| A good number of police officers, soldiers, and even | | | | However, it definitely unloads a lot of confusing |
| ordinary citizens carry legalized stun weapons to | | | | information into the assailant's nervous system. This |
| protect against personal attacks. It temporarily puts an | | | | causes two things to happen and one is the charge |
| assailant out of action without doing any enduring | | | | mingling with the neural impulses from the assailant's |
| damage. | | | | brain. Imagine running an external current into a phone |
| Here's how the weapon works: | | | | line. Random noise mixes with the original signal, |
| The human nervous system is composed of a | | | | creating static that garbles the messages. When these |
| network of nerve cells sending electric impulses | | | | communication lines go down, the assailant's brain has |
| toward muscles of any part of the body the person | | | | a hard time telling his muscles to move, and his senses |
| wants to move. When one wants to move his leg, a | | | | are baffled and placed out of balance. He, then, |
| command in the brain lets the electricity travel to the | | | | becomes partially immobilized. |
| muscle cells of the leg, making it move. In the case of | | | | The other thing that happens is, the current produced |
| the sensory nerve cells, sound vibrations are picked up | | | | may have the same pulse frequency as the body's |
| by the eardrum and are sent back to the brain through | | | | own electrical signals. In such cases, the current will |
| a network of nerves. The brain then interprets the | | | | make the assailant's body perform a great deal of |
| vibrations as a particular type of sound. This is how the | | | | work in a short amount of time. But remember, the |
| different parts of the body use electricity to send | | | | signal doesn't focus the work toward any single |
| messages to one another. Think of it as a telephone | | | | movement but only toward a series of jerks and |
| system. | | | | twitches. What it does is deplete the energy reserves |
| The concept of the stun gun is to disrupt the body's | | | | of the assailant. This would leave him too weak to |
| communication system. Stun guns can create a | | | | manage to move. |
| high-voltage, low-amperage electrical charge. In other | | | | This is how the stun gun works to incapacitate an |
| words, its like the charge has a lot of punch but is not | | | | assailant by applying an electrical charge on the |
| piercing the vital organs. The charge passes through | | | | muscles and nerves. And because there are muscles |
| the assailant's body but it is not intense enough to | | | | and nerves all over a human body, it doesn't really |
| damage his body unless it is applied for extended | | | | make a difference which body part you hit. |
| lengths of time. | | | | |