Inshallah Instructor Injures Individual

[ATM]

ATM, I think we're finally getting somewhere now.

The most important progress we've made is to determine that you do in fact teach Cooper #1 with only minor rewording as a fundamental and absolutely crucial part of your training. You choose not to list it in your rules, but you teach it every bit as strongly as Jeff Cooper did - irrational assumptions and beliefs wholeheartedly included. This is interesting given your extremely vocal opposition to Cooper #1 but it does remove a big chunk of my issue with your argument given that your stated position completely contradicts your actual position.

Or, I can distinguish a memorable catchphrase from a risk mitigation step as well as a reasonably sound catchphrase from a dangerously unsound catchphrase. Feel free to expound on the contradiction you believe you’ve identified.

On what do you base this statement?

I’ve deduced that likelihood from the sum of our discussion so far, no one thing in particular. I have no way of knowing, but you are free to inform me, if you wish, of your experiences or considerations of other approaches. If you have actually experienced and considered other approaches and are truly just playing the role against this one for the exercise, I must commend you for doing so very well.

That is yet another a false dichotomy. Rote memorization of NRA3 will be just as ineffective as rote memorization of Cooper4. Comprehensive and internalized understanding of either (at least with the addition of Cooper #1 to NRA3 which we have already established that you strongly emphasize in your training) is vastly preferred.

Yet another? Have you identified any false dichotomies specifically that actually were?
When I lead people to comprehensively understand old #1, it is only for the purpose of exposing its failings and having them discard it. For those who haven’t already memorized it, it does not need undone. There is nothing to be undone in the rest of those, only a more universal wording and placement of what most already imagined the Cooper4 to entail.

For the umpteenth time you confuse effective application with ruleset. I hope someone else goes through your metaphorical bathwater with a fine tooth comb.

I can’t in good conscience effectively teach a component I will not myself be subject to. One of those rulesets contains a stumbling block. My task is to remove stumbling blocks and make the student successful and responsible.

ATM, you (or whoever taught you the proper application of NRA3) did just make a rule to deal with that. You just called it "only an unhandled gun is safe." And you didn't list it in your primary rules to act as a reminder.

The closest to a rule that might be considered would be in the sense of a maxim, not a rule or a step to deal with anything, but a saying to capture a general or self-evident truth.

Then why do you do it?

Because you say I do? Not sure how else to respond until I see whatever it is you see.

Not bad! I'll think about it some, but at first blush my reaction is that it is simply a more neutral rephrasing that again lacks the emotional impact of the original. I'll get back to you after some time to consider.

Thanks?

Hold on, you said the following:

If you can't support the claim except with a vague appeal to authority I'll consider that it was just you blowing smoke and move on without further addressing it. Your call.

Did you read the earlier thread quoted and suggested in this one earlier? I’ve discussed the importance of primacy of order and placement as humans tend to sequentially process thoughts into actions according to the sequence of recalling their memorized guides. One such example was the ABC’s of CPR instruction and changing the instructed and memorized sequence to CAB when it was determined that chest Compressions were more important to start with than Airway or Breathing. Cooper4 is out of order, it pushed the golden rule of safe gun handling to #2.

If you want more underlying principles of educational/teaching theory, I recommend you PM ol’ huff, he’s offered several instructor development seminars over the years that delve into the craft of more effectively teaching. He also commented in that same past thread (post #96) regarding Cooper#1 being a false metaphor, leading the Cooper list with it, and the problems that creates according the principles of curriculum theory. He’d probably be willing to blow as much smoke on this subject as you’d care for, but if you haven’t read that other thread, you’re missing quite a bit of the progression of this argument.

Is it possible that time and experience have taught you to be a better teacher regardless of the ruleset you are applying? Have you personally gone from teaching rote memorization of Cooper4 to focusing on internalization and in-depth comprehension of NRA3 and confused the actual cause of improvement in student understanding - assuming that is what you have actually observed?

Sure, I’ve become a better teacher, but I haven’t confused that with the failings of Cooper#1 or what I consider to be the improvement of adopting and teaching NRA3 over Cooper#2-4. NRA3 are a more reasonable and complete set. I find them superior in every sense.

Likewise, now that it actually has become a discussion.

What were we doing before you considered it a discussion?

