Pilot shoots hole in cockpit - trust is not transitive
Let’s look at this quote from the article in question, attributed to Mike Boyd: “if somebody who has the ability to fly a 747 across the Pacific wants a gun, you give it to them.” This is a horribly flawed assumption, because it assumes that trust is transitive, when clearly it isn’t.LinkThe reason trust isn’t transitive is because trust is most often based on data regarding the past which allows us to make assumptions about specific competence, quality of performance, and behaviors in the future.
We can assume that a trained pilot, when facing piloty thingies, will act like a trained pilot. WE CANNOT ASSUME THAT A TRAINED PILOT WILL ACT LIKE A TRAINED LION-TAMER WHEN FACING A WILD LION.
Skills from one domain cannot simply be moved from that domain to another. Saliently, the pilot in question must have thousands of hours of flight time, has done the pre-flight check hundreds or even thousands of times, has been steeped in pilot-ness and thus pilot-safety, probably since he was a late teen. He’s very likely an extraordinarily safe pilot. We can assume that every experienced 747 pilot has a keen awareness of the potential lethality of full loaded 747. In the past we can assume that they at least had a deep appreciation of the potential for harm to their own passengers, and post 9/11 we can assume that they appreciate the harm their plane can be to thousands of additional people.
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A good example of the human chaos factor (HCF) at work: stupid shit happens, even with smart people. Not having the safty on was the biggest error. And this is why I advocate that only robots be allowed to carry fire arms! Just like Gort.
Hopefully someone will be able to explain why pilots are equipped with ammunition that can puncture the fuselage. I assumed they were all issued frangible bullets.
I don't believe the assumption is that because pilots are skilled at their profession that they will have James Bond's shooting skills.....I believe the assumption is the pilot is better able to defend himself (thus the lives of those under his professional care)if he has a weapon.
Such an accidental discharge is extremely unfortunate and frightening.....but the simple truth is that gun will beat box-cutter pretty much every time.
I know several pilots who are trained and carry in the cockpit, and feel much safer every time I fly knowing that there is a good chance that if the shit hits the fan, there's a pilot who can defend himself with more than a fire axe.
Also, I won't ever sit in the front 2 rows of first class :-p
As far as Fitchburg's comment of "Hopefully someone will be able to explain why pilots are equipped with ammunition that can puncture the fuselage. I assumed they were all issued frangible bullets." goes: the Air Marshals are armed with frangible rounds to protect the other passengers. A bullet through the fuselage or even a window isn't enough to cause explosive decompression, even several holes in the fuselage isn't enough.
Just because a person can fly a jumbo jet doesn't mean they have any real intelligence in many other areas of their lives. Having that skill doesn't keep you from being a clueless schmuck.
Seems like this gun never should have been unholstered.
On a side note, DC has (or had, not sure what the current status is) a handgun ban. Are/were pilots allowed to fly into DC with handguns? Any pilots out there who can comment?
Sincerely,
Gun owner
When I first read the Mike Boyd quote a day or two ago ("if somebody who has the ability to fly a 747 across the Pacific wants a gun, you give it to them") my immediate thought was that the 9/11 hijackers were in fact trained pilots who could probably do that (mostly automated) task quite easily. There are so many flaws in the logic besides just the intransitivity of trust, I have to wonder if Boyd is just being stupid, or seeing how far he can take his audience.
Another great example of transitive trust gone wrong: The Airborne vitamin supplements (which claim to prevent jetlag and illnesses, and recently finished a class-action lawsuit) proudly exclaim "Made by a Schoolteacher!" Just because I trust her to teach children the alphabet doesn't mean I trust her to make pseudo-medical supplements.
@PukeBazooka
Flying in DC is even more illegal than owning guns in DC, so I reckon it's a moot point. The closest airport to DC is across the river in VA.
@#6 -
None of the "DC" airports are actually within the city limits of the District of Columbia, PB, so I doubt that it's really a problem.
The MASSIVE flaw in Mr. Biddle's argument is the incorrect assumption that firearm carrying pilots are not trained in the use of their weapons, and, specifically, in the use of a weapon on an aircraft (which, as you can easily deduce, involves a few, er, additional considerations... like, for instance, don't shoot the damn plane.) They are trained.
