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Comment by dataflow | Hacker News Reader

> No point staying alive if you're not healthy.

Maybe not for you, but others would beg to differ?

Darwin apparently had debilitating illnesses at 72 (one year before his death) when he published a book on earthworms and their role in forming soil. And Pasteur was apparently paralyzed at 63 when he developed the rabies vaccine. Etc.

Should they have just kicked the bucket when they lost their health, because of the pointlessness of living past that?

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That's an uncharitable reading of what I mean, but I suppose I could have been clearer. Perhaps "no point staying alive if you're so unhealthy that you're perpetually miserable" would be closer to what I meant, particularly having seen a number of elderly relatives living through their last years in unrelenting misery, impatient for death. One in particular sticks with me, an uncle who had been a doctor and knew exactly what was coming because he'd seen plenty of it in his career, but without the means to end it in a dignified way. These people absolutely didn't want to be kept alive longer - which is the point of the distinction between lifespan and healthspan in the podcast.

My paternal grandfather starved himself death because of health issues. My paternal grandmother died in agony from colorectal cancer. My maternal grandfather faded away and died not recognizing most of his children. My maternal grandmother was trapped in a noisy ICU where she couldn't sleep until her heart finally failed.

We can all come up with shitty anecdotes.

Was your grandfather a jain? They have a end of life ritual called sallekhana where old people fast to death.

No. He was just in pain and had no other way out.

Canada has medical assistance in dying now that lets people avoid this.

A bit more charitable read on the GP is that people should focus on having as many healthy days as possible rather than as many total days as possible.

That doesn't mean those already I'll should just give up, it means those looking to their future should consider whether living 20 more healthy years is better than living 40 more years if 30 of those are increasingly focused on just treating symptoms to wake up tomorrow.

Chopin had tuberculosis most of his life and died at 39 weighing only 45kg. Euler became almost blind before 60. Give a chance to sick and feeble, folks.

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