Bill Wilson and Ken Hackathon's Crystal Ball Predictions

[HCM]

This may be taking a direction I had not considered.

Am I seeing an argument take shape that while a more experienced iron sight shooter may find circumstances where they can "cheat" "steer" whatever irons faster than they can find a dot due to compromised index due to awkward postion, injury or whatever . . .


The "non gun" shooter using a dot, can "up from 6:00 or drop from 12:00" - to find their dot - then use the dot advantage as a sighting tool - better than they would be able to accomplish the same with irons and shoot within qualification standards in the case of LE organizations?


If I'm tracking with what I'm seeing in the last few pages then that might explain observations about adjusting a borked index with irons from experienced PF shooters and the emphatic endorsement of irons from institutional users.

Southnarc’s observation re: steering irons is accurate (at least for experienced irons shooters) but context determines if it is a feature or a bug.

Peripheral” vision is not just on the left and right, we also have upper and lower peripheral vision.

Many experienced irons shooters do not realize how much they “steer” the sights in their lower peripheral vision as the present the gun during a “normal” presentation and how much of what they think is their index is actually steering via their lower peripheral vision. They’re subconsciously seeing the top of the gun in their lower peripheral and starting to align the front and rear sights from the top view.

These are the same shooters who have issues “finding the dot” when they try optics without any formal instruction.

These are also the same shooters who, if they persist or take the shortcut of formal instruction in use of the dot to the point they start consistently seeing the dot during normal presentations, suddenly find their irons only presentations are now noticeably faster and more consistent than they were before.

In awkward positions lower peripheral steering can be a feature but in most circumstances it’s a bug. During normal presentations it’s inefficient and slow.

“Good” irons shooters who already have a good index have minimal issues finding the dot during normal presentations. Some of the poo-pooing of dots is from people whose ego is bruised when they learn their index is not as good as they thought it was. IME there is often a correlation between those who poo-poo dots and those who poo-poo timers.

It would be interesting to do an experiment and see if optics with an alignment aid visible from the top, like a paint marker line or other feature aided in lower peripheral steering in awkward positions. My own favorite pistol optic, the SRO has such a line built into the top of the housing and marking such lines on top of RMRs and DPPs was common in the early days of dot use.

Also what effect do BUIS (or lack there of) have in the same circumstances?

[Noah]

I'm kind of in the "good irons with good technique are not actually the one sided disadvantage the Instagram shooters would have you believe" camp.

That said, an observation about non shooters. My brother's wife, when he taught her to shoot, found the very concept of getting a sight picture with irons unintuitive and from day 1 has basically refused iron sight pistols as an ancient irrelevance and used dot pistols. Due to a vision issue, my brother basically feels the same way.

For people who didn't grow up shooting BB guns at age 5 in the 20th century or playing Call of Duty seeing sight pictures since age 8 in the 21st century, using iron sights at all can seem very difficult compared to "put the dot on the spot you want to hit". As prior posters noted, getting the dot in the window seems like a problem for long time, skilled iron sight shooters like Ken who are immediately wincing at the tenths they are losing, and not wanting the "square 1" of learning a tighter index. I hadn't considered that new shooters might almost have an easier time learning that index from the start.

Just an anecdote.

[HCM]

I'm kind of in the "good irons with good technique are not actually the one sided disadvantage the Instagram shooters would have you believe" camp.

That said, an observation about non shooters. My brother's wife, when he taught her to shoot, found the very concept of getting a sight picture with irons unintuitive and from day 1 has basically refused iron sight pistols as an ancient irrelevance and used dot pistols. Due to a vision issue, my brother basically feels the same way.

For people who didn't grow up shooting BB guns at age 5 in the 20th century or playing Call of Duty seeing sight pictures since age 8 in the 21st century, using iron sights at all can seem very difficult compared to "put the dot on the spot you want to hit". As prior posters noted, getting the dot in the window seems like a problem for long time, skilled iron sight shooters like Ken who are immediately wincing at the tenths they are losing, and not wanting the "square 1" of learning a tighter index. I hadn't considered that new shooters might almost have an easier time learning that index from the start.