 

[jbombelli]

 

[jamil]

You don’t care whether they comprehend and adopt fundamental safe gun handling or just memorize some set of rules and possibly disregard some or all of them?

It would be more honest for you not to say I'm saying something I didn't say. This is not even close to an equivalence. But I'll give you the benefit of the doubt. I'll assume you just skimmed.

Now see? This is what I mean by fillibustering. You take a post and, rather than quoting the general gist of what someone says, say one or two paragraphs, you isolate every ****ing phrase from its context and often veer into irrelevant territory. It's like you're trying to create a mountain of busywork to discourage people from responding, so that you can consider their silences as a victory. Just so that you know. If you see that I have not replied to a specific thing, it means I have found it irrelevant or unworthy of my time.

Because, that could make a huge difference in the depth of commitment they will determine for themselves to mitigate risks whenever they handle guns.

It only makes a huge difference in your mind. The set of rules taught, cooper, nra, or some hybrid, don't make a person have any deeper commitment. Do you think the words of a rule are magic? The instructor can certainly help inspire a deeper commitment in students. Or, an unfortunate catastrophe could do it.

So then, you do actually care what they are taught? My students are people, people I encourage to teach and correct other people from what they’ve learned. Any of that ever-expanding group of people may have a positive or negative impact on your self-interests, on the gun culture itself.

Again, this is evidence of you skimming because you've incorrectly parsed the semantics of what I said. Go back and reread it. And then if you still don't understand what I said, please ask and I'd be happy to parse it for you.

Of course I won’t. If I couldn’t reasonably adopt it, I must assume others will simply nod their heads, repeat it, and then disregard it for the rest of their lives as I did. I would consider keeping such a component part of my curriculum to be willful negligence on my part, conduct unbecoming an instructor.

Great. When you're the teacher, you get to decide what you teach. Godspeed.

Hence, the showcasing of examples for voluntary reflection, discussions, scrutiny, testing and comparisons on a gun owner forum rather than lobbying congress for coercive force to be applied.

Well. It does appear that this is what you think you've done. I think you've mostly opined and tried to make it appear as if it objectively matters.

I’ve made both of the first 2 arguments. That some people may consider it helpful is irrelevant when considering a universal platform, especially when there are more sound alternatives even for those who do currently consider it helpful. I’ve made the case that everyone everywhere should continuously evaluate that which they currently practice and teach, as well as alternatives, to push for continued improvement and refinement rather than resting on their own laurels or, in this case, the laurels of others. Is that a bad thing?

Is the NRA3 a sound alternative? Yes. Is it a necessary replacement? Well that's your opinion. You've failed to make the case that it is necessary.

As I stated, it’s what I think is probably the common ground for those who most fiercely cling to Cooper’s #1. It was presented as a deduction from their general behaviors and my interactions with them, not as an exhaustively proven fact. Do you understand the difference? I wouldn’t have chosen the words I used had I been stating it as fact. If some people consider and recognize this, is it a bad thing?

This is not a rebuttal. It is a confirmation. You have limited the possible reasons that people might like rule #1 to a projection of your own perspective, your own imagination.

I can challenge their determination, I can show them just how easily old #1 fails under a bit of scrutiny, I can give them a perspective they may never have even considered since memorizing it. In short, I can introduce new information to them by which they might discover and determine something new or improved for themselves. Is that a bad thing?

So I guess you're better in person than on the internet? Because on the internet, you've failed to do those things. And then you project upon people that the reasons you've failed, the reasons you haven't convinced them, are their fault. You have not considered the diversity principle, different strokes for different folks.

Most people grasp the wrong concept from old #1, if they grasp any at all.

This should be testable. Show me some data that this is true. But be fair. Show me some data that most people grasp NRA#3 better. Saying it, rationalizing it, doesn't make it true.

“In this,” referred to making fundamental safe gun handling first and last, the bookends of everything else they would learn about guns and gun safety. The only flaw here is in your comprehension and response. Without your response, I wouldn’t know that you hadn’t grasped what I was attempting to convey, which is why I tend to prefer that we do things interactively or not at all. It’s a simple but important principle to teaching, learning and communicating more effectively.


On a side note, you know I’ll never accept the challenge to “prove it!” in a reasoning exercise where claims need only be shown reasonable to advance.

