blackboard calculation
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I’ll take ‘Blindingly Obvious Conclusions to Anyone Outside of the Ivory Tower’ for $500, Alex.

The team employed a mathematical construct known as entropy transfer, which can establish causal links between multiple variables by examining the degree to which one variable influences another. In these analyses, influence is defined as an improved ability to make predictions about the future status of a variable (in this case, background checks) based on present knowledge of another variable (media stories about gun control policy).

To further test the validity of the causal link, researchers also searched for influential relationships between mass shootings, background checks, and media coverage of gun-related topics that excluded discussion of gun control policies or regulations. The only link discovered was obvious: a causal link between mass shootings and media coverage of those events. The team also probed potential causal links between firearm background checks and media coverage of unemployment, which has been linked to higher rates of violent crime and could theoretically prompt heightened interest in acquiring firearms for self-defense. None was found.

“The results establish the first step toward our aim of creating a mathematical model of the firearm ecosystem in the United States that explains the relationships among key events,” said co-author Rifat Sipahi, a professor of mechanical and industrial engineering at Northeastern University. “Moving forward, one key aspect of such a model will be to understand how subsequent events unfold and how the presence of time delays between them influence the fate of the ecosystem.”

– NYU School of Engineering in Mathematics ties media coverage of gun control to upticks in gun purchases

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38 COMMENTS

  1. Amazing how they’ll dive to the greatest depths to conclude the obvious then turn around and cry about exploding bullets, undetectable ceramic Glocks and shoulder things that go up. These people must be mentally ill.

    • Anyone remember the TV series ‘Numbers’ from about a dozen years ago? The older brother was a LEO, and the younger was a gifted professorial mathematician who tried to prove all of human interactions through math. Whether true or not, the show ‘proved’ him to usually be correct.

      On the rare occasion when he’d get stumped and wonder (with a tantrum, even though he was about 30-ish) why his math wasn’t working. His older brother would shrug it off and simply say, “hey, the human condition can’t always be explained by numbers on a paper”.

      • Oh yeah, I enjoyed that show when it was on.

        It was probably as accurate with math and statistical science as the CSI franchise was with forensic science (i.e., not at all), but the entertainment value was there and the show on the whole was a lot smarter than most.

  2. No reason to spend research $ on this topic. Its been common knowledge for at least a decade.

    • “The only link discovered was obvious: a causal link between mass shootings and media coverage of those events.”

      Further it can argued the link is much more substantial than “Casual”. One would only need to look at the shooters own words and how they marveled at the media coverage an event would attain.

      Conclusion; (downplayed or not) the media’s fawning coverage creates more mass shootings.

  4. A lot of “research” is UTTER BS. Government grants and think tank monies are paid to morons whose methodologies are extremely flawed or nonexistent.

  5. To people of the gun, this falls under the heading of “DUH”.
    To others that have been taught hate and fear, but MAY have an open mind this will come as a revelation.
    There is a group of the above mentioned people. TTAG has had numerous articles ref. this subject.

  7. Well, yeah, it’s obvious if you’re “in the community.” At one time it was also obvious the world was flat, and an old guy in a toga on a mountaintop caused lightning. Running the same analysis on the potential links to mass shooting is another “duh,” perhaps, but it does validate the method with a presumed known test case. What was done was transition the connection from “Everybody thinks…” to “We can mathematically demonstrate that…” Don’t underestimate the power in that transition.

    Broadly speaking, I’m all for using science to understand how the world works. My concerns, generally, are how and to what ends that knowledge is put to use. Techniques like this are both tools for understanding, and guidance for means of more effectively implementing social engineering. These days the latter, generally speaking, is often not an intent friendly to the 2nd Amendment.

    In this specific case, entities like, oh, Google or the New York Times could look at this and conclude they need to stop running stories about proposed gun control. That hurts us because it reduces the chance we will find out about proposed legislation in time to try to do something about it.

  8. Id like to see their math; more specifically, which variables they correlated for mass shootings and entropy. Unfortunately the publication cost $9.

  9. In other news, NRATV is DOA. LaPierre’s statement mentioned the message creep away from guns that many posters here have brought up.

    • He’s right, but he’s also a shit-head. I can’t help but wonder if this whole ordeal was precipitated by LaPierre getting jealous that *his* NRA was becoming the GOP’s bitch. Neither really gives a crap about gun rights, but LaPierre was on the fast track to being tossed out by GOP flunkies like North & Loesch if he allowed the org to gain much more influence than it already had. All that was left was for LaPierre’s carefully selected Board of Directors sycophants to start being replaced by party members, and I now strongly suspect that’s what North’s job really was as president. Wayne wanted to take the GOP’s kickbacks as an important ‘bundler’ who could steer NRA members’ money to their campaigns, but he definitely doesn’t want them running *his* show. He sure as shit doesn’t want NRA members running it either, though, and that’s the entire problem.

  10. Only Leftards are incapable of understanding this simple concept,thus the term Leftard.
    To whit,former pResident Obowelmovement was the best firearms salesman America has had thus far.

