75 replies to this topic

[Infernity]

[tung] great, but hey Jeff, would you also agree there is no 100% ? hahaha... That's what I say tho...

Yours truthfully
~Infernity

[FutureQ]

An autopsy cannot determine whether she was in a persistent vegetative state or not.

Some people argued that Schiavo was in a "minimally conscious state," a recently formulated condition defined as a notch above "persistent vegetative state." Both states, however, are diagnosed by examining a living patient. Neither can be confirmed with certainty on the basis of autopsy findings. ...Washington Post.

There you go again telling an untruth through cherry picking the facts and leaving out ever so conveniently that which doesn't exactly support your position. No an autopdsy in her particular case probably could not on its own merit alone make such a statement but you omitted the fact they had a plethora of evidence to consider with their findings taken from when she was breathing and the article I posted said they studied all of it so their judgement is based on the entirety not just the autopsy.

However, an autopspy of say an anenchephalic baby that was reported to have been breathing when birthed but died shortly afterward would I expect allow the pathologist to judge that the poor thing was PVS for it's brief period of inhalation.

You can't trust everything, probably very little in fact of what the Washington Post says anyway.

As to your heavilly skewed poll I already said it was too bias and had not enough choices. First and foremost even in the best of conditions and fully brain functional but for some set of circumstance constrained to the method of dehydration alone I still would not prefer it because of damage, that as I understand it, the method can cause to the brain. Do you see my point? How many of the responders were thinking of such and thus concerns aside from the narrow bias you tried to squish them into? The poll in my opinion on this merit alone is wholly invalid.

FQ

[FutureQ]

Perhaps true, but the claims of her family were still just wishful thinking. She was blind. She couldn't have been reacting to them. Her optic nerves were atrophied too much to be functional, from what I read.

Actually from what I read the entire region for sight in the back of the brain was gone. I didn't see optic nerve mentioned but that could be my mistake. Either way she couldn't see had not the brain aparatus to see with so her parents unfortunately let wishful thinking and yes love skew their opinion. Too bad their love couldn't extend to the man that loved her also.

I can't help contemplate how a little medical ignorance and useless piouty combined to destroy a family's relationships and foment so much personal animosity and hatred. This is wholly an understatement when we then consider how the whole country got invovlved, dragged into it, and the damage that has and will continue to do to our courts if the facists are not booted out damned soon.

Chip you are spot on man.

I hope everyone has by now heard of the "Downing Street Memos [minutes]" Can we say Impeachement?

FQ

P.S. I wish to further point out that however we here disagree on the finer details of one tiny part of a micro particiiple of some corner of life we all have commonalties that bind us and bring us into fellowship here. So I just want to say that though my tones can be hoity toity or brassy or skewering or not all of these depending, I nevertheless hold no dislike of those with which I here debate. I'd sure sooner call you friend, Harold, than 99.9999 % of all other people on this planet. This of course goes for all the rest of you mugs too.

[FutureQ]

Thanks FutureQ.  I see your P.S. and understand.  It is interesting and perplexing.  Here is another of the extensions of this media opportunism case about a brain dead person, and yet, in a very real sense, the brain dead are walking and talking and staging media circuses ad infinitum. 

I see many as diseased in a psychological sense. ......

[snipped for sake of bandwidth retention - err space saved on our server ]

All well said and well observed. I have only one critique, while the footmen, the pions, the grunts or everyday joes and janes of various fundamentalist and whathaveyou orgs/factions that are today all vying for power over our minds, might not themselves individually be inherrently evil and are just reacting within their narrow scope of ignorance, I personally believe the task masters, the big moneyed moguls using those pions are evil. They are the ones that have no love for life especially the lives of others and the only things they love are power, money, greed and more power. These things alone seemingly trip their triggers, drive their modus operandi. These would be the people behind the media, or shall we say "Mass Meme Generation Systems" those that have bought it as you say of course.

One question. While I see the clear motives of the big shots very easilly what is in it for the pions? Is the drive to fundamentalism simply futureshock?

Have you seen Karen Yurica's treatises on the Dominionists?

FQ

[FutureQ]

I will go look for Yurica's treatises.  Thanks.

