The Gun Blogs

More at Grapplingwithguns.com

One of the things I keep returning to in this blog is the idea that liberals and conservatives have different ways of thinking about rights, and thus need different sets of arguments or processes to help them understand gun rights. Today I want to focus on deductive and inductive arguments in relation to gun rights.

In a deductive argument, should the premises be true the conclusion is guaranteed to be correct. (Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy)This could be a statement such as, “If I have the right to life, and owning a gun protects my right, then I have the right to own a gun.” This is a more conservative approach to gun rights – we could insert the constitution, self-defense, tradition, or a host of other themes into this argument structure. The bottom line is that a more conservative approach to gun rights often begins with a deductive argument. These things are fixed and correct, and therefore they lead to this right. End of story.

In an inductive argument “the premises provide reasons supporting the probable truth of the conclusion.” (Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy) The outcome of the process is one in which the outcome is likely to be true. “I am safe with firearms and my friends are safe with firearms, therefore it is likely that people similar to us will be safe with firearms.” Liberals often need to build from direct experience to build toward an argument that people should have a general right to ownership.

When it comes to violence, the argument structures may be reversed. Liberals will often begin with deductive arguments. “Violence is bad, guns are designed for violence, therefore guns are bad.”

In terms of violence, conservatives will build an argument based on what types of people are using force. “If people have the right to justifiable use of violence to defend their life against attack and I am under attack then I may use justifiable violence to defend my life.”

I am guessing that underlying these arguments are access to information. It may be true that to get to the point where we believe deductive arguments about gun rights we are basing it on years of informal inductive experience. Maybe when a gun owner was a child she or he experienced very positive inductive reinforcement. “My father taught me how to shoot and now I am teaching you to shoot, therefore it is likely you will want to pass this to your children.” The safety argument fits in with this as well. “If you can learn to respect this very clearly dangerous tool you can extrapolate this knowledge into general responsibility around dangerous things.”

Both of the above examples are inductive in nature, beginning with specific situations and leading to general principles, and both are likely to be a part of experiences from a more traditional or conservative worldview.

My guess is that most liberals who are wholly opposed to guns and gun ownership have had little or no experience with guns and have no access to inductive information that might lead to later deductive arguments.

I, for example, believe that individuals have the right to self defense against deadly threat, so I think the international community’s response is a bit backwards in disarming victim populations then pleading with perpetrators to stop their genocidal attacks. I would make the deductive argument, “Potential victims have the right to arm themselves for the purpose of defense against perpetrators, and we have the opportunity to arm genocide victims for the purpose of self-defense, therefore we should arm potential victims for the purpose of self-defense.” (See Dave Copel’s article at http://www.davekopel.com/2A/Foreign/genocide.pdf for a thorough discussion.)

When I see gun owners offering to take non-gun owners who meet the legal requirements of gun ownership to the range to learn to shoot, I see a way forward. We are able to give people valid, safe inductive experiences that lead them toward an understanding of their rights. I propose that we soften the overall deductive rhetoric of gun rights and focus more on inductive arguments, showing how positive experiences with firearms lead to greater things and better understanding of our world.