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I'm choosing euthanasia etd 1pm. I have no last words.

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Re: I'm choosing euthanasia etd 1pm. I have no last words.

#131

Post by melling »

tostitos1979 wrote: post #99

Pieter: I don't know if you are reading Hacker News at this point or not. Most likely not. I respect your rights and understand the challenge you are faced with. We don't know each other but your work has touched me profoundly as a fellow technologist. All I have to say is I am crying at the moment. I'm crying because I feel very helpless. As a fellow human I am unable to do anything to help you. I am sorry.

Over 500,000 people die of cancer in the US, and over 8 million worldwide.

Maybe you can't do something about one particular person today but millions of more future deaths can be prevented.

Some of the people here will be dying "early" deaths in 10 or 20 years. You won't be saying: "well, you've gotta go someday when you have a couple of kids", for example.

Re: I'm choosing euthanasia etd 1pm. I have no last words.

#133

Post by fsloth »

anexprogrammer wrote: post #104
arkades wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> hard to fear it more than any other thing that can kill me - a stroke, a car accident, etc. Hm. I wonder your age. Young folk seem to think death impossibly foreign, and fear it / ignore it all equally. Older folk, that have had more first-hand experience with the decline of the flesh in themselves and those they grew up with, have more an appreciation for the difference between an abrupt death in a car accident, a…

The only way to win is not to play. I'm past 50. I'm not overly fussed about dying, it's not like it's avoidable. I'm not overly fussed about how either as I'll get what I'm given. Of course I'd prefer a pain-free exit rather than a 2 year painful decline to incoherent as my father had. Unless you go in your sleep I suspect all routes have pain as the final memory. I have no fear of any of it. The only thing actually…

It's pretty obvious to me most people debating how unethical euthanasia is have no exposure to needlessly prolonged suffering or just favor dogmatic cruelty over humane treatment of people. The kind of folks who think mother Theresa was a saint with her horror houses of suffering.

Re: I'm choosing euthanasia etd 1pm. I have no last words.

#134

Post by Broken_Hippo »

the_duke wrote: post #114
fsloth wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, I didn't mean to speak of death in dismissive form. I've seen too many relatives and those close to me perish in various of ways before old age not to care about it. To me all forms of it ... just feel equally bad in the end from the point of fearing some personal fate or another. My view is not of someone oblivious to life's hardship. Life hits you, you take the punches, and stand as long as you can. "Cancer"…

Radiation and chemo therapies are one of the most horrific things one can endure. Depending on the type of cancer, you can go in a few weeks, months, or fight the battle for years. Even if you endure and persist, which gets progressively easier for a lot of cancers thanks to more advanced therapies, you have to fear recurrence. I'm not at all opposed to ending one s own life if done without severe psychological issue…

>If done without severe psychological issues and done thoughtfully after plenty consideration.

I'm even mixed with psychological issues on this. We can help a lot of depression; some folks with bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, and a slew of others. But some, help is just barely help. If they've been trying treatment for 15-20 years as an adult, and have found life to be agonizing for the most part, and they've talked it over with a psychiatrist (who could have proceedures for due consideration)... yeah, I can't say I oppose it.

This does lead back to: Who is allowed to decide whether you live or die? The slippery slope you were speaking of : To me, those are simply beginnings. It is a step above complete illegality.

Re: I'm choosing euthanasia etd 1pm. I have no last words.

#135

Post by woliveirajr »

boothead wrote: post #7
krapp wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probably estimated time of death.

I think I prefer departure

> In this respect, the phrase or its abbreviation is often paired with its complement, "estimated time of departure" or "ETD", to indicate the expected start time of a particular journey.[citation needed]

Source: wikipedia

Re: I'm choosing euthanasia etd 1pm. I have no last words.

#136

Post by chris_wot »

drzaiusapelord wrote: post #126
tostitos1979 wrote: post #99

Pieter: I don't know if you are reading Hacker News at this point or not. Most likely not. I respect your rights and understand the challenge you are faced with. We don't know each other but your work has touched me profoundly as a fellow technologist. All I have to say is I am crying at the moment. I'm crying because I feel very helpless. As a fellow human I am unable to do anything to help you. I am sorry.

>I'm crying because I feel very helpless. As a fellow human I am unable to do anything to help you. I am sorry. Although this is a poor comparison for a million reasons, I just put my beloved dog down a week ago. Helpless is the word here. Its incredible how many game-enders we casually flirt with everyday, how powerful illness can be, how illness makes us make tough decisions, how poorly we handle end of life issues…

The affection and love you have for a member of another species is no less special than the love for one of your own species. I'm sorry for your loss. Death is indeed difficult.

Re: I'm choosing euthanasia etd 1pm. I have no last words.

#139

Post by ekianjo »

Razengan wrote: post #110
arkades wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> hard to fear it more than any other thing that can kill me - a stroke, a car accident, etc. Hm. I wonder your age. Young folk seem to think death impossibly foreign, and fear it / ignore it all equally. Older folk, that have had more first-hand experience with the decline of the flesh in themselves and those they grew up with, have more an appreciation for the difference between an abrupt death in a car accident, a…

Writing this as a reply to all the comments regarding death; I think "death" is just another condition like disease or disability that will eventually be defeated through technology. Someday we will have medical immortality and maybe even mind-backups, to "restore" a person (or a very close approximation of them) in the case of accident/violence. We should be looking at death as something surpassable and not necessar…

> I think "death" is just another condition like disease or disability that will eventually be defeated through technology. Someday we will have medical immortality and maybe even mind-backups, to "restore" a person (or a very close approximation of them) in the case of accident/violence.

Backing up your brain does not prevent you to die. Your organic form will die anyway and you will have to go through death, it's just that a copy of you will continue without you. That's not defeating death at all.

Re: I'm choosing euthanasia etd 1pm. I have no last words.

#140

Post by kordless »

tostitos1979 wrote: post #99

Pieter: I don't know if you are reading Hacker News at this point or not. Most likely not. I respect your rights and understand the challenge you are faced with. We don't know each other but your work has touched me profoundly as a fellow technologist. All I have to say is I am crying at the moment. I'm crying because I feel very helpless. As a fellow human I am unable to do anything to help you. I am sorry.

It's very kind of you to have such empathy for another soul. The ones that have left here likely need that empathy less than the rest of do and so death helps remind all of us to be more accepting of our fellow human in this moment. I appreciate your words here and would offer that I believe all HN posts will eventually make it through (and past) the heat death of the universe.
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