'@Isdaril' "Robbery : even if this is armed robbery, you can suppose that the robber is just trying to steal from you not kill you. So if you either end up killing him or worse you end up both dead BECAUSE you had a gun to defend yourself then you'll agree with me that the utility value of the said gun was negative because a dead person is worse in the whole picture than a robbed one. "
That's not necessarily the case. First of all, armed robbery is "not just trying to steal" - it has to be a threat of death. Such threat necessarily means that once in a while it will result in death or injury of a victim, and criminal escaping unharmed will increase number of iterations. Criminal getting killed or apprehended through threat of death from a victim or passer by not only prevents repeated attempts by that criminal, it creates deterrent for next one who would try. If both end up dead, I see it as a problem of having a gun that is either not lethal enough or wasn't used aggressively or skillfully enough.
Secondly, armed robbery is just a convenient example. There are also assault (where the whole point is to cause death or injury to the victim), burglary (https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/vdhb.pdf - I'll point out specifically table 20 at page 10) and rape. While burglary is not as clear cut, I'm pretty sure that in cases of assault and rape you can't realistically say that not resisting is a better option.
Thirdly, while I do believe that rehabilitation is possible for *some* criminals, practically countries like US and Russia have difficulties with that. For number of reasons (most of which are organized crime culture, fairly primitive prison system and convicted felon status limiting employment upon release) prison often encourages repeat offense even if criminal is apprehended without injury. It's a cynical view, but I can't agree to assigning the same value to life of law abiding victim and that of a violent criminal.
"I doubt that the weapon industry wouldn't be able to find a solution given sufficient incentives"
There is an industry that supplies riot police, they put a lot of thinking into less-lethal weapons. So far the best option seems to be a 40mm grenade launcher with "impact round". Fancy stuff like microwave emitters has no chance to become man-portable, and I don't think that realistic way to non-lethally disrupt human nervous system is even in development. Fundamentally it's a physics problem where you always arrive to the issue if imparting just enough energy to the target, when physical characteristics of target and environment are not even close to being uniform.
Also, weapon mentioned in comics is actually terrible for individual self defense. It requires physical strength, a lot of space to maneuver and, ideally, multiple people to restrain a single assailant. Impractical for police, terrible for civilian use.
Edit: had to look through the thread to see if I've inserted correct link, thread's length shows how far down the rabbit hole we went. I salute your patience and willingness to argue in good faith.
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'@Isdaril' "Robbery : even if this is armed robbery, you can suppose that the robber is just trying to steal from you not kill you. So if you either end up killing him or worse you end up both dead BECAUSE you had a gun to defend yourself then you'll agree with me that the utility value of the said gun was negative because a dead person is worse in the whole picture than a robbed one. "
That's not necessarily the case. First of all, armed robbery is "not just trying to steal" - it has to be a threat of death. Such threat necessarily means that once in a while it will result in death or injury of a victim, and criminal escaping unharmed will increase number of iterations. Criminal getting killed or apprehended through threat of death from a victim or passer by not only prevents repeated attempts by that criminal, it creates deterrent for next one who would try. If both end up dead, I see it as a problem of having a gun that is either not lethal enough or wasn't used aggressively or skillfully enough.
Secondly, armed robbery is just a convenient example. There are also assault (where the whole point is to cause death or injury to the victim), burglary (https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/vdhb.pdf - I'll point out specifically table 20 at page 10) and rape. While burglary is not as clear cut, I'm pretty sure that in cases of assault and rape you can't realistically say that not resisting is a better option.
Thirdly, while I do believe that rehabilitation is possible for *some* criminals, practically countries like US and Russia have difficulties with that. For number of reasons (most of which are organized crime culture, fairly primitive prison system and convicted felon status limiting employment upon release) prison often encourages repeat offense even if criminal is apprehended without injury. It's a cynical view, but I can't agree to assigning the same value to life of law abiding victim and that of a violent criminal.
"I doubt that the weapon industry wouldn't be able to find a solution given sufficient incentives"
There is an industry that supplies riot police, they put a lot of thinking into less-lethal weapons. So far the best option seems to be a 40mm grenade launcher with "impact round". Fancy stuff like microwave emitters has no chance to become man-portable, and I don't think that realistic way to non-lethally disrupt human nervous system is even in development. Fundamentally it's a physics problem where you always arrive to the issue if imparting just enough energy to the target, when physical characteristics of target and environment are not even close to being uniform.
Also, weapon mentioned in comics is actually terrible for individual self defense. It requires physical strength, a lot of space to maneuver and, ideally, multiple people to restrain a single assailant. Impractical for police, terrible for civilian use.
Edit: had to look through the thread to see if I've inserted correct link, thread's length shows how far down the rabbit hole we went. I salute your patience and willingness to argue in good faith.