The thread title can be taken three ways:
a) the ethics of imposing burdens on others for one's own personal growth
b) the ethics of imposing burdens on others for their personal growth
c) the ethics of imposing burdens on children by producing them in the first place

a) An example would be parents who set very high standards for their children's performance to enhance the reputation of the parents now and in the future. This is a "family investment" strategy. There may well be a substantial pay-off for the high-performing children, but like being born, the children likely had little say in the long years of pressure to perform (from dance classes for pre-school or very little league hockey practice, on up to graduate school and climbing the corporate ladder).

b) An example would be a social milieu where others are expected to visibly engage in personal growth activities. This is a "personal investment" strategy. Whether the performance is in meditation, difficult yoga positions, reading the right books, training for the next ultra marathon, ever deeper into Hegel, Schopenhauer, whoever....., most nouvelle cuisine, noisiest Ferrari, etc. There may be personal satisfactions in all this, but at least a substantial portion of reward is in social approval, bought at considerable expense in time, if not money.

A lot of us slobs have avoided being born into very highly motivated families and have not settled into urban/suburban milieus where a lot of competitive personal growth is going on. We don't achieve a whole lot and nobody is surprised.

Is all this packing of expectations onto the backs of others ethical? I propose a split decision 49/51 or 51/49, depending. Imposing high expectations on children, even "gifted" children who allegedly have unusually great potential, is worse than merely overlooking the child's wishes and native talents and interests -- it may actually crush their own desires. "Support" is different than "imposing". Mozart's father supported little Wolfgang's musical talents. Maybe young Wolfgang would have made a perfectly fine tailor, but he seemed to like music more.

Imposing very low expectations on others' personal growth is also detrimental, and is probably more common. Low expectations are at least, if not more, unethical.

But then, it's all a wash since being born is the ultimate imposition, according to the antinatalist view. It's even worse from the antifatalist view: being born brings the mixed and varied blessings of existence, but then we are expected to actually drop dead, sooner or later, either by somebody's deviant agency or just the ingravescent inimicalities of the cosmos.

Fuck! It's a raw deal, all round.

Chimps, OTOH do some really bad behaving. Do they know the difference between good and bad? Do they have a concept of evil? — Vera Mont

Seems like chimps would have to know what good and bad are before they can be accused of "really bad behaving". IF they don't have the concept of good and bad, then they are merely behaving. A cat doesn't catch mice because it is good (or bad), but because it's in their nature to catch mice.

Homo sapiens also exhibit a variety of behaviors which are our nature, not because they are good or bad. Having said that, setting up moral and ethical schemes seems to be one of our features, which we exhibit not because we are so very very good, but because it's in our nature (language, etc.) And we can also argue that we did NOT violate this or that moral code because X, Y, and/or Z. Dogs can't; we can.

the role of man as the apex of creation, knowledge and reason — invicta

Sort of Shakespearean.

What a piece of work is a man, How noble in reason, how infinite in faculty, In form and moving how express and admirable, In action how like an Angel, In apprehension how like a god, The beauty of the world, The paragon of animals. — William Shakespeare - Hamlet

we still retain our animalistic side despite being higher on the evolutionary scale. — invicta

We don't have an "animalistic side" -- we are all animal--animals descended from animals.

True enough, "we have reason and intellect that accords us the ability to tell right from wrong or good from bad". But we also have reason and intellect assisting us in sometimes achieving our least attractive desires. We might possibly, perhaps, know right from wrong and good from bad, but these arms are at least somewhat flexible.

Our best selves may have flourished when we were wandering hunter-gatherers. Being civilized for several thousand years doesn't seem to have civilized us all that much.

For purposes of the OP, it seemed like a better bet to avoid the more equivocal issue of the Republican Party's dive off the deep end. It is too early to know how the far right wing politics will play out. As far as I can tell, they are still committed to the positions of The Business Party, even if some of them are stark raving mad.

Thanks for the video clip. The idea of a "virtual senate" protecting property interests globally is new to me, but the agile mobility of global capital is not.

