Firearm Enthusiasts Are Warming Up to Smart Guns---(really?)

D

DaleA

New member
Well in my almost daily perusal of MSN.COM I came across this headline:

Firearm Enthusiasts Are Warming Up to Smart Guns
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The article says:

Firearm owners may be finally cozying up to the idea of personalized “smart guns,” and it only took them twenty years to hop on board.

That’s according to new polling released Tuesday from Morning Consult where 45% of U.S. adults surveyed said they’d be comfortable using smart gun technology.
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IMhO the article is poorly written by someone who fails to discern being 'interested' in smart gun technology and 'approving' of all guns being smart in the future.

On this site, again IMhO, interest in smart guns might be high but mostly so we could point out the numerous, justifiable, deal-breaking problems with the whole concept.

The article goes on to say:
Like it or not, smart guns are on pace to hit some store shelves later this year. Both LodeStar and the unfortunately named SmartGunz LLC plan to release commercially available handguns later this year with the former reportedly gearing its product towards “first-time buyers.”
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Question for the members: Are there still states with the law already on the books that say after smart guns become available ALL guns sold must be smart?

P.S. The comments to the story are overwhelmingly common-sense objections to the article's basic premise.
 
"Specifically, 43% of adults polled expressed interest in smart guns compared to a slightly
larger 48% who expressed interest in old-fashioned dumb ones. More surprising still,
more than half (55%) of gun owners specifically said they’d be willing to actually use a smart gun.
A slight majority (56%) of gun owners, meanwhile, said they support further development
of smart firearms...."

"Those figures are a far cry from previous polling. Just 5% of gun owners surveyed by
the American Journal of Preventative Medicine in 2019 said they would be very likely
to purchase a smart gun. "

ANYtime you see a supposed overnight shift like that, you have such a polling process problem as to throw everything out and start over.
 
ANYtime you see a supposed overnight shift like that, you have such a polling process problem as to throw everything out and start over.
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Absent some drastic event, I'd generally agree but there have been times/places where you could find a huge change, almost overnight.

If you polled Americans on how they felt about the Japanese on Dec 1 1941, and polled them again on Dec 10, I bet you'd find a rather large shift in attitudes.

or more recently before and after the terrorist attack of 9/11

Another big point is WHO is polled, how honestly they answer, and particularly, how the question is phrased.

The CONCEPT behind "smart guns", that only the authorized user can use it and it will not work for anyone else is a noble dream. But the devil is in the details.

And the details suck.

Personally, I think that if smart guns are such a great idea, then the first bunch of people who ought to be required to use them should be the POLICE.

And, from everything I've seen or heard, the police are (pardon the phrase) "dead set" against having to use them.

There is a whole world of difference between your computer crashing, or your smart phone going "dumb" and your gun not working.
 
How many showed interest because they thought “smart gun technology” would help them hit the target better? Just saying.
 
There's another angle--manufacturers probably will like the increased liability protections smart devices will presumably give them.
 
Anyone have a smart phone that has sat untouched for the last 2 months or more? If so can you check and see if the battery is still charged.

How's that going to work out for guns that might sit untouched for years at a time?
 
My thinking is they are not explaining, what they mean exactly about what smart guns will be once fully implemented. They are coming one way or another.

We could look forward to not only the gun being smart but the bullets also.
In other words bullets could be coded to not fire through anything other than the persons gun and/or the person that purchased them. Bullets would then take a massive jump in price, through increased manufacturing cost, fully knowing that would price the bullets out of reach for the majority on people, " that's what they're looking to do anyway"

How long before all this takes place is a matter of how long the legislation takes to piece by piece it all through a future congress, it may take a long time, but make no mistake if the technology is here, and it is, there will be smart everything connected to guns coming, it's just a matter of time.
 
For what it may be worth, the first story I read involving "smart guns" was in science fiction written in the mid 1960s. Involved a lot of amputating index fingers and holding them on the trigger to fire "only usable by one person" pistols.
 
reddog81 said:
Anyone have a smart phone that has sat untouched for the last 2 months or more? If so can you check and see if the battery is still charged.
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Yes.

My previous phone, last used as such around 2017, worked just fine last year when I used it to record time-lapse video of a utility pole replacement out in front of my home.

That's been over a year and checked it again - 97% capacity.
 
As long as the battery never fails then there’s no chance of anything going wrong. And batteries are always in perfect condition. Just saying.
 
“Smart gun”? That sounds about as likely as a “smart hammer.” Sounds like a solution looking for a problem. There ARE problems… but that’s not a solution.
 
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As long as the battery never fails then there’s no chance of anything going wrong.
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I do hope this is sarcasm, adding a smilie :rolleyes:would remove doubt.

And, in point of fact, its not true, anyway.

The battery is only half the equation. There are two parts to the system, first the circuit that recognizes and authorizes has to HAVE power to do so, and second, it has to WORK, which is a separate matter.

And while the power side is easily addressed, the other side isn't so easy.

as an example, I remember reading someone once wrote, "you can't call 911 on your touch screen phone when its covered in blood..."

And, that is ONE of my issues with the whole smart gun thing, If the sensors (whatever they are) doesn't recognize you (the authorized user) for ANY reason, you're holding a poorly shaped impact weapon, NOT a funtional firearm.

If it uses your handprint / fingerprint, as its ID, what happens when the sensors are dirty, covered with something (dirt, mud, blood, etc) or if your HANDS are?? what if your hand has a cut on it, and now the sensors don't "see" the right reading??

What if you need to use the other hand??

wearing gloves????

All these and more have been discussed here (and many other places) before, and so far as I know there has not been enough of an improvement in the tech to change anything. Yet. And probably not for the near term future.

Another point to consider, (and one that will almost certainly be ridiculed as a conspiracy theory fantasy) is the matter of police activated "kill switches" built into the smart gun. The argument will, of course, be that it will save officer's lives, but consider the result when bad guys get their hands on that tech, and they WILL....

I don't think "smart guns" are a good thing, and I feel anyone attempting to MANDATE their use is an enemy of public safety.
 
is the matter of police activated "kill switches" built into the smart gun.
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Ridiculous over reach...

or is it?

an article written by former U.S. Representative Bob Barr, hidden away in the recently passed infrastructure bill, the very one I warned before would negatively impact drivers across the country if it were to pass, is a measure to install vehicle kill switches into every new car, truck, and SUV sold in this country.
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https://www.motorious.com/articles/features-3/kill-switches-new-cars/

Isn't it all just common sense laws that couldn't cause any problems?
(HEAVY sarcasm).
 
They sure did not poll me. More parts means more complexity. More complexity means more things that can fail. In a device that my life could very well depend on, I don't want the possibility of a bad electronic part, dead battery, or some other thing that could go wrong.

smart guns... nope
 
I wouldn't mind a smart scope that would adjust for bullet drop and wind. It's not like this sort of thing would ever drop into my price range...

A scope like this once mounted it could be said it's a smart gun. If the poll wasn't specific, I could see some people thinking something like this was the subject being discussed.

Tony
 
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