Now, obviously this gent screwed up, and/or the training he got didn't serve it's function. But, we don't let pilots cary guns just because they are pilots, we let them carry guns because we trained them to carry guns in the cockpit.
"Trust isn't transitive" should be a bumper sticker. I'd put it on my car!
Can someone 'splain me whether the pilot had been through the training program? The article talks about the pilot and the response to the accident, then quotes a gun guy who's shaking his head, then veers off into a discussion about how there are full training courses all the time, but that transportation and lodging isn't paid for, which is why some pilots eschew the training.
The article seems to imply by this that the pilot didn't go through training, but was given a gun anyway.
Did I miss something?
BTPEARCY - I never said they weren't trained.
In my blog I said that the firearms training they have is probably less then 5% of what they have in training to fly a jet.
If you are into gun-training then you know that they probably took 5 days of classes, if that. You also know that there probably was no stringent test at the end of the class, the class was merely pass/fail where fail would mean very bad behavior and pass meant that you could mostly hit the paper at 30 feet and the instructors didn't feel the urge to hide whenever you drew.
Compare that to how many hours are required before you are allowed to just fire up the engines in a jet, no less take off.
When pilots have enough training to make them provably as safe and competent with firearms as they are with planes, then I might trust them as much with guns as I trust them with planes...
trust is not transitive. Therefore, any person who previously has led a blameless life should not be trusted to not hijack an aircraft.
As to arming overpaid, over-sexed bus drivers: no.
I think it's kind of obvious that you shouldn't trust a person to wield a firearm just because they are a pilot, but I don't think anyone was saying that to begin with. In order to carry in the cockpit you have to go through a bit more than just signing up for it, I would imagine.
As a gun owner and a pilot I can say that the legal requirements to have a gun at home are about nil compared to those you need to meet to fly a commercial aircraft. Now as far as what training you need to carry in the cockpit I do not know.
Who do you trust, ever? Good luck answering that one. The world of literature and stage drama is overflowing with stories of misplaced trust, of violation of trust, of why we need to trust but can't.
When you live in a society where the govenment expects to be trusted, but by its actions demonstrates a complete lack of reciprocal trust for those it governs, then it should be no surprise when that government fails to provide evidence to prove its trust-worthiness. Even when the public demands such. And here we are.
If they have a locked cockpit, there's no reason they shouldn't carry their guns with an empty chamber. That would make accidental discharge impossible.
Of course a properly handled firearm with a round in the chamber should also not accidentally discharge. The pilot did something stupid.
C'mon - what kind of training do you need to have to have to learn to put on the safety?
This is the first thing you learn when you are given a gun to hold - I learned it when I was like, eight years old (yes, I'm from Michigan...)
Given the number of stupid (but mostly innocuous) goof ups I've witnessed pilots make over the years, I'd chalk it up to this particular pilot's random incompetence, and nothing more.
What a great line--"trust isn't transitive."
As someone who makes a living writing and teaching about trust, I'm jealous--wish I'd thought of it!
It's exactly right. It's the same reason that the value of a social network liked LinkedIn drops off radically past one degree of separation.
It's the same reason I might buy an expensive instrument or piece of art on eBay after scanning "trust ratings," but I sure as heck wouldn't introduce someone to my daughter on the same basis.
It's the same reason I might tell my current problems to a seatmate on a plane who I'll never see again, but not to a business acquaintance. Whereas I might lend money to a business acquaintance, but not to a seatmate on a plane whom I'll never see again.
Trust, like many things human, is indeed not transitive. The decay rate of trust declines considerably as you change the venue of the original trust relationship. Guns just amplify the gravity of the issue at hand.
In fact, trust can't exist without risk. It's precisely the risk we take when we say, "Well, he does pretty well with a 747--maybe I can trust him with a gun?" Well, probably you can--but it ain't guaranteed.
Ronald Reagan lied when he said "trust but verify, " because if you have to verify, it ain't trust. But in this case, his advice would have been right--a whole lot of verification should be required of someone with a gun in a plane, verification that consists of things a lot closer than the ability to fly a large plane.
So you are saying that I should not trust some guy to be able to handle a shotgun just because I trust him to be Vice President? Oh wait, bad example, never mind.