As Norman Finkelstein put it...

Identity politics is an elite contrivance to divert attention from this class chasm. — Isaac

Absolutely.

It's also the case that the elite effectively throttles any meaningful move toward income redistribution through progressive (rather than regressive) taxation or UBI.

I'll stick with the idea that the US is a one-party state but I agree that the Republicans' behavior has been very destructive. To pick up a strand I touched on earlier, politicos respond to the electorate's opinions, just as the electorate is affected by party propaganda. It's reciprocal. So, some of the really nasty right-wing moves are received favorably by a really nasty portion of the electorate. There is a substantial population of hateful bastards out there. For example, protecting the unborn, as they claim, strikes me as an outright right-wing lie. Banning abortion is punitive.

There is a multi-generational stratum in American politics which never liked the passage of social security, unemployment insurance, a minimum wage law, medicare, medicaid, civil rights legislation, fair housing, 1973 Roe vs Wade, gay rights, and so on down the line. They are basically a selfish lot that fear and loathe the idea of the downtrodden getting any kind of help from the government.

Some of these twisted bastards have in the past been democrats (dixie-crats particularly). sometimes they have been republicans, and sometimes they have been something else.

there is a significant difference.
— Michael

No there isn't.

Great conversation... Really nailing this topic. I expect readers are riveted. — Isaac

more than :grin: but not quite :rofl:

Today the Republicans are the wicked ones. Some of us are old enough to remember when the Democrats were the party of segregation now and integration never. The southern wing of the Democratic Party forced rules into various areas of national policy that are on-going malignancies. The Republicans may be degrading voter access to the ballot, but they are following a well-trod path established by southern Democrats. Corrupt Republicans? What about the Democratic machine in Chicago and other cities?

The thing is, (to over-simplify) there are many Americans who have always disliked progressive politics, and have over time shifted to the more regressive party. Once it was the Democrats, now it is the Republicans. Yes, party propaganda has an effect on the electorate, but the electorate also has an effect on the parties.

It's also the case that the parties can be out of step with a diverse electorate.

How better to extend tyranny than to provide the illusion of freedom? — Tzeentch

Exactly.

People run for office, but without any party label. — Mikie

If we elected an entirely new House, Senate, and President with no party affiliation it would not be long before some sort pf parties formed. Why? Because elected office holders, and the people they represent (assuming this was a system of representation) have interests that are not compatible with everyone else's interests. Eventually the several competing interests would clump together to better gain advantage. Before long, there would be parties.

How do we get around the problem of "interests" which are quite legitimate?

A one party state isn't of necessity repressive. For one thing, the two wingéd Party of Business is under no internal threat. Neither is the US at risk of attack--we are more threatening than threatened, well, except for nuclear weapons. The golden goose of the US economy is consumption by citizens who are free to consume as they wish. If you want to spend $5,000 on a hideous tattoo, fine. If you buy an absurdly oversized car, great. If you buy tickets to art films and art museums, super. If you want to pay a printer to publish a communist rag, no problem. Free enterprise provides a pretty large stage on which to play one's chosen role. After all, the theater is selling tickets and buying goods and services, so go ahead and proclaim. "You say you want a revolution / Well, you know / We all want to change the world..."

How does Noam Chomsky get away with saying all those dangerous things? He may deplore the system, but he does not make suggestions about how to blow it up, so to speak. (After a talk he gave I asked him why he did not propose actions that people could take? He said, quite firmly, that that was not his role.)

Opposition to the government of the United States is tolerable as long as one is not organizing its actual overthrow. My opposition to the flag and the republic for which it stands is causing no loss of sleep in Washington. But if I had organized the January 6 attack on Congress, I'd be in solitary confinement in a federal prison. Trump, being the president at the time, has been able to escape a similar fate, so far.

