Gun = Power to Kill
If we believe that humans are essentially good, then we would therefore believe that humans would generally do what is good with the powers given them. In that case, we would want everyone capable of holding a firearm to have one at all times because, being essentially good, humans would protect each other from harm.
This argument uses as evidence the idea that most of the time when a shooting happens, the only person who actually has Power to Kill, (A gun) is the person who does harm. Therefore, if everyone else had Power to Kill too, the one who wished to do harm would be able to do much less harm before someone good interfered.
If we believe that humans are essentially bad, then we would therefore believe that humans would generally do what is bad with the powers given them. In that case, we would want to take as much power away from people as possible to keep them from hurting each other. Thus, it makes sense to want to regulate Power to Kill because power in the hands of men is generally seen as a bad thing.
The evidence for this argument lies in the fact that people do bad things with their power, and there are a lot of examples to back this idea up. Think of what Hitler did with his power, or the Columbine shooters with theirs.
What do you think? Are humans are essentially good or essentially bad? Why?
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You're right, Dallin, that was a deep post, but as always I love reading your thoughts. You always give me something to think about. I believe humans are essentially good because I experience a lot more good interactions with people on a daily basis than I do bad. Unfortunately, the bad experiences tend to stand out more and be the ones that we tend to dwell on, but I think we often overlook all of the good that we are surrounded by every day. As far as your gun example, the majority of the people in this country that own firearms are not using them for bad purposes and I honestly don't believe that it is just because they are "afraid" of an external punishment. My belief would be that they honestly value human life and have the light of Christ. Unfortunately, one evil person can do a lot of damage and harm to many others if given too much power or access to dangerous things, but I do think that because the majority of people are good it is still in our best interest to empower people with the ability to do good unless they have shown they are not trustworthy to be given this right and even then you likely can't stop them from getting whatever it is they put their mind to getting. Maybe slow them down, but most likely not be able to stop them in most cases. Those are just some of my thoughts.
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