13 ms·

I wonder how many were killed by this thing? BS guess: 200 million? (2 per produced rifle according to wikipedia)

by johansch 13y ago

larrik 13y ago
My own BS guess: 2 per produced rifle seems extremely high to me. I think .2 per produced rifle would still be high.
- mtdewcmu 13y ago
  I agree, that number does sound kind of high. The number of deaths per rifle would likely follow a heavy-tail distribution: a few rifles would have extremely high numbers, and most would be have extremely low numbers. So the average would be a lot higher than the median. That doesn't rule out 2/rifle on average as a possibility. But the average is a misleading statistic if you're talking about the common case.
bsamuels 13y ago
I think you're drastically overestimating how much action weapons see. Consider the amount of rifles belonging to collectors, military, how many are used in training, how many are in weapons stockpile. Maybe 1 in 5 rifles have even been used in action. Probably 1 in 5 of those rifles have ever hit someone. It's going to be a number several orders of magnitude lower than 200 million that's for sure.
- sillysaurus2 13y ago
  Even 2 million people is a loss of life hard for me to comprehend. The only way I can come to terms with that number is by thinking of it like: If I meet one new person each day, then I'll meet about 1000 people every three years. If I die 30 years from now, then I'll have met 10k people. In that circumstance, 2 million people is 200x more souls than I'll meet in the rest of my life. I'd have to meet two hundred new people each and every day for 30 years. Kind of strange trying to wrap my head around such numbers. Maybe nonsensical looking at it that way, but it's the only way to look at it that hits me how each of these people who died were people with hopes and dreams and fears and loves. Some of those people were vicious wild animals; others may have been poets caught in a bad situation.
  - chiph 13y ago
    The Great Purge by the NKVD during Stalin's time was directly responsible for the death of almost 1.5 million people. Those killed indirectly (starved to death because of poor decision making by collectivist workers because the more intelligent people were jailed/killed) vastly exceeds that figure.
tlear 13y ago
Would probably be easier to estimate the number from getting number of killed in all wars in last 60 years. Separating by type of war and then applying fraction killed by small arms
aaronem 13y ago
Zero; a firearm has neither agency nor volition. The question, in order to be sensible, would have to be one of how many people were killed, by other people, who used a firearm of Gospodin Kalashnikov's design to do so.
- enscr 13y ago
  There we go again... Chicken or egg might be easier to resolve than guns vs people
  - franklinho 13y ago
    Chicken or the egg is quite easy to solve. It's the egg. "Since DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) can be modified only before birth, it can be argued that a mutation must have taken place at conception or within an egg such that a creature similar to a chicken, but not a chicken, laid the first chicken eggs." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicken_or_the_egg http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicken_or_the_egg
    - JTon 13y ago
      While fascinating, I think you've taken the statement far too literally
      - franklinho 13y ago
        Totally aware, but I can't resist when someone brings up this conundrum.
    - deleted 13y ago
      [deleted]
    - vacri 13y ago
      Chicken or egg is easy to resolve: things were being born from eggs before chickens existed :)
- codex 13y ago
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
- fsckin 13y ago
  An estimated 1/5th of all firearms in circulation around the world owe their design to Kalashnikov. You could tally all firearm deaths since 1947, divide by 5 and get a reasonably good estimate. To get even closer, exclude 95% of suicides and exclude 95% of homicides in the USA (along with plenty of other countries) since killers in countries not at war or in conflict tend to use handguns 20 times more often.
  - vacri 13y ago
    The point on handguns is the most underrated part of the US debate on gun control. Assault weapons are a mere blip on the annual murder chart. Two-thirds plus of murders in the US are done with handguns. The remaining third are longarms and other methods. Assault rifles are visible because they're occasionally used in spree killings, but the problem is handguns.
brohee 13y ago
Very much bullshit, adding all war victims since WW2 don't ever come close to that number. And I doubt her are more than one or two millions murder victims since 1947, and that's already an enormous number....
- maxerickson 13y ago
  The world is a bigger more violent place than that. There are presently hundreds of thousands murders each year. So something like 2 million people have been murdered the last 5 or 6 years. (but still all those acts aren't being done with 1 single type of rifle)
- morsch 13y ago
  The definition of war victim is debatable, but I'm pretty sure any sensible definition will result in casualties much higher than 2 million since 1945. The number of soldiers of the North Vietnamese forces who died seems to be around 1 million, for example. If you include civilian casualties -- and why wouldn't you -- it seems that the Vietnam War alone cost almost 2 million people their lives. The number of murders seems to be around 450000 per year, world wide, with, I assume, lower numbers in the past due to a lower overall population. Still, easily more than 2 million since 1947. I'm not saying that in either of those figures the AK47 (or, in fact, any small arms) were significantly involved, but that wasn't the question.
- vacri 13y ago
  Over the past decade, the US has had between 11-18k murders per year. Back-of-the-enveloping it to a bit less than 10k/year for 66 years gives us around half a million murders in the US. The US has a depressingly world-average rate of murder, and is only 5% of world population.
6d0debc071 13y ago
As a scale for the guess: 65 million people live in the UK. Around 313 million people live in the United States. Between 60 and 85 million people, including civilian casualties, were killed in World War 2.
johansch 13y ago
Seems like around 200M people were killed in wars during the 20th century: http://www.scaruffi.com/politics/massacre.html http://www.scaruffi.com/politics/massacre.html http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_many_people_died_in_war_since_1914?#slide=2 http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_many_people_died_in_war_since_... http://www.cissm.umd.edu/papers/files/deathswarsconflictsjune52006.pdf http://www.cissm.umd.edu/papers/files/deathswarsconflictsjun... I'm revising my BS guess to 1/5th of this; 40 million.
gkop 13y ago
There's no way to know the answer to this, of course. But something important to recognize about the AK is the high number of civilians killed by its fire. It was designed for street fighting. At least 4 out of 5 infantrymen bearing AKs don't even bother to aim the rifle. Probably 90% of deaths by AK are civilian.