A lot of activities of which particular Republicans and Democrats may personally disapprove are perfectly compatible with business. Somebody's weird lifestyle may be objectionable, but hey -- they're working, paying taxes, paying rent, buying gas, groceries, sex change surgery, hormones, etc. All contributing to the grand bottom line

Then don’t bother voting since whoever gets into office is the same guy :lol: — invicta

A lot of people don't vote -- and my guess is that there is no barrier preventing them for doing so, EXCEPT they don't see any point to choosing between the party of Tweedledum and Tweedledee (go ask Alice).

otherwise we’d be dealing in conspiracy — invicta

Which we seem to be doing, anyway.

Presumably political parties exist because portions of the electorate -- society --have opposing as well as allied interests which a political party can pursue. If the Business Party is unconcerned or opposed to the interests of the working class, where does that class turn?

How would a 'no party' system work? Say more about that.

Professor Chomsky: Is there such a thing as "artificial intelligence" residing in a server farm? Are the AI programs "intelligent" or are they merely mimicking human communication? IS "AI" wishful thinking on the part of corporate executives?

You have lived under the republican/democrat two party nation in the USA. I have lived under the tory/labour two party nation in the UK. Party politics has failed in my opinion. — universeness

You might want to focus your question a bit more. Chomsky has long described American politics as a one-party state. Dems and Reps form two wings of pro-business policy. There are no third party contenders of even remote significance.

A question I would ask you (Universeness) is whether you think the Tories and Labour are essentially the same thing.

Do you think we need a new politics? Do you think it would be progressive to remove all political parties from politics and governance? Do you think 'Vote for a person, not a party,' should become the loudest political clarion call? — universeness

Can we get a "new politics" with the same economic structure we have now?

it's easier for like-minded to come together to form a small commune (where people can come and go), — jorndoe

Granted that setting up a commune is comparatively easy. It's also the case that communes often fall apart. I don't know what the history of kibbutzim are. Perhaps there was historical precedence that members shared; perhaps there was institutional support. I don't know how long any particular kibbutz has been operating, I'm pretty sure the kibbutz were not the same as the 1960s communes that came and went pretty swiftly.

Any society that gravitates too much towards either side will collapse. — Christoffer

All societies eventually collapse, don't they, given time?

A given cultural region--pre-Columbian North America, Europe, E. Asia, South Asia, etc--may maintain consistent features over long stretches of time, but social structures within the cultural region collapse and re-form continuously. It seems like an organic process, different than when a society is crushed by outside forces of various kinds.

The soviet system collapsed, but not merely from internal flaws. There was the German invasion of 1941 which was immensely costly. Then there was the Cold War, which drained the resources of the soviet system. (The Cold War drained capitalist resources too, but the drain was proportionately more tolerable.)

Our prime example of communism was begun in an only slightly industrialized country (Russia) with a very long history of despotic rule. Despotism was a handy model to follow, and people like Stalin had little compunction about exercising murderous power. Communism was started in the wrong place at the wrong time by the wrong people.

Whether a "socialist" system is viewed as the equivalent to "communism" is an important question, I prefer the term socialism,

Neither communism nor socialism has a snowball's chance in hell of getting anything other than a very hostile reception from the Establishment and us running dog lackeys. Whatever flag they fly under, the revolutionaries intend to take the wealth away from the bourgeoisie (all of it, pretty much). Not a popular idea in bourgeois circles! Distributing their wealth to the people is anathema to the rich, of course.

The USSR operated as State Capitalism. The State was the company for which everybody worked, and the company looked after its own interests. That wasn't what communism was supposed to be.

I am very familiar with the viewpoint discussed in the article and I reject it as being, well, just plain stupid. It falls into the same category as saying "pregnant people" rather than pregnant women. Last I checked, women were the only people getting pregnant--no exceptions.

Here's another example: Niggardly. No doubt the literalists would look at this and deem it racist! Niggardly means stingy, ungenerous, and meager. The word comes from Old Norse and Old English and has absolutely nothing to do with the offensive word 'nigger' it resembles. Nonetheless, I used niggardly once and a politically correct adult nearly fainted.