I believe what that Mike Boyd meant to say was that it is pointless to prevent pilots (those with permission to carry) from carrying their guns in cockpit, because if a pilot is set out to commit an act of terror, he won't use his gun; the 747 he conrols is much better for that purpose.
Indeed, while I can see the need to allow pilots to carry guns, I don't think it should be mandatory. And the training/screening to allow one to do so should be more strict rather than less so of a normal citizen just because it means one more gun on the plane.
But considering how many pilots have guns and how long they've been carrying them, it's not that mind blowing that a stupid accident like this will happen once in a while.
Of course, no one actually RTFA... :-(
- The pilot was trained
- The news article specified that a weapon was discharged in the cockpit, but DID NOT say that a bullet made a hole in the plane. In fact, they specifically mention that (erroneously I think):
What I find most interesting is that the pilots must take a psychological test before being allowed to carry a firearm while flying their huge flying bomb...
Good story, good discussion. But the first thing I thought when I read "trust is not transitive" was a whole other meaning. Wouldn't this mean "Even if I trust Bob and Bob trusts Carol, I shouldn't necessarily trust Carol"? A whole other topic to discuss.
I don't know if there's a better way to express Peter Biddle's (valid) point. Maybe "Trust isn't transferable"? That's not quite right either...
BTW, my favorite of Mr. Biddle's scenarios for what actually happened:
Maturin @#3:
".....but the simple truth is that gun will beat box-cutter pretty much every time."
Absolutely not.
I have just walked up behind you and used one swipe of my box-cutter to open your carotid artery from your ear down to your clavicle. You didn't even draw your gun because you blacked out immediately, before you could have known what was happening.
And now I have a gun!
That's yet another reason why firearms on planes is wrong.
Won't the policy of giving pilots guns work out to be statistically similar to what goes on with private citizens and their guns, that accidents and incidents of criminals using the guns against their owners are much more common than owners actually defending themselves with their guns?
Not always safe to think that pilots are the smartest peas in the pod. I knew a guy who had been flying for a major US carrier for 12 years and actually thought that Thailand was where the people spoke Taiwanese. True story.
The Unusual Suspect. If we are to presume that protecting the pilot is a logical course of action, then what should we protect him/her with? Or do we just say that they are as safe as possible while locked in the cockpit? Are new planes designed with toilets in the cockpit?
You're right. Trust isn't transitive. Just because a government bureaucracy can design a set of security procedures that's remarkably effective at preventing people from boarding planes with too-large a bottle of shampoo, that doesn't mean it can design a procedure for pilot CCW that makes a damned bit of sense.
http://www.crimefilenews.com/2008/03/gun-accident-in-airliner-cockpit-was.html
Take a look at that. That's the "holster lock" the TSA requires pilots to attach to their weapon whenever they enter the cockpit. This is a weapon-retention system that *requires* the user to finger-diddle the trigger of a loaded weapon every time he uses it.
The pilot still NDed. But he NDed because he had to monkey around with this ridiculous and unsafe system that the TSA requires him to use.
Shooting ability aside, there is a deterrent effect to arming pilots. This is a positive.
Re: #28 RaisedByWolves
I certainly can't imagine that I'd choose to fight a guy with a gun over a guy without one. Would you?
Can you find me one - JUST ONE - experienced criminal who would prefer to attack an armed person over an unarmed person? You'd think that if armed people are so vulnerable to super-criminal-anti-gun-fu, they'd be chomping at the bit to take on people carrying guns.
Re: #28 Ken Hansen
You state:
"the pilot in question participated in training to learn the proper handling of a firearm in an airplane (and, one can only assume, other contexts). The fact that he was a pilot didn't qualify him to carry the hand gun, his successful completion of the training program did"
This presumes that the firearms training is sufficient. I posit that you are probably basing this on the hope that it's sufficient, rather than fact. You HOPE that the training qualified him.
I think that his firearms training is most likely a rounding error when compared to the training which qualified him to fly.