I wonder how many were killed by this thing? BS guess: 200 million? (2 per produced rifle according to wikipedia)

larrik 13y ago

My own BS guess: 2 per produced rifle seems extremely high to me. I think .2 per produced rifle would still be high.

mtdewcmu 13y ago
I agree, that number does sound kind of high. The number of deaths per rifle would likely follow a heavy-tail distribution: a few rifles would have extremely high numbers, and most would be have extremely low numbers. So the average would be a lot higher than the median. That doesn't rule out 2/rifle on average as a possibility. But the average is a misleading statistic if you're talking about the common case.

bsamuels 13y ago

I think you're drastically overestimating how much action weapons see. Consider the amount of rifles belonging to collectors, military, how many are used in training, how many are in weapons stockpile. Maybe 1 in 5 rifles have even been used in action. Probably 1 in 5 of those rifles have ever hit someone. It's going to be a number several orders of magnitude lower than 200 million that's for sure.

sillysaurus2 13y ago
Even 2 million people is a loss of life hard for me to comprehend. The only way I can come to terms with that number is by thinking of it like: If I meet one new person each day, then I'll meet about 1000 people every three years. If I die 30 years from now, then I'll have met 10k people. In that circumstance, 2 million people is 200x more souls than I'll meet in the rest of my life. I'd have to meet two hundred new people each and every day for 30 years. Kind of strange trying to wrap my head around such numbers. Maybe nonsensical looking at it that way, but it's the only way to look at it that hits me how each of these people who died were people with hopes and dreams and fears and loves. Some of those people were vicious wild animals; others may have been poets caught in a bad situation.
- chiph 13y ago
  The Great Purge by the NKVD during Stalin's time was directly responsible for the death of almost 1.5 million people. Those killed indirectly (starved to death because of poor decision making by collectivist workers because the more intelligent people were jailed/killed) vastly exceeds that figure.

