And note David’s recent post if you missed it.

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Seems from your discussion here that the book uses the Overextended Outrage fallacy to make its narrative. To wit, from the fallacy description web page (below), “This is a form of poor statistical thinking where one or more statistically rare cases are implied to be the norm or the trend (without evidence) for the purpose of expressing or inciting outrage toward an entire group. It is a form of extreme stereotyping (the fallacy), based on the cognitive bias known as the group attribution error.”
(ref: https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/logicalfallacies/Overextended-Outrage )

I know a lot of AR owners at the club. Another is my brother in NC, who is so true blue that President Obama once nominated him for a Federal position. None of us fit the Crazy Right Wing Always Carry It In Walmart skit.

One could certainly have a more nuanced view of the AR owner. There is a large group of folks who simply like to shoot military style weapons, which is a reason that the Civilian Marksmanship Program has such an easy time selling 1911’s and M-1’s and one reason, but perhaps not the only reason, people buy these rifles. But given that population, one can reference the risk assessment matrix, which looks at likelihood vs impact. A mass shooter might be extremely rare, but has severe impact.

So the argument for discussing the AR owner and whether regulating these firearms is or is not a good idea is not because of the very typical owner who is of negligible risk and just likes to shoot the damn thing, but the very unlikely owner who constitutes severe risk. Thus, not tarring all of us (including yours truly) with the mass shooter brush but still trying to negotiate fair treatment given the unlikely but severe cases.

It is kind of how we did hazard analysis back when I was a lead scientist in a nuclear facility, so I am aware of how it is done. Doing it carefully is the trick.

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I have not read this book, but your assessment is, essentially, similar to what Tom Grisham said about it. Sounds like it proves to be an agenda driven missed opportunity. Thanks for reviewing it-

Salvatore

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