whatever... deaths from firearms.
Of course mass shootings are the one's that always make the headlines and are the most emotive but they're not the whole story.

Anyway... I don't feel like going over it all.

Cheers

Imagine how people would freak out if the government wanted to ban swimming pools.