tlear 13y ago

Would probably be easier to estimate the number from getting number of killed in all wars in last 60 years. Separating by type of war and then applying fraction killed by small arms

aaronem 13y ago

Zero; a firearm has neither agency nor volition. The question, in order to be sensible, would have to be one of how many people were killed, by other people, who used a firearm of Gospodin Kalashnikov's design to do so.

enscr 13y ago
There we go again... Chicken or egg might be easier to resolve than guns vs people
- franklinho 13y ago
  Chicken or the egg is quite easy to solve. It's the egg. "Since DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) can be modified only before birth, it can be argued that a mutation must have taken place at conception or within an egg such that a creature similar to a chicken, but not a chicken, laid the first chicken eggs." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicken_or_the_egg http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicken_or_the_egg
  - JTon 13y ago
    While fascinating, I think you've taken the statement far too literally
    - franklinho 13y ago
      Totally aware, but I can't resist when someone brings up this conundrum.
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
  - vacri 13y ago
    Chicken or egg is easy to resolve: things were being born from eggs before chickens existed :)
codex 13y ago

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

fsckin 13y ago
An estimated 1/5th of all firearms in circulation around the world owe their design to Kalashnikov. You could tally all firearm deaths since 1947, divide by 5 and get a reasonably good estimate. To get even closer, exclude 95% of suicides and exclude 95% of homicides in the USA (along with plenty of other countries) since killers in countries not at war or in conflict tend to use handguns 20 times more often.
- vacri 13y ago
  The point on handguns is the most underrated part of the US debate on gun control. Assault weapons are a mere blip on the annual murder chart. Two-thirds plus of murders in the US are done with handguns. The remaining third are longarms and other methods. Assault rifles are visible because they're occasionally used in spree killings, but the problem is handguns.

brohee 13y ago

Very much bullshit, adding all war victims since WW2 don't ever come close to that number. And I doubt her are more than one or two millions murder victims since 1947, and that's already an enormous number....

maxerickson 13y ago
The world is a bigger more violent place than that. There are presently hundreds of thousands murders each year. So something like 2 million people have been murdered the last 5 or 6 years. (but still all those acts aren't being done with 1 single type of rifle)
morsch 13y ago
The definition of war victim is debatable, but I'm pretty sure any sensible definition will result in casualties much higher than 2 million since 1945. The number of soldiers of the North Vietnamese forces who died seems to be around 1 million, for example. If you include civilian casualties -- and why wouldn't you -- it seems that the Vietnam War alone cost almost 2 million people their lives. The number of murders seems to be around 450000 per year, world wide, with, I assume, lower numbers in the past due to a lower overall population. Still, easily more than 2 million since 1947. I'm not saying that in either of those figures the AK47 (or, in fact, any small arms) were significantly involved, but that wasn't the question.
vacri 13y ago
Over the past decade, the US has had between 11-18k murders per year. Back-of-the-enveloping it to a bit less than 10k/year for 66 years gives us around half a million murders in the US. The US has a depressingly world-average rate of murder, and is only 5% of world population.

6d0debc071 13y ago

As a scale for the guess: 65 million people live in the UK. Around 313 million people live in the United States. Between 60 and 85 million people, including civilian casualties, were killed in World War 2.

johansch 13y ago

Seems like around 200M people were killed in wars during the 20th century: http://www.scaruffi.com/politics/massacre.html http://www.scaruffi.com/politics/massacre.html http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_many_people_died_in_war_since_1914?#slide=2 http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_many_people_died_in_war_since_... http://www.cissm.umd.edu/papers/files/deathswarsconflictsjune52006.pdf http://www.cissm.umd.edu/papers/files/deathswarsconflictsjun... I'm revising my BS guess to 1/5th of this; 40 million.

gkop 13y ago

There's no way to know the answer to this, of course. But something important to recognize about the AK is the high number of civilians killed by its fire. It was designed for street fighting. At least 4 out of 5 infantrymen bearing AKs don't even bother to aim the rifle. Probably 90% of deaths by AK are civilian.