This reads like dodging to me. You did set up a false dichotomy, and in the process you implied that nra=success, cooper=fail. It's a false dichotomy because there are other alternatives available that you haven't acknowledged.

And, on a side note. You don't get to make such claims and then say you get to determine what kind of exercise this is. I see it as an exercise in determining truth. There are many ways to do this. Reason is one. Reason alone isn't necessarily definitive. But even so, your reasoning isn't conclusive either.

And of course you won't accept the challenge to "prove it" because it would likely destroy your argument. If you were to have the data that shows NDs and how they were taught gun safety, I suspect that you'd find that most were caused by people who thought the gun wasn't loaded. That is the excuse we hear most. And in addition to being the excuse, it was the root cause, training notwithstanding.

Of those who thought it wasn't loaded, I further suspect that you'd find most haven't taken much comprehensive training at all of either cooper or nra. Of the ones that did have training, it's most intuitive to suspect that you'd find no statistical significance of which particular rules were taught (both can be taught in the form of "bookends", either can be ignored in the wrong state of mind). I think having comprehensive training at all, whether it's Cooper or NRA, would likely be the likeliest determinant in whether one will have "accidents".

But, since you assert that there is a significance, that's just something you need to prove, since this really is an exercise of finding truth, not just in you testing your reasoning skills. And I know it's hard to prove because those kinds of statistics are not readily available. But. In the absence of such proof, it's probably better not to be so exuberantly confident in your assertions. Because you can't back that **** up with real world practicality. Ideas ain't **** until some rubber hits some pavement.

That's all I have time for right now. I have to go test my advanced TP handling skills, and then off to work.

 

[BE Mike]

Here are some very good rules from the NSSF website:

1. Always Keep The Muzzle Pointed In A Safe Direction

2. Firearms Should Be Unloaded When Not Actually In Use

3. Don't Rely On Your Gun's "Safety"

4. Be Sure Of Your Target And What's Beyond It

5. Use Correct Ammunition

6. If Your Gun Fails To Fire When The Trigger Is Pulled, Handle With Care!

7. Always Wear Eye And Ear Protection When Shooting

8. Be Sure The Barrel Is Clear Of Obstructions Before Shooting

9. Don't Alter Or Modify Your Gun, And Have Guns Serviced Regularly

10. Learn The Mechanical And Handling Characteristics Of The Firearm You Are Using

I think the best thing to do is be reminded very frequently how important firearms safety is. Having people post firearm accidents helps a lot IMHO. Photos really hit home. That being said, some folks aren't going to be muzzle aware. Others might think it is ok to use alcohol or recreational drugs while handling firearms, etc. I don't think we can teach responsible behavior to irresponsible people, nor can we teach common sense. We can only remind the responsible and serious among us to handle guns safely.

 

[ATM]

jamil,

In post #1, Kirk showcased an instructional/correctional option based on one set

In post #3, I showcased an instructional/correctional option based on another set to compare and contrast.

Everything else has been the conversational result of that start.

I scrutinized the set he presented and asked for the same for the set I presented.

If you imagine it as something else, you aren't actually even involved.

I'd like you to be involved, but I don't require it. You can go back to diluting or derailing or demanding proofs ...or whatever floats your boat.

It won't nuisance me in the slightest, but I must admit, I have no idea of your motivation or purpose in this thread at this point.

 

[jamil]

jamil,

In post #1, Kirk showcased an instructional/correctional option based on one set

In post #3, I showcased an instructional/correctional option based on another set to compare and contrast.

Everything else has been the conversational result of that start.

I scrutinized the set he presented and asked for the same for the set I presented.

If you imagine it as something else, you aren't actually even involved.

I'd like you to be involved, but I don't require it. You can go back to diluting or derailing or demanding proofs ...or whatever floats your boat.

It won't nuisance me in the slightest, but I must admit, I have no idea of your motivation or purpose in this thread at this point.

My posts are evidence that I am actually involved (a point which I must admit, more than one person has PM'd me to ask why I'm wasting my time). It may not be the involvement you wanted, but I have posted in this thread in response to things you've posted, according to my own interests. You've done the same as you've admitted in your reference to post #3.

But you don't get to determine how I choose to engage in the conversation. So we're back to the fundamental issue that I've identified, that you don't comprehend diversity of opinions and perspectives that people have. You can't make everyone to be in your image. Live and let live. To each his own. Different strokes for different folks. Jeez. I thought you were a Libertarian. You should know this stuff.

