Literally magic. The Indian god Ganesha for example has a head of an elephant and we humans are doing something similar.
What an amazing species we are when we are doing something positive.
From what I’ve read, it is that these patients are too far along for much hope of anything. I’d certainly like to go out adding to the hope that future patients don’t have to suffer the same fate.
Ideally in the long run, this is a step in the direction of keeping people alive with a higher quality of life, but that's unlikely to be this first person's experience.
Plus, if the suffering experienced by this patient helps cause someone else (or many someones else for centuries to come) to have a higher quality of life, one person's suffering can buy a lot of QALYs.
Alternatively if as my mother tells me, I'm doomed to an eternity of unimaginable physical and psychological torture by supernaturally powerful fallen angelic beings with complete control of my entire sensorium, even a few more minutes of being hooked up to a hospital bed with doctors trying to make things better are preferable to that!
Unequivocally yes. I think you are drastically underestimating how bad a life can get.
> Plus, if the suffering experienced by this patient helps cause someone else (or many someones else for centuries to come) to have a higher quality of life, one person's suffering can buy a lot of QALYs.
Exactly, that's why I'm arguing that this person's choice is brave.
In my opinion having had a firsthand view of what life with major illness, disability, and suffering can be like, absolutely yes.
For an excellent dive into this topic, I highly recommend the book Being Mortal by Atul Gawande.
As a general rule of thumb, trying to decide someone’s own stream of consciousness is assholeish behavior.
Nonetheless, I do generally agree with you. I've seen several articles about how doctors die very differently than most people (they often have DNRs and far fewer end-of-life interventions).
But individuals surely have the freedom to think like this and make decisions accordingly.
You're making a very big leap from "doctors should not be encouraging this" to "we should not allow doctors to encourage this".
And my comment likened both, so to suggest the intent of the word censoring is somehow different is semantic nitpicking rather than any productive discourse.
Why not? I could make an argument that cultural change happens through conversations like this, but honestly I think people are just intrinsically motivated to share their opinions whether it makes any difference or not.
> And my comment likened both, so to suggest the intent of the word censoring is somehow different is semantic nitpicking rather than any productive discourse.
The difference between censoring someone and disagreeing with their opinion is NOT a nitpicky detail. It's literally one of the major differences between totalitarianism and democracy.
The position that censorship is the only way to get people to stop saying things you disagree with, is an absurd, extremist position.
Human kidney transplants (both cadaveric and from a living donor) have been a common operation for many years.
I still think it counts as brave though, certainly not an easy choice.