Thursday, August 11, 2016

Plausible Realibility

A big pet peeve of mine... is this idea.. that if something makes sense to you... then it is therefore true.  Its something I call Plausible Realibility.  Its when one thinks that since they can explain something in a way that sounds good and makes since.. it becomes reality.  What's more frustrating... is this sounds like it would be something that dumb people would do... but in reality dumb people are used to having things explained to them... so assuming they know how something works intuitively isn't even a remote possibility.

No... this is a failing of smart people... and it drives me crazy.

Now one places where Plausible Realibility really shows up is in gun culture.  But it is slightly different there.  In gun culture... even the dumb people do it.  but most have no idea they are doing it.  They think they are being tactical or trying to make themselves sound informed.

For example...

There are some good arguments for why you shouldn't use a slide stop as a slide release.  In fight or flight mode there are physiological changes that take place that reduce your manual dexterity.  So you can make the argument that it is more effective to practice the grip and rip.. where rack the slide yourself.   Fine.  We can debate that.  But there is another part where they go completely off the rails and say things like "the slide release can cause wear and jams because the spring isn't fully compressed."

Now see... this is just stupid.

I've done this thousands of times.  I've never had a missfeed like this.  But that doesn't matter.  someone thought it up... and it sounded good... so its true.

Here's another one...  The M9 is unreliable in a dirty environment because it has an open slide.  See sand or dirt could get in that big opening and gum up the works.  So the gun is unreliable.

Never mind that the US military has been using the thing mostly in deserts and jungles for going on 40 years.  it has its shortcomings.  Reliability isn't one of them.

See the fact that you can dream up a mechanism by which a given firearm may fail... does not mean that firearm will actually fail that way.  In fact... this is one thing that science is actually good at.  We can test it.

So the next time you hear some expert tell you he doesn't like this gun or that gun because theoetically blah blah blah...  just ask him if that firearm actually has failed that way.. or does it only fail that way in his head.  Theory is nice.  Reality is better.

before I typed this... I loaded and reloaded 3 different pistols 20 times each. They were a  Steyr M40a1,  a Beretta 92fs, and a HK USP 40 compact.

I used the slide release method every time.

60 out of 60 times the round fed into the chamber just fine.

Science bitches.  That's how it works.



13 comments:

Stg58/Animal Mother said...

I never rack the slide of my 1911. I always use the slide release. Faster, one handed and feels satisfying.

Difster said...

It depends on the weapon and the hand. I can reach just about anything on any gun. I've operated the slide release on my Ruger P89 when my hands were so cold I couldn't feel my fingers. I don't think there's been a slide or mag release yet that I haven't been able to operate one handed.

Nate said...

well... also... note the same people that lament the use of the slide release also sing the praise of the BAD lever.

Consistency is hard.

Stg58/Animal Mother said...

Good point. I love the BAD lever. Slide releases and other mechanisms were included for a reason. Use them.

Nate said...

also... it says something that men used to train to reload wheel-guns with speedloaders.. and could do so quickly while taking fire.

And yet now we're such pussies we can't even hit a lever with our thumbs.

Because tactical.

Stg58/Animal Mother said...

SAD!

Nate said...

I had to change the font from normal to large so Diffy could see it.

Because he's old and blind and can't figure out complicated things like screen magnification.

Stg58/Animal Mother said...

"Smooth is fast" really important there.

Russell said...

It's the same mentality that plagues gyms.

That's how we got Crossfits more egregious sins.

Stg58/Animal Mother said...

But the chicks there are hot. "C" should migrate to a women only enterprise, so we men can benefit without the aggravating Cmen asking us when we're starting C.

Russell said...

"Cmen"

They certainly are catchers.

Anon said...

"The chicks there are hot."
Yeah, if you're into women with no tits, narrow hips and shoulders like Harambe the gorilla.

MichaelJMaier said...

I seem to recall reading you shouldn't use the slide release button because it can damage the extractor in some manner.

I neglected to follow up on researching that "fact".

Anyone have input on that?