The obvious solution is that everyone one the plane must be armed at all times. Only then will we ever be truly safe. Why oh why can't the sheeple see this simple fact? It is central to my point.
the Archie Bunker solution
Another interesting thing here, as knifie_sp00nie mentions, is that it is very unlikely that this was an accidental discharge. Anyone who owns an HK handgun (I own two,) can tell you that these are professional caliber weapons that do not discharge by themselves. They incorporate multiple physical design elements that make almost physically impossible to discharge a gun like this without actually pulling the trigger. According to some reports, this particular unit had the Law Enforcement Modification trigger setup, which means there is no separate safety switch.
(http://expressingopinions.com/2008/03/24/pilot-fires-pistol-in-cockpit/)
However, it still requires manual and complete actuation of the trigger to release the hammer. Standard HK pistol testing includes repeated drop tests from 6 feet, hammer first, onto a concrete slab, and other ANSI standard tests to ensure that the unit cannot discharge by being dropped.
Let me quote knifie_sp00nie: "The pilot did something stupid." And the idea that US Airways thinks it can withhold the details of the incident from the public is outrageous. They may be a private company, but they operate as a public trust and should be subject to extreme scrutiny in matters regarding passenger safety.
same way shampoo MIGHT blow up the plane, guns on board are an added, unnecessary risk.
Frijole, thanks for the info.
Ummm...no.
Having his finger on the trigger was his biggest mistake. Well, actually, it looks like he broke all four of the rules of firearm safety. So take your pick as to which one was the biggest mistake, but all four should not have been broken.
Notice that safety manipulation is not on the list. The only safety that really counts is the one between your ears. If that one is off, then the others don't matter. And likewise, if that one is on, then the others also don't really matter.
"RULE I: ALL GUNS ARE ALWAYS LOADED
RULE II: NEVER LET THE MUZZLE COVER ANYTHING YOU ARE NOT WILLING TO KILL OR DESTROY
RULE III: KEEP YOUR FINGER OFF THE TRIGGER UNTIL YOU’RE READY TO SHOOT
RULE IV: BE SURE OF YOUR TARGET AND WHAT’S BEHIND IT"
I'm pretty sure he violated #1, else why would he have pulled the trigger?
#2 is tough to follow sometimes. For example if in a plane and he draws his weapon, I'm sure at some point the muzzle will be pointed at the floor of the cockpit, and also might temporarily be pointed at some fairly important equipment. This is okay if you are good on all the other three rules. But he definitely violated rule #3 by having his finger on the trigger. (if he didn't then the gun would not have gone bang)
#4 was broken for sure. He had no idea what was behind his target. No one knows where his bullet landed, but it hit the ground somewhere over Charlotte, so he'd luck it didn't hit anyone.
My understanding is that airline pilots who are armed are only allowed to carry 40S&W H&K USP pistols. These are very safe pistols. I am not sure what configuration they are allowed to carry, they're available in Single Action/Double Action, and Double Action Only. In Double Action mode the trigger pull is very heavy and gritty. Not something you do accidentally. Even the Single Action trigger is heavy, but not as heavy as DA, and still not light enough to go off on it's own. It requires manipulation of the trigger to go bang.
The plane was on approach to Charlotte when he fired his pistol. What the hell was he doing fiddling with this pistol then? Isn't that an important time to be umm...flying the damn plane? What was the pistol doing out of it's box? Are they required to take it out during flight then put it back on approach? That seems odd. I'd think they'd be required to just leave it alone unless it's needed.
One of my uncles taught pilots for 20 years. He has tons of stories of pilots being all arrogant and assuming that because they are pilots, which are of course, God's gift to the rest of the world, then they can do whatever. The AP article linked said that of 10,000 people that had been trained to carry in the cockpit this is the first Negligent Discharge, so that's probably a pretty good indicator that their training is decent. Most likely this was just an arrogant pilot who thought he could get away with ignoring the safety rules because, well, why couldn't he? Hopefully this will be a wake up call to any others who felt this way.
Really? Still? With all the new crazy-ass TSA regulations?
America had some of the the laxest boarding procedures in the first world before 9/11, now they have some of the tightest. And you still don't guarantee there is no guns?
When is the last time (in the current climate) that a gun was found on board a US plane? I almost can't fathom a gun being found on a plane in Europe (not to set US against Europe, just that's my main experience).
