California Mathematicians Develop Equation to Prevent Shootings

[HereSince1628]

34. heuristic but resolving very little

Moreover, tractable, generalizable mathematics typically requires simplification of the problem and it's assumptions. And mathematically speaking one walks away mostly better understanding only the things that were considered during the model building and it's analysis. But heuristics is actually one of the greatest goods that comes from such an exercise, so that outcome is not entirely unexpected or necessarily bad.

Still failure to incorporate realistic outcomes for exchange of gun confrontations, aka gunfights, (including the likelihood of collateral injury/death whether or not the gunman is subdued) would and does effect the social acceptability of the outcomes of gunfights and is likely to trip up many persons concerned about 'realistic' political considerations rather than workable mathematics.

The thought involved in considering the problem beyond the immediate mathematics is also interesting. In particular, for example, I note that the authors present certain scenarios concerning the availability and prevalence of legal and illegal guns among victims and attackers as being differentiated into urban vs suburban scenarios. The reality of such distinctions seem very fuzzy edged at best and are actually not required by the mathematics. So, why did the authors choose those names? It's likely a matter of their understanding of American culture. That perspective of the authors' cultural understanding is inescapably incorporated into the way they look at the various functional relationships upon which the model rests.