Too bushed j/k for now to fully reply, going to get some shut eye but...
Here is a head start on Yurica:


http://www.yuricarep...ngOfAmerica.htm

http://www.yuricarep...torationAct.htm

http://www.yuricarep..... Excerpts.htm

and more

http://www.fromthewi...01_carlyle.html

the secret plans

http://www.insider-m...istianMafia.htm

how to steal a presidency

http://marc.perkel.c...ves/000690.html

the ultimate goal

http://www.monbiot.c...calypse-please/

On this last one a fellow just could not believe it that Texas *State* Legislature would actually do as this article says so he and I spent the evening trzcking iit dwn and it was true to our horror! You'll see whast I mean..

I'd say have fun but ther'e nothing fun about this.

FQ

[Clifford Greenblatt]

She was probably given morphine to appease those who thought she was minimally conscious, as unlikely as that was.

Why would this appease them more than lethal injection, which would be more effective than morphine for preventing any possible pain? The U.S. Constitution permits condemned criminals to be put to death by lethal injection but not by starvation.

[Clifford Greenblatt]

I don't think euthanasia is legal in Florida, otherwise that option would likely be favoured over starvation.

Would it really have been euthansia if the court considered her legally dead? If the court did not consider her legally dead then how could it demand that she die?

[FutureQ]

She was probably given morphine to appease those who thought she was minimally conscious, as unlikely as that was.

Why would this appease them more than lethal injection, which would be more effective than morphine for preventing any possible pain? The U.S. Constitution permits condemned criminals to be put to death by lethal injection but not by starvation.

Appease whom? I think perhaps you don't grasp fully the nature of all the characters in this particular passion play. The parents of the girl Terri and their backers surely would not be appeased by lethal injection they did not want her to cease breathing in the first place. I use the term cease breathing for obvious reasons. If they aren't obvious to you then you should study the situation more. When you do you'll realize your query is a non sequitor. Those recognizing the true nature of her situation needed no appeasing but went along as we all will do and do all the time when surrounded by the demon haunted that seem so terribly to need their minds swabbed with loads of sauve to insulate them from reality.

FQ

[FutureQ]

Aiyee!  I've been pretty busy today but have read the one on the election fraud and the Texas legislature sheenanigans.  That was an eye opener.  Been following the very convincing evidence of the rigged election as it has been reported by Brad and via Bev. Harris et al including the replete statistical analysis of the exit polls, that were off as much as the Ukraine exit polls that Bush used as an excuse to call for a repeat vote there.  I've read half way through the first link you gave and am extremely impressed by the thoroughness and quality of the report.  It should be required reading for any so-called Christian.  I am somewhat aware of this insanity via online presented speeches of Bill Moyers but this article brings home to me just how entrenched this insanity is and it is frightening.  I have long held that paranoia now-a-days is a position of sanity and am further convinced.  Yes, nothing fun about this at all.

Thanks loads for the links.  I will be spending more time with them.  The new words and concepts for me are of great value.  Wish “supralapsarianism” ("It means essentially that the man called from before the foundation of the world to be one of the elect of God’s people, can do no wrong") had a shorter and more easily pronounced handle.  Maybe "unaccountable" for violent psychosis might equate but that is still kind of tongue twisting.  I'll probably get a better usable shareable equivalence after reading the article in full.

Us Homo saps are in one hell of a pickle.

Scary shit. huh? I purposely use the profanity *shit*.This is because we are in deep *shit* as in we are in it right now. There's no need to wait and see how more bad it will get if we all don't start putting the breaks on these people. I am concerned that too many in our ilk wish to not make enemies in that camp thinking we can stay under the radar. This is flawed because it is way way too late for that. We are smack dab on their radar.

The other excuse has been that traditional conservatives have been fiscal allies of Libertarian issues or so some think. I think this is a huge mistake because when it comes to the core value of libertarianism *freedom*, especially personal freedom, the namesake relatives, LIBerals have been and will continue to be the real allies of keeping government out of our private buisness especially how long we wish to live. Neo-Cons pay lip service to freedom by saying they are for smaller government but time and time again try to legislate morality and other social issues trying to push people to their fit of narrow conformity. What they really mean by small government is a Fascist Monarchy [Fascism = gov + corporation]. Most would find no trouble at all with some messianic business friendly leader being dictator for life if that meant all conservative social issues like abortion and such were followed straight down their church led line.

