Sunday, March 14, 2010

It Pays to Draw Second

In gunfights, at least as portrayed in many Western films, the good guy character always waits that one split second to draw his iron, and ends up putting down the Black Bart bad guy character who drew his iron first.  Doesn’t seem realistic, does it?  Well it is.

If only everything in life was so simple. New research from the University of Birmingham suggests the best strategy may actually be to wait for the other guy to make his move.

In a series of “laboratory gunfights” - with pistols replaced by electronic pressure pads - researchers found that participants who reacted to their opponent’s movement were on average 21 milliseconds faster to the draw.

Not only this research supports the draw second conclusion.  Danish physicist Niels Bohr calculated on this, with the following conclusions.

It turns out that the celebrated Danish physicist and Nobel laureate, Niels Bohr, liked to take time off from figuring out the structure of the universe by watching westerns.

Bohr noticed that the man who drew first invariably got shot, and speculated that the intentional act of drawing and shooting was slower to execute than the action in response.

Here was a hypothesis that could be tested, and with the aid of cap guns hastily purchased in a Copenhagen toyshop, duly proved it.

In a series of mock gunfights with colleagues Bohr always drew second and always won.

The gunfighter’s dilemma

Linked via an Attack Cartoons titled Vente Grande Magnum.

Posted by John Venlet on 03/14 at 04:21 PM
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