Summarizing Chambers

Dr. Chambers (previous post) has pretty much gutted many of Taser's studies. He has revealed them to be statistically incapable of providing any meaningful evidence of safety. He also pointed out that those studies where the taser shock was applied into the back are not applicable to the real world (I've called such examples FAKE and I have repeatedly pointed out that their only purpose is for denominator washing [LINK]).

Given that the authors of these flawed so-called scientific papers are supposed to be highly educated (Ph.D.s and so forth), and the fact that those papers that are actually incapable of proving what they claim to prove due to something as elementary as inadequate sample size, might be interpreted by some critics as indicating deeper problems than just making a simple error. Some critics might point to the financial conflicts of interest, and question the motivations.

Dr. Chambers didn't go quite that far.

Now, on the other hand, we have expert after expert (at the Braidwood Inquiry), and study after study, that has found potential problems with taser safety.

Dr. Chambers pointed out the inherent difficulties of proving that something that does not occur at very high rates. It is like playing darts. One player might throw 20 darts and thereby 'prove' that it is 'impossible' to hit the bulls-eye. Another player might throw one dart and hit the bulls-eye. The first player might protest that he has conducted a larger study and he stands by his findings of impossibility. The only rational response to such a position is "Oh shut up!"

And these are just the issues that have been detected to date.

When you walk past a haystack and easily spot a couple of needles, it's likely that the haystack contains more than just those two needles.


Tasers-R-Safe evidence := Tasers-R-Safe evidence * 0.10 weighting
Safety-Issues evidence := Safety-Issues evidence * 5.00 weighting