ETA: My purpose in this thread is OCD related. You've declared something unsubstantiated to be true in a way that makes me have to respond to it. Reason alone is not sufficient to establish the truth of this kind of assertion. And not that you've reasoned particularly well. Some of your arguments are valid as far as conclusions following from premises, even though you haven't established the truthfulness of the premises. And some of your arguments are invalid, because the conclusions don't follow from the premises. I have pointed some of those out.

 

[JettaKnight]

If you complete the paper preliminary cleaning properly, a lined trash can should be sufficient for the conclusion of the Clean Getaway.

Of course, hanging chads and log jams complicate the issue. In those cases, all bets are off!

This reminds me of traveling behind the Iron Curtain.; it seems a lot of sewer pipes aren't able to handle toilet paper. There was a discreet trash can right next to the toilet in the stall.

 

[Alpo]

Then again, those little trash cans were used in the USA for sanitary napkins. YMMV

 

[JettaKnight]

Then again, those little trash cans were used in the USA for sanitary napkins. YMMV

But, in the men's room?

 

[cordex]

Feel free to expound on the contradiction you believe you’ve identified.

You teach something that contains 100% of the stumbling block that you criticize in Cooper #1.

If you want to say it should be taught outside the rules, fine. I like it there, but that is something that reasonable people can disagree on. My issue with your stated position was that you keep claiming that Cooper #1 was problematic because it forces people to make "unnecessary beliefs or assumptions" or is a "dangerous fallacy" ... except that you then go on to teach those exact same beliefs and assumptions and fallacies.

There are four main reasons we handle guns that we believe to be unloaded in the same safe manner as guns we believe to be loaded. Only one of those reasons has anything to do with the gun itself being dangerous - that is, that the gun may in fact be loaded despite what we believe to be true or have even verified for ourselves.

If you are teaching that only an unhandled gun is a safe gun you are implicitly teaching that even a gun that has been positively unloaded may actually be loaded, which is not inherently different than Cooper #1. After all, the only thing that makes a gun immediately dangerous in this context would be that it might be capable of firing. I'm in total agreement that the lesson needs to be taught, which is why I like Cooper #1. Can you explain why you teach what you have identified as unnecessary beliefs and assumptions attendant to a dangerous fallacy?

Yet another? Have you identified any false dichotomies specifically that actually were?

Yep. Yet another. I have repeatedly pointed out your criticisms of Cooper4 that were founded around the false dichotomy of either teaching NRA3 thoroughly or Cooper4 by rote. That's practically your shtick at this point.

The closest to a rule that might be considered would be in the sense of a maxim, not a rule or a step to deal with anything, but a saying to capture a general or self-evident truth.

Maxim, rule, mindset, basic understanding, whatever you prefer to call it - an absolutely essential component. So long as the other rules are built on top of it I'm happy. If you want to call it your maxim 0 instead of rule 1, that's just fine.

I’ve discussed the importance of primacy of order and placement as humans tend to sequentially process thoughts into actions according to the sequence of recalling their memorized guides.

Wait, do you not first teach that the only safe gun is an unhandled gun and that the NRA3 always apply to all guns? Where exactly does it fall in your instructions? Without that basic assumption, people tend to short circuit the rest of the rules. That makes the case for it being taught first, don't you think?

 

[ATM]

My posts are evidence that I am actually involved (a point which I must admit, more than one person has PM'd me to ask why I'm wasting my time). It may not be the involvement you wanted, but I have posted in this thread in response to things you've posted, according to my own interests. You've done the same as you've admitted in your reference to post #3.

If you don't challenge the reasonableness of my positions, they stand. You don't have to test or adopt them, but you can't refute them. I wanted to see if they could withstand refutation and you just keep stating that I haven't proven them. So, they stand, reasonable and unrefuted. If you call that involvement, OK.

But you don't get to determine how I choose to engage in the conversation. So we're back to the fundamental issue that I've identified, that you don't comprehend diversity of opinions and perspectives that people have. You can't make everyone to be in your image. Live and let live. To each his own. Different strokes for different folks. Jeez. I thought you were a Libertarian. You should know this stuff.