Why don't we just ban the word "black" altogether?

We don't do that because even a slightly clever child will understand that if you are talking about a "black hole" in physics, or putting "black dirt" on the garden, or having a "black eye" these words have nothing to do with race. Similarly, there is nothing racist about white chalk and a black board, or publishing a white paper on the economy, or keeping favorite telephone numbers in a little black book, or for women, buying that 'little black dress'.

A whole series of words have been applied to Americans who originated in Africa : niggers, negroes, colored(s), colored people, African Americans, blacks, people of color, and are now included in BIPOC. I'm sure more will be added.

There is a big debate on the word "blackmail", because apart from being a negative action, it has racist connotations. — javi2541997

Dearest Javi, please don't go there! Blackmail doesn't have racist denotations or connotations any more than "black hole", "black board", "black top", or "black beans" have.

What @Baden had to say is on the mark.

I would like to add a general principle for Jamal, myself, and numerous others: Exercise at least a little generosity in interpreting the words that other people write (or say). Granted, anyone might have said something more lucidly, more graciously, more precisely, more.. whatever -- but just because you can imagine the word being misunderstood, doesn't mean the use was deficient.

hen I was growing up, "gay" was a common insult, but now it isn't, or at least I'm pretty sure it isn't. — Judaka

Gay? Queer? Homosexual? Faggot? Gender expansive? Gender Fluid? Celibate non-binary polyamorist? I'm not quite sure what constitutes an insult in this department these days, When I was coming out, "homosexual" as a legitimate self-descriptive term was shifting to "gay". 20 years later (1990, say) "gay" was shifting to "queer". "Faggot" or "Fag" was somewhat positive for a while, but now seems to have taken on more negative connotations again.

So this is a good example of where generosity should be applied. If someone says, "Homosexuals deserve equal rights." no one needs to pounce on them for using the wrong word. The sentence could have used gays or queers, but the intent (affirming equal rights) seems obvious enough.

Yes, that's basically my point. If we want children to develop critical thinking skills then absolutely the worst thing we can do to bring that about is further impose on their freedom by force-feeding them lessons on it before making regurgitate it for grades like show ponies doing tricks.. — Isaac

So, millions of people who are very accomplished, creative, admired thinkers, creators, performers, etc. have gone through various school systems over the last 300 years. Granted millions went through modern education mills and did not come out as accomplished anything. But then, in the long history of civilization, most people are not brilliantly accomplished, Most people have maintained their societies by keeping their noses to the grindstone till they dropped dead.

The leisure that could be enjoyed by the masses today is, I suspect, viewed as more a problem than an opportunity by the powers that rule society. Hence, keep the masses busy -- in school as long as possible, then busy working, and after work busy mowing the lawn, and 1001 other things. "Idle hands are the devil's playground," Well, sort of true. People who have time to learn and think along their own lines, may very well conclude that there is something defective and oppressive about the ruling class. The ruling class has found that it's nicer to keep us proles busy than having to suppress riots all the time.

Why do you think that? — Isaac

Apparently the development of children is outside your field of knowledge. I think that because I have observed children acquiring knowledge. Spoken language -- no problem. Just about everybody who has ears acquires their native language(s) through self-learning. That is a built-in capacity. Writing -- and thus reading -- are, in the history of the species, very recent developments -- 5,000 years ago, give or take 15 minutes. Widespread literacy is much more recent, Similarly, widespread arithmetic skill eems to be quite recent too.

How many children do you know who have self-taught themselves from pre-literacy and innumeracy, on up to being able to read a newspaper and balance a checkbook? Personally, I don't know any. I have met quite a few people who are not able to do either of those things; they aren't stupid, they just didn't self-instruct their way there. I have read accounts of a few famous people who were really self-taught all the way. Mozart started playing the piano at 4 years, but his composer/musician father also taught him. Needless to say, geniuses are not typical people.

That people do is not an argument that they ought, nor that they must. — Isaac

Yeah, well... what you do is not an argument for what you ought, or must do either. Yet you keep doing it. Why do you persist?

