Statistically significant and large are two different concepts.

Significant mean non-random. It means that there is enough data to demonstrate that the result is significant (i.e. real in some sense). 4% can be statistically significant if there is enough data to show that the correct value is within a narrow range.

Large just means large and is hard to pin down. It might mean absolutely large, like 80% or 90%. It might mean more than half, i.e. 51%. It might mean the largest fraction of several, e.g. 32%, where the other fractions are 20%, 17%, 15%, 9%, 7%

With that in mind, I strongly doubt that the number of bad guys killed or wounded by a law abiding citizen the largest number. Can you demonstrate with actual numbers what your claim is?

– the number of deaths was on the decline pre-Bush and pre-FOX propaganda

– the number of deaths increased after 9/11

– the numbers topped 100,000 after Hurricane Katrina (remember the stories of NON-accidental shootings in Louisiana?)

Correlation does not prove causation, but this does not surprise. I would not be the least bit surprised to see the numbers continue to increase after 2008 both because of Obama being president and because gun companies have been “exporting” guns to Mexico (making sales easier, actually) and the blowback is hitting the US, not just Mexicans.

http://wonkroom.thinkprogress.org/2011/04/22/mexico-gun-makers/

I agree that self-reported data are unreliable, but a large number of sociological studies rely on such data, and this is one of them. I originally posted as a response to the first couple of comments, and someone who called self-defense woundings/deaths anecdotal.

The remainder of the numbers I cited are because I get sick of people giving more significance to accidental gun deaths than they deserve. Some are preventable, some are not, given that guns exist, but they account for a VERY small fraction of accidental deaths.

I personally wouldn’t call 1/4 a “small fraction,” especially when the total contains 10-20 categories, and that 1/4 class is the most highly populated. That would be embarrassingly dumb, and would be like calling cancer deaths a “small fraction” of all deaths. Half a percent is a small fraction, but not 25%.

I don’t know what statistics they used, so I won’t judge or assume. However, really, self-reporting data is highly unreliable and there are reasons to believe that these data in particular would be biased in one direction.

Not being either a statistician or a sociologist, I would necessarily need to assume the authors are making reasonable argument, just as they would have to assume the same for me, as they are not chemists.

I’m not a statistician but I’m trained in this area, have taught it at the graduate level,and have a PhD in Anthropology, so if we are going for qualifications, I don’t know as much about chemistry as you do but I know as much about this sort of study as the authors do. So if you are going to take their argument based on Authority, give me the same benefit. Although I admit my PhD is from a small and insignificant school out east.

The study I cite is a reasonable study that produces a conter-intuitive result if you believe, in advance, in the unmitigated good of packing heat. That is what I think it is useful for.

My point in the OP is that firearms are responsible for a tiny fraction of accidental deaths

That does not matter at all. Not even a little bit. Lung cancer is responsible for only a small fraction of cancer deaths. Therefore, don’t do lung cancer research? Therefore, no one with lung cancer is really that sick? Therefore, causes of lung cancer (i.e. smoking) are not relevant? The argument you make is utterly irrelevant and kind of embarrassingly dumb. Don’t feel bad, a lot of people make that sort of argument. But it really is not relevant at all.

Had the uncle in the post that started this all said, of his niece being shot in the head by her dad unjamming a pistol across the living room from her “well, she had a higher chance of getting in a car wreck so this does not matter” … what would that have meant?

But Greg explained all that already.

Because Greg wrote: “…the numbers are bullshit”???

I’ll have to look at the Duluth hunt. “City” usually means archery. Fewer worries about what will stop the projectile before it hits someone.