All are free to consider and test, I have not initiated aggression. Folks who are interested in a more reasonable instructive/corrective platform and approach to practicing and teaching safe gun handling than that presented in the OP have such an option presented with examples which survives every scrutiny offered.

ETA: My purpose in this thread is OCD related. You've declared something unsubstantiated to be true in a way that makes me have to respond to it. Reason alone is not sufficient to establish the truth of this kind of assertion. And not that you've reasoned particularly well. Some of your arguments are valid as far as conclusions following from premises, even though you haven't established the truthfulness of the premises. And some of your arguments are invalid, because the conclusions don't follow from the premises. I have pointed some of those out.

My method of stating it confidently to attract scrutiny and refutation was clearly stated. Claiming I haven't proven my position is hardly scrutinizing anything I've shown, claimed or purposed to do. I presented contrasting examples which stand, unrefuted, for further personal testing and adoption. If people aren't interested in testing and proving a thing to themselves, why would I? I just prove that it's an invincible option available to them whenever they're ready to move up from the old failed one that doesn't survive scrutiny.

Refute that, buddy.

 

[jamil]

Then again, those little trash cans were used in the USA for sanitary napkins. YMMV

One of my first jobs, I had a summer job in my late teens working at rest areas. Mowing was kinda fun. They definitely shouldn't have trusted teenagers with a large zero-turn mower with 6' deck, and hydrostatic transmission. Anyway, one of the daily tasks was cleaning restrooms. Nothing fun about that. Women didn't tend to put the sanitary napkins IN the trash. On the floor, on the back of toilets, ON the trash can lid (who wants to touch a trashcan lid?), wadded up on the counters were where they usually ended up.

 

[jamil]

But, in the men's room?

You are so old. People are gender fluid now. Didn't you know that? Sheesh.

 

[ATM]

You teach something that contains 100% of the stumbling block that you criticize in Cooper #1.

If you want to say it should be taught outside the rules, fine. I like it there, but that is something that reasonable people can disagree on. My issue with your stated position was that you keep claiming that Cooper #1 was problematic because it forces people to make "unnecessary beliefs or assumptions" or is a "dangerous fallacy" ... except that you then go on to teach those exact same beliefs and assumptions and fallacies.

There are four main reasons we handle guns that we believe to be unloaded in the same safe manner as guns we believe to be loaded. Only one of those reasons has anything to do with the gun itself being dangerous - that is, that the gun may in fact be loaded despite what we believe to be true or have even verified for ourselves.

If you are teaching that only an unhandled gun is a safe gun you are implicitly teaching that even a gun that has been positively unloaded may actually be loaded, which is not inherently different than Cooper #1. After all, the only thing that makes a gun immediately dangerous in this context would be that it might be capable of firing. I'm in total agreement that the lesson needs to be taught, which is why I like Cooper #1. Can you explain why you teach what you have identified as unnecessary beliefs and assumptions attendant to a dangerous fallacy?

I don't teach it, it simply arises as a natural conclusion of the choice to adopt that system of safe gun handling, that handling a gun in some other manner is to be considered the opposite - unsafe gun handling, regardless of actual or perceived danger. Simple, easy, responsible, voluntary, polite, reasonable gun handling.

Yep. Yet another. I have repeatedly pointed out your criticisms of Cooper4 that were founded around the false dichotomy of either teaching NRA3 thoroughly or Cooper4 by rote. That's practically your shtick at this point.

I am unable to reasonably teach the Cooper4 thoroughly without Cooper #1 breaking down to the point where it could or should be discarded and forgotten. I have taught, and still could, Cooper2-4 thoroughly, but now find NRA3 to be a slight improvement over those. I've covered this, the comparison you suggest is simply not possible. I'd have to stop at rote for Cooper#1, and I won't do that.

Maxim, rule, mindset, basic understanding, whatever you prefer to call it - an absolutely essential component. So long as the other rules are built on top of it I'm happy. If you want to call it your maxim 0 instead of rule 1, that's just fine.

They're not built on top of it, it might be better described as a truism produced by adoption.

Wait, do you not first teach that the only safe gun is an unhandled gun and that the NRA3 always apply to all guns? Where exactly does it fall in your instructions? Without that basic assumption, people tend to short circuit the rest of the rules. That makes the case for it being taught first, don't you think?

Nope, if they only process one, I want it to be the golden rule of safe gun handling, the one that prevents tragedies.

