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tlambert | October 17, 2002Lott's reply to Duncan's article raises some disturbing questions about Lott's honesty. See also James Lindgren's report on his attempt to find some evidence that Lott actually conducted a DGU survey.
Where did that 98 percent come from?
98 percent claims before 1997
Way back in 1993 in talk.politics.guns, C. D. Tavares wrote: The answer is that the gun never needs to be fired in 98% of the instances of a successful self-defense with a gun. The criminals just leave abruptly, instead."
When I queried him about this, he quickly corrected his error: Kleck says in the magazine "Social…
tlambert | July 27, 2001by Steven D. Levitt, Professor of Economics, University of Chicago
[Editor's note: A version of this piece was published in the Chicago Sun-Times on July 28, 2001 under the title "Pools more dangerous than guns." ]
What's more dangerous: a swimming pool or a gun? When it comes to children, there is no comparison: a swimming pool is 100 times more deadly.
In 1997 alone (the last year for which data are available), 742 children under the age of 10 drowned in the United States last year alone. Approximately 550 of those drownings -- about 75 percent of the total -- occurred in residential…
tlambert | September 1, 2000(from The Criminologist Vol 25, No 5 Sep/Oct 2000 pp 1,6)
In a recent issue of the Criminologist, Otis Duncan raises concerns about my writings. He discusses a wide range of issues from the estimated number of defensive gun uses and the rate at which defensive uses result in the gun being fired to even the significance of why the NRA doesn't cite certain aspects of my research. Let me go through the different points raised by Duncan:
In discussing my op-ed pieces, Duncan notes that "It is especially noteworthy that Lott does not credit Kleck with the estimate of 2.5 million." (p. 5)…
tlambert | January 1, 2000This post contains extracts from Chapter 23 Private Defence of Textbook of Criminal Law by Glanville L Williams (2nd Ed 1983).
Summary
In general, private defence is an excuse for any crime against the person or property. It probably applies to the defence even of a stranger, and may be used not only against culpable but against innocent aggressors.
In general, defence is allowed only when it is immediately necessary against threatened violence. A person who acts under a mistaken belief in the need for defence is protected, except that the courts hold that the mistake must be…
tlambert | January 1, 2000Otis Dudley Duncan, University of California, Santa Barbara
(from The Criminologist Vol 25, No 1 Jan/Feb 2000 pp 1-7)
We who work hard to produce statistics for public consumption would do well to acquire a little historical perspective. Theodore Porter's wide-ranging Trust in Numbers: The Pursuit of Objectivity in Science and Public Life (1995) takes note of 19th-century developments illustrating the "creative power of statistics.... Every category has the potential to become a new thing." Crime did not originate in that century, but "it may be doubted whether there were crime rates"…