Moreover as Aubrey de Grey points out when SENS or whatever life extension paradigm hits the public consciousness when it is proved possible it will be governments that will be put upon to provide it so that it is provided uniformly and the governments traditionally so against government programs for anything won't be very fast at giving in to that.

I think the writing is well upon the wall. We Transhumanists need to make allies with the left and stay there. If the Xian right wingism can ever be extricated from control of the Republican party, which I highly doubt, then my words may prove false but I'm not too worried for that.

FQ

[FutureQ]

Hmm, after posting my last comments, methinks that we need to take this political discussion to a more politcal related forum and forum heading. Could any moderator watching please do so for us? You have permission to move my posts.

FQ

[Clifford Greenblatt]

From online Cambridge dictionary:

They removed a feeding tube.  They did not give her a lethal injection.  That was her choice as determined by the courts. 

Pope John Paul II refused medical treatment at the end of his life, but I am not aware that this included removal of all nutritional means.
If a condemned prisoner is kept in a cell without food, would this not be an act of killing?
I understand that there was a matter of Michael having to wait for Terri to be die before receiving $1M from her estate. Could he have not have avoided a costly legal battle by having the courts declare her legally dead so he could receive the money? He could have then turned Terri over to her parents who could have maintained her with their own funds. Why did he not care that losing Terri hurt them very deeply?

[Clifford Greenblatt]

The "jail cell" that Terry Schiavo was in was humanly impossible to remove.

Are you implying that Terri was in a sentient condition? Others in this thread argued that she was not. If she was not sentient the whole time she was being fed with the feeding tube then how was she in any sort of prison? Do you think Terri's parents were unwittingly subjecting Terri to torment by insisting that she be kept alive?

[Clifford Greenblatt]

Clifford.  I find you to be exhibiting a criminal anti-life immorality.

I am not pretending to know all of the facts of the case. My questions were for purposes of inquiry even if some implied assumptions in them may have been inaccurate. I did not say anything like "So and so is a murderer." This forum is not intended to be a battleground for personal attacks. If you disagree on an issue then please attack the idea, not the person.

[kevin]

hm... Chip... I realize that the topic of this discussion is perhaps closer to your heart than others, but try to relax a bit.

[tiktok]

If I were to go that route of being in an unrecoverable vegetative state, I would want my wife to decide over my parents. My wife knows me better. She loves me more. I trust her more.

Heh.. sure, but would you feel the same way if she was shacked up with someone else and was having kids to him?

[Clifford Greenblatt]

Against judicial interpretation of the law = criminal

Then Rosa Parks was a criminal until the law was changed.

Against self-determination, respect of a person's wishes that do not infringe upon your own or others = immoral

Then it is immoral to discipline a child for refusing to make a reasonable effort to live up to his potential as long as he could slide by in life without being a burden to others.

[Clifford Greenblatt]

At the end of the day, it is a true test of the love between husband and wife and whether it is "till death do us part" or "till PVS do us part". Where does one draw the line?

The tricky issue here is that Michael may have regarded Terri as being in a state equivalent to that of a person who would legally be regarded as brain dead. It is generally regarded as both legally and morally acceptable to remove organs from a brain dead person for transplant purposes and he would therefore, as far as he understood, would not be violating his wedding vows by taking another wife. He may have wanted to end Terri's biological existence because this was preventing him from making his marriage to his new wife legal.

Regarding Chip’s point about Terri being stuck in a prison against her will, I will assume Michael was truthful in saying that Terri did not want to be kept on life support under certain conditions. However, it is very difficult to say what conditions Terri had in mind. I will assume that Terri would have signed a living will if Michael had told her the benefits of doing so. Does a living will automatically mean no life support in every case of a PVS? Was Terri suffering, was she happy, or was she totally unconscious. Being blind and having a half size brain are not sufficient indicators. I heard a well known pastor speak about a child in his own congregation who was born with a 10% brain size but later became almost normal. Unlike many who are unconscious, she did move. I could believe that her intelligence could have been radically reduced, but even a person with the intelligence of a day old baby is worthy of life. She may not have been able to feed herself but other mental functions may have been in order. I will not pass judgement on the people involved in this case because I do not have sufficient knowledge to do so, but these are some interesting points to consider.