    • I just spit out my coffee laughing. Never heard that nickname for the Kenyan before. Thx for the shirt stain…

  11. While it’s obvious intuitively that the threat of gun control drives firearms sales it’s nice to be able to demonstrate that fact statistically. I have long said that there would be fewer AR-15s and AK-47s in circulation in this country if it weren’t for the 1994 Clinton Assault Weapons Ban.

    • I now own 4 AR platforms because politicians kept opening their yaps over the last 18 months.

    • I would be data in support of your theory (sort of).

      The main reason I finally bought an AR15 was because of the constant threats of banning at the time. I may have bought one eventually anyway but my timetable was greatly pushed up by the political BS.

      In the end I’m glad I did buy one. Not only was putting it together fun (bought a PSA kit), but it turned out to be one of my favorite rifles I’ve ever shot. It’s also been a great tool for teaching my kids because the size, modest recoil and adjustable stock makes it perfect for everyone from my 8yo to my wife to me.

      • So it’s certainly past time to order a PSA kit for that 8yr old (and every other crumb cruncher in the home). Got one for the little woman? Got inventory of “high capacity” mags and ammo?

  12. Guys, before you get all haughty, recognize that in the field of *good* statistics, *legitimate* statistics, the conclusions are generally obvious to the human observer provided their dataset is half-decent. After all, our mental hardware is pretty damn good at statistics, since observing & exploiting natural patterns is how our species got its edge over the competition (hunting, farming, migration –all rely heavily on statistical prediction). The real purpose of statistics is to remove bias elements from the dataset to ensure that the obvious conclusion isn’t based upon an unseen distortion (and also to scale the observation/computation of datasets to levels far greater than one person can process) –of course, it’s just as easy to do the reverse and introduce distortion so as to mislead the observer. Like firearms, the field of study can be used for both good (information) and ill (propaganda), but in the end it is simply a tool.

    I suspect the real ‘scary’ consequence of this sort of social cause/effect study, would be to convince the political media figures to not report on shooting events quite so breathlessly, since keeping gun owners in an oblivious contented stupor of complacency has always been the trick to defeating us. However, these same people are desperate attention whores, so it is impossible for them to resist the histrionics we always see in gun reporting. Like most legit stats, these will be informative and potentially useful to interested parties, but in all likelihood ultimately ignored.

  13. mathematical construct known as entropy transfer, which can establish causal links between multiple variables by examining the degree to which one variable influences another otherwise known to statistics as “pull it out of your ass method #69/make shit up”

  14. These people are F*ckin geniuses. I mean who would have thunk from Twinkies to Zima to those Bounce bars you’d stick in your dryer to Guns that people want something if they’re told they can’t have it.

  15. Here is a list of little baby Rifat’s co-authors from UCLA and NYU, Maurizio Porfiri, Raghu Ram Sattanapalle, Shinnosuke Nakayama, and James Macinko. In the second paragraph of their article in “nature human behavior”, they confidently cite the “Gun Violence Archive website” as the source for their data on mass shootings from 2014 to 2017.

    I can hardly wait for their future scholarly works linking gun violence to climate change, racism, sexism, homophobia, medicare for all and student loan debt forgiveness.

  18. Well, since the mathematical technique employed is called “Transfer Entropy”, not “Entropy Transfer”, I’m dubious that phys.org has done a good job of summarizing the work of Dr. Sipahi et al.

  19. This is all based on Probability. However, Probability says far more about the state of our knowledge than it does about the state of nature. Something to keep in mind.

  20. So when will there be a study casually linking that the more coverage the media gives mass shootings, there will be more mass shootings.

  22. The quoted excerpt doesn’t support what TTAG’s headline says.

    “The only link discovered was obvious: a causal link between mass shootings and media coverage of those events.” This says that *mass media coverage* causes *more mass shootings*, not that mass shootings cause more gun-buying.

    That said, it’s still a “duh” moment for anyone outside the progtard bubble. Next time this subject comes up, we all need to hit them HARD with this mathematical fact.

    The “mainstream” media’s anti-gun obsession is getting innocent people killed.

  24. It has been proven in history that when the adversary, in politics or any thing else, wants to achieve a said
    point, regardless of how it is done, they will do it. We are at a time of this Nations freedoms being cast
    out the window. Gun control is a number one object for the democraps. Any time there is a shooting, bam,
    it is on front page news, but you never hear of the rapes, murders, robberies, ect , that have been stopped
    and prevented because someone had a firearm or the person that was being attacked had one. This is a
    proven fact that this far out weighs the incidents of the so called shooter. But how many have thought of
    a person being programmed? This has been proven, but not brought up by the left sided media. Being paid
    an exceptional amount of money to do it and then given a paid lawyer to defend them. Check into all that
    George Soros has put into the demo fund, it will make you sick. There has been hundreds of gun control
    laws passed in the last 30 years, but crime is as high as ever. Did you know that Nickolas Cruz, the shooter
    in the Parkland school shooting last year has not been convicted yet? Think about it! In today’s world, the
    criminal has more rights than the victim. Wake up people, gun control is not to stop crime, it is to stop YOU.
    If you do not vote for Trump, then you have voted for the left. Simple as that. But think about this, today and
    yesterday, and tomorrow, there will be 4000 innocent babies aborted each and every day. But it is going to
    be illegal for us to defend our selves with a firearm. Wake up America, freedom is in the balance.

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