And how often do you think this actually happens? Are you talking day-to-day probability, or universal (the-whale-could-turn-into-a-pot-plant) probability? Because one is useful and the other is just pandering to mythological-grade chance.
I'm genuinely not refuting your claim, I just would like it qualified.
My understanding is that pilots with guns are not really a case of transitive trust. We are trusting them with the plane. They are allowed a firearm because the main thing to secure (i.e. the plane, flying bomb, etc...), they already control.
Now it could be argued that a crazy pilot with a gun could more easily take over plane from the rest of the crew than an unarmed pilot. It's also possible that a large number of armed pilots actually adds a greater risk to people due to accidents than any reduction of risk provide by their presence (e.g. very low chance of destructive hijacking and an armed pilot would not necessarily stop a hijacking). I doubt anyone really has accurate figures for the risks though.
As several other posters have pointed out, "trust isn't transitive" sounds snappy but implies that it's related to social networks (if I trust A and A trusts B, should I trust B?). Which is misleading in this context.
(Oh, and by the way, algorithms such as PageRank are based on the notion that trust is at least somewhat transitive in the above sense. Otherwise you'd just count in-links.)
A more appropriate phrase (speaking as someone who's done a bit of research in reputation systems) would be
Trust is domain-specific.
(Which is an oversimplification, because trust in some domains does bleed over into some other domains...but it's a reasonable starting point.)
People are forgetting that the plane landed safely with all its passengers. People are only frightened because of the prospect that it could have been worse.
Or, people are only frightened because all the local news channels are interviewing everyone they can find, whether they have any expertise in the matter or not, and airing the ones who are most alarmed, above a caption that says "AIRLINE PASSENGER".
#8 and #9 -- thanks for the answer. I knew that Dulles is quite a ways outside of DC but didn't know that the other airport was outside city limits as well. Makes sense now that I think about it; there's not really any suitable location in DC proper. Thanks for entertaining my silly question.
Um.
Trust isn't what determines whether you get to carry a gun or not.
That is all; carry on.
what does?
Did you see a snake? I dunno, I thot I thaw a snake!
http://www.dba-oracle.com/images/barney_fife.jpg
#43 JRTOM - From American heritage dictionary:
"Of or relating to a relationship between three elements such that if the relationship holds between the first and second elements and between the second and third elements, it necessarily holds between the first and third elements."
The relationship is trust, and the elements are roles. The elements are:
me as a passenger
pilot as a pilot
pilot as a shooter
Clearly an upgrade from NT server to 2003 is in order. (Sorry...Windows humor...I know.)
The primary problem here is the TSA policy regarding the pilots' guns. They used to require a big heavy safe in the cockpit to store the guns, but that took too much space. Now they require a -combination trigger lock- that has to be installed whenever the pilot is outside the cockpit, and deinstalled in the cockpit--meaning the pilot is sticking something through the trigger guard every time he enters or leaves the cockpit. And they're surprised when there's an accidental discharge?
Jeff @#30:
"The Unusual Suspect. If we are to presume that protecting the pilot is a logical course of action, then what should we protect him/her with?"
We protect the pilot, the rest of the flight crew and passengers with group action, specifically, everybody getting up out of their seats and beating the living crap out of the hijacker.
This is what ALMOST happened September 11, 2001 on United Airlines Flight 93 when the flight crew and passengers fought the hijackers to regain control of the plane. Unfortunately for them, they had learned too late that what they were experiencing was a suicide attack, not a simple hijacking.
This is exactly what happened December 22, 2001 on American Airlines Flight 63 when Richard Reid was caught lighting explosives built into his shoes. He was jumped by other passengers and flight crew who used plastic handcuffs, seatbelt extensions, headphone cords and a syringe full of Valium to subdue him.
You can be sure that this will be the immediate response to any hijacking attempts in the foreseeable future.
As previous posters have pointed out, this is not about transitivity. Transitivity is when A (rel) B and B (rel) C implies A (rel) C. In this case, (rel) would be trust. So when we're talking about transitive trust, that would be: Alice trusts Bob, Bob trusts Carol, does that mean that Alice trusts Carol?