I've questioned the necessity of 'teaching' as opposed to self-directed learning. — Isaac

I'm 100% in favor of self-directed learning, with the caveat that most children need help in acquiring the most basic information, like the sounds associated with the alphabet, the manual ability to generate writing, counting, basic arithmetic, and the like. Having acquired these skills early on (as most children do) they can build up their capacity. The shift from "learning to read" to "reading to learn" is where there is a drop off for some children, around the age of 10 or 11, give or take a little.

If you think that self-directed learning won't occur in a typical school, you are probably right. School children (and children who are put to work for long hours) don't have the unstructured time to engage in self-directed learning. Many adults maintain a level of busyness that relieves them of the time they could engage in self instruction. "Production must go on!"

could — Isaac

would — Isaac

I could, would, and do consider them reciprocal. Certainly, animals of all kinds learn without instruction (including us), but many animals teach their young. People, of course, do this extensively.

One of the problems I see in the usual practice of education is that many teachers themselves are not actively engaged in learning -- not just in their field, but in other fields as well. And teachers surely ought to be able to manage self-learning. An English teacher should regularly read science and science teachers should regularly read literature.

Teachers who are not themselves engaged in learning (at a reasonably challenging level) are less likely to understand their students' challenges. Further, a teacher who stops learning is a poor model of adult citizenship.

Learning and teaching are two different things. — Isaac

One could think of them as reciprocal rather than as opposed.

I am in total agreement with you.

I attended school in a small town in Minnesota starting in 1952. Was it a good education? It was a mixed bag. Some elementary teachers were probably good; a few, probably less so. Secondary was more of a mixed bag, because in 7th grade, tracking began towards college or a trade. I was considered unpromising so was tracked into the commercial program. Owing to an intervention by several people, I ended up going to college after all.

I was not well prepared for college, and I had no real, well motivated plan. but I managed to do OK and graduated with a BS in English and social science. I figured that I would teach English. I quickly discovered that I was altogether NOT cut out to teach high school students. Instead, I ended up working with adults in a number of different educational contexts. That, and clerical temp work which I hated, whenever I needed quick employment.

Looking back at the intervening decades, I'd say a lot of schools are doing as well as they can under the circumstances (which is, in many cases, not terrible), and so are a lot of students. Any picture of the future is blurry at best. I don't know what the perfect school was, is, could be or should be. At least we need more varied options. Catholic education is good for some; for others, the public school is better. For some, high structure is critical, for others, low structure. And more. All of these things can not exist under one roof.

Besides the school, we know that parents and community make a difference. I don't know what to do about that, either. Small town Minnesota didn't / doesn't share much in common with megacities and/or really world-class slums.

Yes, I wish everyone was interested in maximizing their own and their children's and their community's human potential, but the masses, trying to get by--let alone maximizing their potential--are generally lukewarm on the matter. Not their fault.

My main criticism of my education is that it did not give me a very realistic view of the world, and I wasn't an outstanding student. At 76 I'm still working on "how the world works". It's kind of depressing.

Do you have any cause to believe that, have you tested it, or read of anyone having done so? — Isaac

Yes. The Industrial Revolution changed things. 250 years ago, the economic activity that most people (outside of the elite) engaged in did not require much in the way of literacy skills, numeracy, and 'general knowledge'. 100 years ago, most people (outside of the elite) required a fair amount of literacy, some numeracy, and more general knowledge. The relationship between basic educational attainment and a reasonable level of social/economic participation (still outside of the elite) became stronger over the 20th, into the 21st century.

Many studies have shown conclusively, definitively, that lacking basic skills (literacy, numeracy, general knowledge) is a barrier to minimal economic and social performance for most people. Are there exceptions? Of course there are, but not so many.

Furthermore, humans begin acquiring basic skills from an early age. Child development information shows that IF children have not been exposed to enough positive spoken language from caregivers by 5 years of age (20 million as opposed to 30 to 40 million words) basic educational attainment becomes difficult from kindergarten on up. Further, there needs to be a strong positive element in the communication -- being yelled at doesn't help.

