Well observable and actual are a bit more tied here since once something red shifts outside our light cone it is effectively gone forever in all conceivable respects, it may as well be in another universe except that I find it vaguely more probable we'd find a way to enter alternate universes than reach those places.



From a logic standpoint I view it as part of the logic train that concludes by stating as an unprovable but necessary assumption that you can draw meaningful conclusions about the world around you from the data your senses offer processed through your mind.




He is a good actor but one doesn't see him in much, and ST: Nemesis was not a stellar movie IMHO




It's establishing legal competence that's my sticking point, find me a good way to do it - doesn't have to be airtight, nothing ever is - and I'd likely change my tune.



I suppose so, our problem is while brains can help one triumph so can fanatical dedication to a purpose, and that's not a rare trait among mass murderers. Also, components of a device need not be high-grade metal, a substitution of plastic or wood is conceptually doable and for a few components wouldn't make a lick of difference whereas for others it might wear out relatively fast but not so fats you couldn't empty multiple clips and swap in a spare to do it some more. A wooden mallet might be crappy for pounding in nails but will do the job decent enough if a metal one isn't available.



Almost always easier to retro-retrofit something I imagine. As mentioned, converting weapons to fully auto is something I know about mostly tangentially. The notion that full auto is inherently better than semi or burst fire is not one I subscribe to. Still the core mechanics are simple enough. I'd have to know 'the defeated purpose' being referred to by that person, but the difficulty of a given project when it comes to mass murder is, IMO, always best weighed against the difficulty of making decent pipe bombs I suppose.




I know most of the right wing is quite willing to take them away from felons, because I break with them on that, I don't think they have a right to them but much like voting I'm a big believer in reasonable post-incarceration/parole periods before someone can get them back. Never saw much point in assuming the 50 year old who spent 18-25 in the slammer for virtually anything hasn't reasonably reformed if they made it from 25-50 without another 'mandatory vacation'. I think one has to acknowledge that a kleptomaniac, for instance, whether they did their vacation in a prison or a mental hospital, isn't really any worse of a candidate for gun ownership then the next Joe... unless their klepto impulses took on the form of armed robbery of course.

Anyway the core point there is that I personally, and speaking only for myself, have very grave and I think justified concerns about the fairly broad way people approach felon/mentally-ill/incompetent. If someone is good to be out on the streets at all, the status of those three ought to be fairly gray. What bugs me about this whole thing is - and I hate to say it - that these spree killings are simply poor justification for trying to alter our approach to problems that obviously aren't easily solved. We just don't have enough murderous madman for me to feel tinkering with civil rights (not just guns, because it's more then guns at that point) is warranted, considering the risks. I know I'm not alone here in remembering that we made it a pain in the ass to commit people to asylums for some very good reasons.



The whole problem there is that you get into the whole 'if the shit hits the fan and we come under a dictatorship'. I personally have no problem with requiring ID to buy a weapon, same as booze, its the idea that the gov't could keep a record of who bought what, it's too close to not keeping a record of who voted but how they voted. Like a little logo on the Driver's license indicating the person could legally buy firearms and a database at the BMV or whoever of who couldn't wouldn't bug me at all, at that point I just don't want them to be in any realistic position to be able to make oppressive or arbitrary changes to who can buy.

This doesn't mean all bets are off at organized control though, but non-gov't options are possible, if a few groups like the ACLU and NRA and so on banded together to create a voluntary ID and promised to destroy records if ever they could fall into bad hands, one could, say, offer a tax discount to places that only sold to people with that ID.

In any event, no progress will ever be made when control-favorers respond to "I don't trust the government" with "Well, you should" as the essential line of reasoning. Make more progress exploring other routes even if they might be viewed as inferior.



Problem is most of our spree killers didn't have records that really stood out except in 20/20 hindsight.



I wouldn't scream if we did that, I just doubt it would be all that effective, since you would need a standardized mental health database and even a lot of pro-control sorts would have entirely different reasons for screaming holy hell about that.

As I said, from my perspective most of the proposed control methods - even the pretty reasonable ones - strike me as invariably being very half assed patches that don't have the potential to do very much and come with a lot of foreseeable 'uh-ohs' and God alone knows how many unforeseen consequences. I think the best solution is just to have more guns in normal citizen hands outside the home, make training easy to get, and just start trying to build up the cultural faux pas around reckless usage.