I dont believe that is what he is saying at all, man does have free will, however, we are still driven and limited by human nature, and natural instinct overall. People up top that direct society have always been educated, and have studied history for thousands of years. Survival and maintaining your people's style of life will always take precedence. That is why human history will keep repeating itself, while time changes, what drives people hasn't changed, leading to people in power and people in general to make the same mistakes people decades before them made.
That is just my take on the subject, Pi3volution might have a completely different perspective though.

I'm saying that no matter who you are, humans will always be selfish and greedy in some way which makes us do things against our own morals. It's an unavoidable fact.

You are still saying you have no free will. Everything is a choice. You choose to be greedy, you choose to be selfish. Wake up.

I don't think you understand that humans have the tendency to center on themselves sometimes. It is how it is. You would, of course, naturally work to maximize your own opportunity cost. I'm not talking about your character being selfish and greedy. I think you need to wake up if you do not think you are at least a tiny bit greedy. Everyone has greed; that is how humans advanced to this information age we are in now. If we are not naturally greedy, we wouldn't be dominating the planet and driving animals extinct; there wouldn't be as much man-made catastrophes. Greed drives your motivation. It is a matter of the degree to which you take your greed. That is what you are referring to. I am talking about how humans are. Would you gladly volunteer yourself to die to prevent overpopulation of the world? Very few would offer themselves, because you have a want to survive. But to survive, you must sacrifice. "There is no free lunch."

As quikbeam explained above, human nature is what it is. You can't change that.

Free Will does not exist. There is no possible way for Free Will to exist.

There is no choice, it is simply an illusion.


Philosophically considered-

Based on what we know of the universe, on a macro-scale, it is mostly determined, it is only within a quantum level that there is any form of indeterminacy. Considering this, Neuro-science has yet to find any sign of quatum indeterminancy within the human brain, so, I shall break this argument into two parts.

1. Suppose that quatum indeterminacy does exist within the brain, it would mean that our choices are completely random, and that we do not choose it, rather, it comes to us from randomness, therefore, we are not free, but only a slave to chance.

2. Suppose that it does not exist, then our brain would be deterministic, and respond only to antecedent and stimulus. Thus, when we think we choose something, that choice is not really a 'choice', in that there is no exercise of free will, because we do not freely choose to do that, that choice is already determined by outside stimulus and antecedents which can ultimately be traced to something that is not within yourself, therefore, everything occurs from necessity rather than choice.

LOL that's is the perfect computational explanation of a human mind xD
thank you for the enlightenment

So you would feel comfortable with your school janitor packing heat? How hard do you think it would be to grab that weapon off of them when they're mopping up the bathroom floor? Also, consider this: an armed student walks into class and opens fire, how long will it take for the janitor to drop his mop and run to said class and take out the mostly likely better armed gunman? That's if he even feels like risking his life for the kids who shit he cleans up everyday. You are right though, making schools gun free zones are as effective as making them drug free zones. When I was in high school drugs were everywhere and that was a long time ago. I can only imagine how much worse it is now.... The point is there no easy solutions...

I was but for my own self enjoyment :D

anyways if not gun people will still have other means to kill. Without guns the death rate would be lower. Police and other proper authority would probably still have the rights to use fire arms in there end there will always be crooked cops etc who'd try to sell guns illegally. It's a cycle, can we really keep guns away ?

You know the saying " It's not guns that kill people but people.......". I say it's access to guns that encourages people to kill people.

Reduce the access to guns and you reduce the murder rate. Period!

I like that joke about the king of England.......totally works.

Maybe if you give guns to all Americans they'll just all kill each other........that is just sarcasm and I hate the idea but that is what
the NRA seems to want! Guns in school, guns for everyone.

I'm from Canada BTW. but have American friends.

And this is where the cultural divide lies. There are those who see no point to firearms. To them they are just tools for killing and mass-murder. If not for murdering other humans than defenseless animals. There is no tangible benefit to society and all they can see are the risks and the consequences of further existence of guns.

But there are those who understand firearms. We own usually more than one and practice with them regularly. We study, teach and promote safe practices. We understand these are deadly instruments and respect that. You can not help but appreciate the responsibility and privilege of being able to hold a tool that can both end a life and save one. Ownership of a firearm when used lawfully in no way infringes on the rights of another. This is what irritates most gun owners from the anti-gun party. Because we never tell others how to live but keep having other people tell us otherwise or what we "need". If I don't have the right to tell you what YOU "NEED" then you should not have the right tell me what I need. My rights end where yours begin.