Besides, each of the three begin with the word ALWAYS. It's not like they can wiggle out of that one.

 

[Alpo]

One of my first jobs, I had a summer job in my late teens working at rest areas. Mowing was kinda fun. They definitely shouldn't have trusted teenagers with a large zero-turn mower with 6' deck, and hydrostatic transmission. Anyway, one of the daily tasks was cleaning restrooms. Nothing fun about that. Women didn't tend to put the sanitary napkins IN the trash. On the floor, on the back of toilets, ON the trash can lid (who wants to touch a trashcan lid?), wadded up on the counters were where they usually ended up.

Thanks for sharing.

 

[cordex]

I don't teach it, it simply arises as a natural conclusion of the choice to adopt that system of safe gun handling, that handling a gun in some other manner is to be considered the opposite - unsafe gun handling, regardless of actual or perceived danger. Simple, easy, responsible, voluntary, polite, reasonable gun handling.

They're not built on top of it, it might be better described as a truism produced by adoption.

Ahhhh ... so now you don't teach them that only an unhandled gun is not dangerous? You just teach the other rules and hope they get it? I clearly misunderstood when you said:

I teach them that only an unhandled gun is not dangerous. When I say unload and make safe, they understand that unloaded means positively unloaded …and make safe means not handled.

Hopefully you can understand my confusion. In that case I'm back to disagreeing with you for failing to make that explicit.

Regardless of whether you teach it explicitly or simply hope people eventually come to that realization on their own, the presumption is ultimately that a gun should be handled as though it were dangerous whether you believe it to be loaded or not, true?

 

[jamil]

If you don't challenge the reasonableness of my positions, they stand. You don't have to test or adopt them, but you can't refute them. I wanted to see if they could withstand refutation and you just keep stating that I haven't proven them. So, they stand, reasonable and unrefuted. If you call that involvement, OK.



All are free to consider and test, I have not initiated aggression. Folks who are interested in a more reasonable instructive/corrective platform and approach to practicing and teaching safe gun handling than that presented in the OP have such an option presented with examples which survives every scrutiny offered.



My method of stating it confidently to attract scrutiny and refutation was clearly stated. Claiming I haven't proven my position is hardly scrutinizing anything I've shown, claimed or purposed to do. I presented contrasting examples which stand, unrefuted, for further personal testing and adoption. If people aren't interested in testing and proving a thing to themselves, why would I? I just prove that it's an invincible option available to them whenever they're ready to move up from the old failed one that doesn't survive scrutiny.

Refute that, buddy.

The confidence of your argument is irrelevant to the validity and truthful outcome of your argument. If it is only to get people to engage you in the way you want them to engage, it really hasn't accomplished that the way you wanted.

So about the other stuff. If the premise of your argument is true, it should follow that your conclusions are true. So for the valid parts of your arguments, you've tended to state a premise without establishing its truthfulness. That's not required to say it's "reasonableness" in subjective terms. But it is required for a valid argument to be true objectively. For the parts of your arguments that are invalid, I don't think I need to address those further.

So. Is it reasonable for you to be of the opinion that the NRA rules are better than the Cooper rules? Sure. In a subjective sense. Different strokes and all. But "reasonable" doesn't make it true. It is unreasonable to assert that your opinion is objective truth, because you've not connected the dots between your reasoning and reality. For that your premises need to be true, and your conclusions must logically follow. So here's the important question: As taught by equally effective instructors, will teaching the NRA rules produce more safe students than teaching cooper's rules? Those are the dots you haven't connected. You've given reasons why you think it should. But you've presented it as if it is a foregone conclusion. In a sense, you straw-man the opposing position rather than strong-manning it.

So. Here are my recommendations to improve your case.

1) Be more honest about the other side's case. Instead of blustering as a form of straw-man, you should strongman the argument. What I mean by that, the "bluster" part is where you seem to minimize the other side of the argument, and try to argue as if you've already have established your superiority, when you have not. This is a form of straw-man, much like the progressives do with non-progressives. The Daily Show does this, for example. It's their main shtick. I think you build a stronger case, a more objectively believable case, when you engage opposition on an equal footing, and pick the strongest parts of the argument to address. I think perhaps your ENTP traits, which are an overall strength in debating, may be a weakness in this area. You tend to minimize or deny when good points are made.