Is your ground for believing it sufficient to imprison children against their will and punish them for failure to comply? — Isaac

Some schools provide very good experiences for children. Some schools are shit holes. The latter are more like prisons. Education critics have been calling out the negative features of schooling for a long time. Back in the 1960s, Edgar Z. Friedenberg labeled schools as a "labor pool management system" keeping young people out of the labor pool for as long as possible, through doctoral studies if need be. Many criticisms have been far harsher.

Schools have lost some of their raison d'être; mass media have had 24/7 access to children for a good 60 years (maybe a couple of decades longer) and have instructed 'the people' on what it means to be a good citizen -- I mean, "good consumer". Buy this, buy that. Wear this, wear that. Etc.

Quote possibly most children can not have the kind of growing-up experiences that both of us would like and approve of.

@Jamal aka mynah bird... Per your question, I am pretty sure that I have failed to receive email alerts for the last 3 PMs in my inbox (over the last month). I used to receive email alerts before.

With reference to starlings: "The birds were intentionally released by a group who wanted America to have all the birds that Shakespeare ever mentioned. It took several tries, but eventually the population took off. Today, more than 200 million European Starlings range from Alaska to Mexico, and many people consider them pests."

For god's sake, importing alien species merely as literary decoration is just not acceptable.

A number of serious invasive species have arrived by accident in shipping containers of various kinds. The seemingly innocuous European earthworm (a longer, fatter worm than native North American earth worms) are causing problems in forested areas because they eat all of the leaf litter on the ground, which facilitates soil loss when it rains, and changes the ecology of the forest. It took the worms roughly 75 to 100 years to work their way out of farming areas into the northern hardwood forests, crawling along like worms do. (We call them nightcrawlers; they're good bait for fishing.)

The gypsy moth, emerald ash borer, and various other plants and animals have caused lots of problems--like deforestation--because they have no predators in this hemisphere. A Japanese lady bug was introduced (deliberately) to eat aphids on soybeans. They do that really well, but in the fall they start looking for winter quarters (that would be our houses). They have a bitter odor, and they leave spots on outside walls (never mind them getting inside).

Florida is dealing with pythons and other large invasive snakes that people have dumped in the swamps.

I don't think it includes anyone. No one needs formal education, it's a myth designed to produce compliant little consumers. It stops people thinking because they expect all the information they need to be handed to them, they don't develop enquiring minds, but instead are hewn into mindless cogs. — Isaac

Quite a sweeping generalization!

On the other hand, I agree that the program of mass education for Americans is, indeed, designed to produce compliant citizens. Mass communication also performs this function, instructing people how to satisfy their many artificial wants.

Back to sweeping generalizations. I have a typical formal education - bachelors degree and a masters degree. Quite a bit of the bachelor degree education was good instruction. I liked it. I learned quite a bit. The masters program was a credential generator--not a fraud, but not very good, either.

A lot of what I have learned between graduating from college and retiring, I learned through my own effort. Since retiring, I have learned much more because I now have much more confidence and time to study. But, take me back 55 years and, no, I did not have much context into which to fit what I was being offered.

I have known a few self-taught individuals, and their intellectual accomplishments are impressive. But not everyone has the talent, early on, to guide their own education. I certainly didn't. Most people don't. That's why we "educate".

Per @Banno, "they are not useful. This reinforces the view that, for all the "clever", they are bullshit generators - they do not care about truth."

This sounds like something you might say about me. — T Clark

Humans are all bullshit generators -- it's both a bug and a feature. Large problems arise when we start believing our own bullshit.

"Goofy" is an insufficiently identified feature of GPT3, 4, 5... and AI. Thanks!

How much of the "goofiness" is due to the goofiness of the nerds and geeks who code this stuff and the creeps who pay for its execution? After all, it didn't spawn itself. We should be asking GPT fewer questions and asking Open AI LP more questions. OpenAI conducts AI research with the declared intention of promoting and developing a friendly AI.. Their stated purpose deserves to be intensively cross examined -- and quite possibly doubted.