At the end of the day though it's ironic that both parties understand that fundamentally, mankind is capable of terrible acts of violence against each other.

Will removing guns lower gun crime and deaths? Absolutely. It would take one hell of a magic wand (or a boatload of more national debt) to do it. But mankind has always looked for tools and weapons to assert power over one another ever since the first primitive man picked up a stone to throw at another. And unless we can somehow culturally change ourselves for the better, violent crime will not end.

Guns are here to stay, it's part of modern life. Until we can develop a Star Trek phaser gun with stun capabilities there will always be gun deaths. We need to work on controlling the problem without denying the rights of a vast majority of people. Because if the majority of gun owners are punished for the actions of a few then we really have lost liberty.

Pistols and revolvers for protection, hunting rifles for hunting. A man who hunts with a semi or fully automatic rifle is no hunter.

People hunt with semi automatics all the time for followup shots in densely wooded area's.
Part of hunting is doing so humanely, and if your second shot can put it down quickly if the first didn't why not?
You only get moments as an animal runs by.

Absolutely true, when someone is determined to hurt someone else, even kill them, they will go for the most effective tool readily available.

Now put aside mass killings for a moment, which the FBI defines as the killing of 4 or more individuals at one time. These events are exceedingly rare but definitely stir the fear of nations. Look at Norway for example. Yes guns make perpetrating these kind of acts more easy but this is so statistically rare I would venture that you're more likely to die in a car accident than be shot by a mass shooter.

But will removing a gun from the equation lower the death rates? Most likely. But is that better? Does a victim that is severely beaten, raped or rendered permanently disabled but survives make everything better?

I'm going to post a video where crime statistics are compared in American and the United Kingdom. If you've never gone over these statistics they are absolutely fascinating and I will leave you to make your own conclusions.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ooa98FHuaU0&list=WLC54946E3821AF7F9

And to address your last point the NRA doesn't want everyone armed with a gun. It wants people to HAVE THE OPTION. And until there can be guarantees that NO ONE can get a gun, then we should not be allowed to forfeit our right to have one as well.

Not sure why people are so hell bent over guns. It's been statistically proven that cars and drunk driving kill as many, or more, people each year than guns do. Yet I don't see people screaming for prohibition and stricter "car enforcement".

Drunk driving statistics for 2009 - 12,744 people killed from drunk driving. (http://www.alcoholalert.com/drunk-driving-statistics.html)

Gun deaths (total, meaning accident, suicide, and homicide) in 2009 - 31,347. Of those deaths, 11,493 were gun homicides (1,013 Handgun homicides, 640 long gun homicides, 9,840 are listed "other" gun homicides). (http://www.gunpolicy.org/firearms/region/united-states)

Statistics blow my mind. People screaming for more restrictions, weapons bans, and so on.

It just reminds me of history repeating itself. The prohibition was not helpful at all and actually increased crime up until it was repealed.


Everyone has access to cars/vehicles. Guns are a lot stricter. Yet people are more worried about firearms than they are about something that EVERYONE has access to and uses almost daily.

"banning guns is like banning kitchen knifes and forks"

I also use guns to cut my meat and put food into my mouth.

I will post the Second Amendment again to our overseas friends who do not understand our constitution.


"A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed."

There is NOTHING in this Amendment, part of our bill of rights guaranteed to every citizen that talks about having a gun for hunting or personal protection.

And to educate those who are not fully aware of US firearm laws or culture, ownership of fully automatic guns is exceedingly rare and highly controlled. Hunting with these weapons is also illegal because most states limit the round capacity of firearms used in hunting.

Pistols are definitely for self protection

Hunting rifles are for hunting.

A semi-automatic "assault rifle" exists to fight those who would oppress us. Either foreign or domestic. And in plain terms, it was meant to kill PEOPLE. Now does this happen? Are we all trading fire in the streets like some bad Call of Duty game? No. More people are killed in this country by hands and feet than by rifles(this includes ALL rifles, bolt action, semi-auto, assault rifles etc.)

The Second Amendment wanted the people to have a fair shot at either resisting invasion, or overthrowing their own government. Just look what the Reds did after overthrowing the Tsars, they made gun ownership illegal.

It may be a deranged or paranoid insurance policy, but it's what our founding fathers wanted. They just overthrew a Tyrant, and knew that they could become just as tyrannical in the future.

I can't speak for those living in other countries that don't have a gun culture and aren't allowed to own any guns. And just as I respect and admire your countries for having that kind of existence, I only ask that you try and understand where we Americans are coming from. (Some of us at least...)