2) Be more honest about your side of the argument. You tend to state subjective things as if they're objective things, as if your statements stand upon their own merit, and are at face value without further need of support. To be taken as an objective statement, some things require further support than just reasoning alone. Without establishing that the facts within your statements are true, your argument doesn't necessarily produce a truthful conclusion. This should be obvious. I think I've touched on some examples of this previously. But then when people call you on it, you either deny, deflect or filibuster (I've explained what I mean by that). That's not being honest about your side of the argument. It makes it appear that you're trying to win more than you're trying to get to the truth. You seem to approach it as if you've already know the truth, that you're just trying to get everyone to agree with your truth.

3) Ask for only what you can prove is justified. You tell me that you don't need to prove that your premise is true, that you don't need to built a logical case why it's is true, that your reasoning alone is sufficient. I suspect this is because it's hard to do what I've asked. And I get that. But, because you want everyone to change to your way and stop teaching Cooper's rules, it puts a greater burden of proving the need. It requires your premises to be objectively true. If you want everyone to change, reason alone isn't enough, just as reason alone doesn't establish that "global warming" justifies mountains of life-changing regulations, and spending the people's money on green energy. With thinking people, it's harder for you to justify a change without proving the need beyond subjective reasoning.

So. My question for you to answer on that remains. The question is not, "is it reasonable to change?" Different people will reach different conclusions about what is reasonable to them. A more objective question would be, "as taught by equally effective instructors, will teaching the NRA rules produce more safe students than teaching cooper's rules?" If you can establish what is the truth for that question, then your conclusion of that logically follows.

 

[Benp]

IMO, there isn't a point to follow any set of firearm safety rules in a particular order, but they should all be followed. Whether there are 1,2,3, 4, etc rules or if there is a person who has gathered 18 rules that they want to follow in order to be safe with a firearm, we all want the same outcome which is personal responsibility and no one getting shot who wasn't supposed to be shot.
Trying to argue that one methodology is better than another is like trying to prove that Pepsi tastes better than Coke. You can tell others about the rules that you follow, and you can teach others your rules, but at the end of the day it's their decision to incorporate those teachings exactly to the letter or they may take the principles that were taught and reword them to be more meaningful to them.

 

[jamil]

IMO, there isn't a point to follow any set of firearm safety rules in a particular order, but they should all be followed. Whether there are 1,2,3, 4, etc rules or if there is a person who has gathered 18 rules that they want to follow in order to be safe with a firearm, we all want the same outcome which is personal responsibility and no one getting shot who wasn't supposed to be shot.
Trying to argue that one methodology is better than another is like trying to prove that Pepsi tastes better than Coke. You can tell others about the rules that you follow, and you can teach others your rules, but at the end of the day it's their decision to incorporate those teachings exactly to the letter or they may take the principles that were taught and reword them to be more meaningful to them.

You said it much more concisely than I did. I kinda have adopted my own set of rules that I follow and have passed on to my son (who is not all that interested in guns and shooting). I've gone over both the Cooper and NRA rules with him. But when I talk about Cooper's #1 or NRA's #3, I've sort of restated those as "just make sure the firearm is in the appropriate state for the intended use."

To me this implies what is necessary for use WRT it's loaded state. If for your purpose you expect it to be unloaded, make sure it is before you use it for that purpose. If you expect it to be loaded, make sure it is before you use it for that purpose. If it helps to assume it's loaded until you've verified it isn't, that's fine. No harm either way because in your use of the firearm, your beginning assumption doesn't really matter until you decide to use it.

 

[JettaKnight]

IMO, there isn't a point to follow any set of firearm safety rules in a particular order, but they should all be followed. Whether there are 1,2,3, 4, etc rules or if there is a person who has gathered 18 rules that they want to follow in order to be safe with a firearm, we all want the same outcome which is personal responsibility and no one getting shot who wasn't supposed to be shot.
Trying to argue that one methodology is better than another is like trying to prove that Pepsi tastes better than Coke. You can tell others about the rules that you follow, and you can teach others your rules, but at the end of the day it's their decision to incorporate those teachings exactly to the letter or they may take the principles that were taught and reword them to be more meaningful to them.

That's an impossibility.


However, teaching is about determining which methodology is better than another and employing the best one, or a combination of good methodologies; that really should be obvious.