[FutureQ]

introducing a new consideration, that of the burden imposed by having a loved (or ex-loved) one in a state of PVS.

So people can love only one person at a time now? It's not possible at all to love both your invalid wife and a new girlfriend? That's news to me. That you guys think that one must suffer longly and not find something redeeming in the love of another while still loving the former is rather telling.

Regardless of the matter of love in the case Michael also knew a sense of duty. That sense of duty need not wane simply because one's relationship changes drastically. By analogy if one of you had a child that became PVS you should be sure to not have another for fear of being accused of not loving enough the first or else you should relinquish all sense of duty to the invalid child upon receiving another, yes?

So much one dimensional thinking going on here.

FQ

[FutureQ]

"till death do us part" or "till PVS do us part". Where does one draw the line?

Umm, there's a difference? See that's the point we've been getting at that you guys just don't get. Simply drawing breath IS NOT LIFE!

FQ

[FutureQ]

Simply drawing breath IS NOT LIFE!

It used to be that people were buried alive due to innapropriate diagnosis - so much so that a device was invented that enabled the buried person, if conciousness were regained, to pull a string from the buried coffin which would ring a bell above.

I have seen horrendous injuries arrive in the hospital - people with no face but a mash of gore, with brains exposed, with thoraxes split open. Yet each of them survived. The power of regeneration is remarkable and continues to suprise even the most venerable of medical professors. Who is to say what is possible whilst life - even if it is only a breath that serves 20% of the remaining brain tissue - still burns?

Who can unequivocally deny during the dawn of the age of stem cell medicine that in a patient with PVS, so long as some neurological substrate exists, cannot recover some semblance of identity once function has been restored in damaged regions? I cannot scientifically negate that possibility given that we do not yet know precisely where memories and personality are encoded. So long as the possibility remains that the encoding is redundant and diffuse across multiple regions in the brain it is conceivable that with the return of function that some identity will also be returned. More importantly is that with the return of function a person will exist - irrespective of the degree of amnesia and how much rehabilitation is required.

A person that can think and feel, and in time talk and lough and read this post and the posts before it.

Sure we're all here in this forum, well most of us, because we've seen the trends in mediciine and hold the wildest hope of eventually cheating death and stopping aging.

That does not mean we are foolish though. As to not knowing where permanent memory is stored. I'm sorry but you are mistaken. We know it is in the connections of neurons, not in the DNA as in some awful Sci-fi, not in the gut. It is in the brain the higher brain in fact and however redundant it may be the loss of so much brain material as Terri had lost must mean that the identity that was Terri Schiavo was gone. Replace every neuron, go ahead, what you have is a new person not Terri Schiavo. The entire life's recording that was Terry is unlikely to fit redundantly or not in what she had left as that was, as I understood it, not even higher brain cortex material. Do we keep personal identity memory in the limbic system, the lizard brain? I doubt it.

A new person that has become as the result of replacing dead brain material with new stem cells and regenerated the brain then retrained, is of no use to the original person whatsoever and that is what was of concern here, the original person's wishes.

If we had a punishment, like on Babylon 5, where people were mind wiped, would you think that was ok to happen to you because well, you'd still look like you but whomever resulted wouldn't know who you ever were? Do you think Terri Schiavo would have chosen such a fate?

FQ

[Clifford Greenblatt]

I personally know someone who was pronounced dead three times as a child. He is crippled but he can walk slowly on his own. He did suffer much brain damage but he knows people by name and can carry on meaningful conversations. From all my experience with him I have the impression that he is happy to be alive.

[susmariosep]

Here is my impression.


Chip sees many things in an issue that others don't or prefer not to.

A good thing and also not so good, because I from personal experience have time and again had to put a stop to seeing on and on and thus never starting anything and finishing it.

On the other hand, he does bring up a host of concerns which to my view are quite tied up with the premises of the poll, and which merit many separate threads to untangle and make determinations of choices.

This is the first of three threads brought forth by Chip in evidence of his charges against one Harold Brenner, aka Prometheus. I am now going to read the next thread he brought up.

Susma