On the other hand, there is no way to substitute "Us" "Pilots" "trust to fly planes" and "trust to carry guns" into the above. We trust pilots to fly planes. This would suggest A=We, B=Pilots, and (rel)=trust to fly planes. But then there's no way to do the B (rel) C part, since that would be "Pilots trust ?? to fly planes". Obviously we can't put "trust to carry guns" into that sentence sensibly ("Pilots trust guns to fly planes","Pilots trust their trust in guns to fly planes"?).
Instead, what we have here are two relations. So really what we're saying is that A (rel1) B does not imply A (rel2) B. In this case, We trust pilots to fly planes does not imply we trust pilots to carry guns. A=us, B=pilots, (rel1)=trust to fly planes, (rel2)=trust to carry guns. So really, the point which is being made is that (rel1) != (rel2), i.e. trust is domain-specific, and the existence of one type of trust relationship does not imply the existence of another type of trust relationship. This is a good point and less obvious than it seems in this framework, since people do often expect trust to be domain-specific, however, it is not transitivity.
Trust should definitely be considered domain-specific. Trusting your friend to keep your secret should not imply trusting you friend to do heart surgery.
A minister who spoke to our congregation recently described trust as having three components: caring, commitment, and competency. Caring is how much the other person cares about you. Commitment is how committed they are to your well being. And competency is how able you believe they are. Caring and commitment are not necessarily domain-specific, but competency clearly is.
If #52 is correct, and pilots are required to manipulate trigger locks on loaded guns in the cockpit, that is fucked up.
I have long been an anti-advocate (that does not sound right) of trigger locks. They are, by design, unsafe since you're manipulating the trigger on a loaded firearm! Why people think this is ok is beyond me.
Alternative ending:
...the bullet proceeded to travel through vital control mechanisms that caused the jumbo jet to lose control and slam into the Sears tower, causing it to collapse and kill about 3000 people.
just what is the pilot supposed to DO with this gun anyway? Realize a hijacker is breaking in to the cockpit (through the tissue paper "reinforced" door, drop flying the plane, get the gun out, take off the lock, cock it and ?
Even he had it pointed at the door ready to go and let the copilot fly the plane, it's still bullshit.
Seems that #52 is correct.
http://www.crimefilenews.com/2007/12/tsa-arrogance-threatens-safety-of-air.html
Here's a picture of the holster/padlock combo the pilots are required to use. It's a Galco "Holster Vault". That is messed up to require manipulating a combination lock on a live firearm, while in flight! It's an accident waiting to happen. Oppps. Guess it just did.
Oh, and critic or opponent are what I was looking for above. ugh. Looong day, had a brain fart.
that's not a holster, it's a bondage toy!
even the most fat,out of shape pilot only needs this:
http://mel.icious.net/i/tanto.jpg
Some people seem to be misunderstanding what Biddle means by "transitive." It doesn't mean trust being applied to different people, but to different actions/activities performed by the same person.
Meaning:
Transitive:
We trust (a) to do (x), so we trust (a) to do (y).
Non-transitive:
We trust (a) to do (x), but have no idea whether or not to trust (a) to do (y).
"trust isn't transitive"? I understand it, but my vocabulary's above average. Better to be clear, like Orwell said. More like "Expertise in one area doesn't guarantee it in another." Or "Outside of your area of expertise, you're no smarter than the average". Or something pithier.
cgreen23 wrote, 'Ronald Reagan lied when he said "trust but verify, " because if you have to verify, it ain't trust.'
He used that phrase precisely because it was an old Russian saying and the Russians would, unlike cgreen23, understand what he meant. http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Russian_proverbs
Guess it was just another one of them Russkie lies. So argue with the old Russians.
Cowicide @#56 wrote:
"Alternative ending:
...the bullet proceeded to travel through vital control mechanisms that caused the jumbo jet to lose control and slam into the Sears tower, causing it to collapse and kill about 3000 people."
Later that same day, President Bush, vowing to "stop the terrorists once and for all", declared martial law in the United States and went on to serve two more "extra-Constitutional" terms as "the Wartime President".
When the nascent Republican States of America declared war on Quebec in 2015, Canada sued for peace, only to have Ottawa occupied by Blackwater troops under contract to the R.S.A. Anti-Terrorism Command.
Effectively gaining control of Canadian oil helped delay the collapse of the American dollar until 2017.
---
Anyone else...?