Why Not Use Science To Determine What Should Be Done About Gun Control?

[jimmy the one]

4. English bill of rights 1689, just glorious

iiibbb: 1) Why would they say a "controlled" militia, and then proceed to say that the right shall not be infringed? Doesn't the second context make more sense... especially since they never meant for there to be a standing army, and that all citizens were expected to act in defense of the country, as well as provide their own arms to do so?

(part reposted from another thread): You post dictionary definitions evidently from a modern site http://www.thefreedictionary.com/regulate

Here's how 'regulate' was defined in 1828 by webster, contemporary to 2ndA 1791:

1828 - regulate REG'ULATE, v.t. 1. To adjust by rule, method or established mode; as, to regulate weights and measures; to regulate the assize of bread; to regulate our moral conduct by the laws of God and of society; to regulate our manners by the customary forms.
2. To put in good order; as, to regulate the disordered state of a nation or its finances.
3. To subject to rules or restrictions; as, to regulate trade; to regulate diet. http://1828.mshaffer.com/d/word/regulate

In 1828 'regulate' meant either to adjust by rule or method, to put in good order, or to subject to rules or restrictions, or a combo of the three. .. 'control' is not in websters 1828 definitions.
You seem to harp on singling out one particular definition of 'regulate' & trying to apply your own favorite, while disallowing for the others. Boo.

iiibbb: Why would they put a clause to govern state militias in the part of the Constitution that was specifically created to enumerate the rights of individuals?

The 2ndA qualified as an 'individual' right, only for militia purpose; american white males 17 - 45 (not women, adolescents, most blacks, slaves) had an individual right to belong to militia. Militia service became a responsibility the next year by the Militia Act of 1792.

British Paper on 2008 ruling by US Supreme Ct on 2ndA: ... contrary to discredited scholarship {to wit, joyce malcolm} upon which Heller relied, the right to “have arms” embodied in the English Declaration of Rights did not intend to protect an individual’s right to possess, own, or use arms for private purposes such as to defend a home against burglars (what, in modern times, we mean when we use the term “self-defense”). Rather, it referred to a right to possess arms in defense of the realm.
The “have arms” provision in the {1689} English Declaration of Rights .. provided two protections to the individual. First, the right to “have arms” gave certain persons (qualified Protestants) the right to possess arms to take part in defending the realm against enemies within (i.e., Catholics) as well as foreign invaders.
Second, the grant of a right to “have arms” was a compromise of a dispute over control of the militia that gave Parliament concurrent power (with the sovereign) over arming the landed gentry. It allowed Parliament to invoke its right of “self-preservation” and “resistance” should the sovereign usurp the laws, liberties, estates, and Protestant religion of the nation.
... The Supreme Court correctly found that the English right to “have arms” was an expression of the same right that has “long been understood to be the predecessor to our Second Amendment.”
Where the Court erred was by interpreting the quoted terms in a manner divorced from their historical context, reading “individual” to mean “private,” “defence” to mean “defense against harm by private individuals acting for private purposes” and equating “self-preservation” with the modern usage of the term “self-defense.” In doing so, the Court relied heavily on the scholarship of Joyce Lee Malcolm. The overwhelming consensus among leading English historians, however, is that Malcolm’s work is flawed on this point.
The origins of {2ndA} in the English right to “have arms” demonstrate that this right of self-preservation/self-defense gives individuals the right to collectively defend their public interests against organized assault or tyranny, not only in case of a foreign invasion, but, in 1689, in the event of a Catholic plot to overthrow English Protestants.
Moreover, the right of “self-preservation” was to be exercised not by individuals acting privately or independently, but as a militia organized by their elected representatives, whether Parliament, the Boston Town Council, or otherwise.
http://www.oyez.org/sites/default/files/cases/briefs/pdf/brief__08-1521__22.pdf