We can decide to. It isn't easy, but it is possible.

I can't go on I'll go on. — green flag

You will, we will, because (as The Preacher in Ecclesiastes says), "Anyone who is among the living has hope--even a live dog is better off than a dead lion!"

We would simply BE. — schopenhauer1

Simply BE. Excellent advice.

Why do people create sock puppets? What are they for? — Tom Storm

It's a deviant sexual thing.

Although suicide is a mental health issue not everyone who becomes suicidal suffers from mentally ill. — Fooloso4

Yes, it is the case that a mentally healthy person may wish to commit suicide (to relieve unbearable physical pain, for instance), but it is a safe generalization to claim suicides are the result of mental illness.

300 million guns are of course central to this whole issue, but if you--or anyone else--can come up with a way of retrieving even a few million of the guns in private hands LET'S HEAR IT. Guns in the United States are like perfluorocarbons--ubiquitous. (Still, 1/3 of Americans don't own guns). With respect to guns there are two legislative steps that could help (future condition tense) IF they were passed at the federal level: 1) lift the liability shield for gun manufacturers 2) ban further manufacture of most kinds of guns. Lifting the liability shield might accomplish #2.

The majority of suicides by gun are not mass murders. — Fooloso4

Yes. The vast majority of suicides by gun are private affairs. School shootings in particular are public and highly reactive events for obvious reasons.

We still need many more mental health resources available, not just for kiddie killers but because there are a lot of people out there whose mental health is in poor shape (10%? that's what it was 50 years ago. 15%? 20%?) Suicide isn't the only mental health issue, obviously.

I heard an interesting proposal about school shooting, and maybe other mass shootings. It was developed by a research group at Metropolitan State University in Minnesota. Their research showed that a large share of shooters were suicidal in the year before they committed their violent acts. Taking a gun to school (or shopping center...) and opening fire was a fairly certain way of dying--a form of suicide by police bullet.

The finding supports the idea that one cause–maybe THE cause–of mass murders is the failure of society to provide adequate mental health treatment -- treatment that should be readily available, effective, and covered by insurance or at public expense. Of course we provide no such thing. Mental health services are difficult to access, treatment beds are in short supply, there are not enough treatment staff to go around, and without insurance it is too expensive to afford, for most families.

Other studies have shown that the mental health of adolescents is not good (never mind the rest of the population).

So, maybe it isn't such a mystery why people go on shooting rampages.

BTW, @NOS isn't the only person to think that there is no such thing as society. He has Margaret Thatcher for company.

You are conflating COLLECTIVE DEFENSE with Individual Defense.

One nation defending its territory from another nation's aggression requires armaments to be used against the attacker. Civil order and peace within a nation is a different, separate issue.

All the armaments of the United States armed forces--from ICBMs to pistols–do not contribute to the peaceful relations among our fellow citizens. What maintains peacefulness in society is the collective desire to avoid conflict as one goes about one's life. Internal peacefulness is not maintained by 300,000,000 guns either.

You can afford not to be paranoid because other people have guns, because other have the will to defend you wherever you yourself refuse to. — NOS4A2

It's the 300,000,000 guns owned by 200,000,000 Americans--some of whom are demented anti-social thugs, that contribute to paranoia. Those 200,000,000 gun owners are NOT defending me or you. Mostly they are enriching gun and ammunition manufacturers at a high cost to society.

Guns can definitely be used for defense. If you choose to go without, just know that your final victory was that you didn't live in fear. — frank

Of course a gun can be used for defense, provided you are prepared for an attack and in a defendable position. Outside of that, successful defense is unlikely. A motivated shooter will generally have the advantage, and bullets flying around from random shots might find you anywhere.

Mother Superior jumped the gun

Happiness is a warm gun

You woke up this mornin', got yourself a gun

Bang bang he shot me down...

Etc.