Just an anecdote.

You’re on to something.

There is a whole argument that humans intuitively solved almost every other projectile problem (throwing rocks, spears, shooting arrows etc) via target focus.

Iron sight alignment and shot calling I.e. “reading” what the gun is doing with irons is a learned skill set.

Trying to learn this skill at the same time one is also trying to learn the other aspects of shooting such as grip, trigger control etc without fully understanding the feedback from the irons about what the gun is doing is challenging.

It’s like trying to learn a foreign language at the same time you’re trying to learn math and science being taught in that foreign language without being fluent in that language.

This is why we see shooters who start on dots, (which provide much more/clearer feed back on what the gun is doing) then layer irons on top as an additional skill set do better, faster with both dots AND irons than those who learn via the opposite process.

People who find irons completely “unintuitive” are a thing.

One of the more interesting results of our organization’s transition to dots has been that some of the biggest “success” stories with dots have been people who not only were “not gun people” but who found irons so “unintuitive” they failed to qualify with irons and required remedial training just to barely pass every quarter. These same people are now consistently shooting 95-100% on the qual with the dot without any additional training.

[Noah]

@HCM , I think we're seeing that for people with a long history with irons like Ken, or me, where irons just do feel extremely "natural" and shifting and varying focus and confirmation and shot calling with irons comes easily to me, it's really hard to recognize how unnatural they are to others.

The data on new shooters you're bringing, speaks.

[SouthNarc]

Many experienced irons shooters do not realize how much they “steer” the sights in their lower peripheral vision as the present the gun during a “normal” presentation and how much of what they think is their index is actually steering via their lower peripheral vision. They’re subconsciously seeing the top of the gun in their lower peripheral and starting to align the front and rear sights from the top view.

So as an interesting aside for a completely different gun topic, this very issue was my argument against below eye-line, FAS style point shooting with all those weirdos in the 2000s, who insisted that there was zero visual referencing of the gun in what they were doing, particularly the 1/4 and 1/2 hip positions. I always wanted to do an experiment with those guys where they wore something like a doggy chew cone around their neck that completely obscured their vision from the chin down, shoot those same positions and see if the results changed.

Even Bill Jordan allegedly glanced down at his revolver for a split second according to some old timers.

Super interesting to see this manifest in a completely different training topic.

[YVK]

It must be scary to be an instructor that has been teaching iron sights for decades, and then have this new technology come around that you are back at square one with. You can fight it or embrace it.

Like in any field where new tech becomes a practice standard. There is now a pretty old study where medical students armed with handheld echo devices outperformed experienced cardiologists armed with legacy stethoscopes at bedside evals.

[Clusterfrack]

It must be scary to be an instructor that has been teaching iron sights for decades, and then have this new technology come around that you are back at square one with. You can fight it or embrace it.

I'm not a professional firearms instructor, but I am a professional instructor in another field. I like the motto "always a student" and try to embrace a growth mindset. Because knowledge evolves, instructors who don't keep learning get left behind and become irrelevant.

[Archer1440]

I'm not a professional firearms instructor, but I am a professional instructor in another field. I like the motto "always a student" and try to embrace a growth mindset. Because knowledge evolves, instructors who don't keep learning get left behind and become irrelevant.

It’s a common thread with all good instructors – their knowledge is always evolving.

[Trooper224]

I'm not a professional firearms instructor, but I am a professional instructor in another field. I like the motto "always a student" and try to embrace a growth mindset. Because knowledge evolves, instructors who don't keep learning get left behind and become irrelevant.

I have much respect for Ken and his contributions to pistol craft. But, since he's been doing these Wilson videos, it's become painfully obvious he's no longer a student.

[GJM]

I have much respect for Ken and his contributions to pistol craft. But, since he's been doing these Wilson videos, it's become painfully obvious he's no longer a student.

The student/instructor thing is very interesting. When people post on PF, and elsewhere, are they wearing the shoes of instructor or student?