A kidney donor at 18 now regrets it • Hacker News Board

Re: A kidney donor at 18 now regrets it

#131

Post by chimprich » Tue, Oct 04, 2016, 4:41 PM UTC

pfarnsworth wrote: post #104

Well, this article did a good job in scaring me off of donating any organs whatsoever. I currently disallow donating organs upon my death, because I think if I'm a known donor, the doctors might not try as hard to revive me. And now after this, I'm pretty certain I won't take any tests to determine if I'm compatible with anyone needing a kidney.

> I currently disallow donating organs upon my death, because I think if I'm a known donor, the doctors might not try as hard to revive me.

Sorry, but that really is such a nonsensical argument I'm not sure if you're serious. Why would a doctor not want to revive you? So another doctor somewhere could save a patient? Why would that be preferable to saving your life there and then? Why would the doctor risk their own career for that?

I presume that if you're refusing to donate any organs after your death, you'd refuse one if you ever needed one (unless you're a huge hypocrite). In which case, surely scenario A is far less likely than scenario B?

Re: A kidney donor at 18 now regrets it

#132

Post by sqeaky » Tue, Oct 04, 2016, 4:42 PM UTC

Retric wrote: post #113

mcguire wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a general rule, in scientific circles anyway, the person making an assertion is the one who gets to support it. Asking "Why do you believe that?" is always valid.

[citation needed], people generally need to pass a crank test or be ignored as not worth the effort of speaking to.

In this context someone explaining themselves would be nice, even without citations (they would be nice though). Instead I was getting downvotes for asking "why" just with a few more words.

At the moment there is no reason to believe either side and plenty of reasons to dismiss both, not as cranks, but at least as cranky.

Re: A kidney donor at 18 now regrets it

#133

Post by AstralStorm » Tue, Oct 04, 2016, 5:19 PM UTC

avar wrote: post #21

There's some down-thread armchair speculation about why humans have two kidneys. I found it interesting, but instead of conniving my own theory did some searching. The gist of it is that nobody seems to know, but the most simple explanation is that lateral symmetry is common in general because it's more efficiently encoded in the DNA. The organs & structures that don't come in twos are the odd exceptions, not the oth…

Most probably the kidneys are vital enough yet inexpensive enough to allow a pair to exist. You do not get two hearts because that muscle is very expensive. Also because a vascular injury to a major artery will also end your life. Similar reason for the liver - too expensive and also easy to regenerate from a partial injury. The brain is well protected and partly redundant. Lungs are fully redundant and protected by the ribcage. Spleen is not critical enough, stomach can heal. The pancreas is probably an odd one.

Re: A kidney donor at 18 now regrets it

#134

Post by AstralStorm » Tue, Oct 04, 2016, 5:25 PM UTC

randyrand wrote: post #66

timecube wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A big issue with allowing organ markets is that impoverished people can practically be forced to sell their organs.

a rather easy solution to that would be to bar the poor from being paid. Sounds unfeasible, but for example -- we were also able to bar the poor from investing with the "accredited investors" title.

Does not work. Middle men and black market will still exist.

Re: A kidney donor at 18 now regrets it

#135

Post by AstralStorm » Tue, Oct 04, 2016, 5:36 PM UTC

Lordarminius wrote: post #59

pdq wrote: post #47

This is going to rub a lot of people the wrong way as unethical, but the best way to incentivize organ donation is if the donors get paid a market price for the organ. The donor is giving up a valuable piece of their body, taking time and large medical risks in surgery, and likely reduced life expectancy. If you walk through the current process, everyone in the donation gets paid -- doctors, nurses, hospital, pharma…

While there is a short fall of viable organs for donation, the issue the author raises here is one of long term risk . This is what gets brushed aside when the organ donation process is activated. Only now do we have results from long term study of donors and some of them as pointed out by the author are not good at all. This problem is not confined to kidney donations for instance, is a growing body of evidence that…

"Lasix" is not one technology or surgery. If you meant the oldest variant of LASIK or LASEK, the complications are known, it is quite major eye surgery. Newer variants have lower rate of both short and long term complications. (femto-LASIK, the Epi-LASIK and more modern no-touch variants)

Also there are a few big studies comparing long term quality of life. Pretty favourable for surgery. This easily trumps "we found changes in cornea".

Re: A kidney donor at 18 now regrets it

#136

Post by timecube » Tue, Oct 04, 2016, 6:53 PM UTC

smcnally wrote: post #110

sean2 wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because a common occurrence when your poor is: You need $500 to pay for some debt now or a chain reaction will destroy your life. You've taken as much as your family has been willing to lend you and you've taken as much as the system (as much as you can understand it) is willing to loan you. You don't have that money. Luckily, someone is offering $1,000 for a kidney and you're compatible! You can fix your car / post…

I don't disagree the poor would be targeted or coerced to participate. I do disagree people would be "forced," en masse, to donate organs. I also think removing it as an option misses a lot of opportunities.

If you can't get government assistance because you have an "extra" kidney, and you need to feed your family, I wouldn't call that decision anything other than forced.

Re: A kidney donor at 18 now regrets it

#137

Post by randyrand » Tue, Oct 04, 2016, 8:59 PM UTC

AstralStorm wrote: post #134

randyrand wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

a rather easy solution to that would be to bar the poor from being paid. Sounds unfeasible, but for example -- we were also able to bar the poor from investing with the "accredited investors" title.

Does not work. Middle men and black market will still exist.

the black market exists regardless.

Middle men are easy to fix. Require the kidney transplant be done in a registered location and don't accept "nameless" kidneys.

Re: A kidney donor at 18 now regrets it

#138

Post by Retric » Tue, Oct 04, 2016, 9:02 PM UTC

sqeaky wrote: post #132

Retric wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[citation needed], people generally need to pass a crank test or be ignored as not worth the effort of speaking to.

In this context someone explaining themselves would be nice, even without citations (they would be nice though). Instead I was getting downvotes for asking "why" just with a few more words. At the moment there is no reason to believe either side and plenty of reasons to dismiss both, not as cranks, but at least as cranky.

/I assume the thread is dead so..

Complaining on a form inherently lowers it's quality. As a rule Down-vote, Flag, or say nothing don't clutter up HN with posts that make for poor reading.

And yes, mass downvoting both sides of a thread is often better than getting in the middle of a heated debate.

Re: A kidney donor at 18 now regrets it

#139

Post by djtriptych » Tue, Oct 04, 2016, 11:10 PM UTC

sidlls wrote: post #45

djtriptych wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, healthy people are born with empathy. Which is why childhood animal mutilation is a standard test for sociopathy.

No, healthy people learn empathy, they aren't born being empathetic. They should learn it very early, and certainly should demonstrate some empathy by the time pre-K rolls around.

It's a complex emotion, and we don't have good tests to measure any but the most basic emotions in infants. But we do have good indicators that 12 month old babies show empathy.

As well as dogs. Dogs have empathy, even for humans.

So yeah, the idea that an 18 year old is struggling with an emotion that babies and dogs don't have much trouble with is a silly proclamation IMO.

Re: A kidney donor at 18 now regrets it

#140

Post by M_Grey » Tue, Oct 04, 2016, 11:49 PM UTC

sqeaky wrote: post #132

Retric wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[citation needed], people generally need to pass a crank test or be ignored as not worth the effort of speaking to.

In this context someone explaining themselves would be nice, even without citations (they would be nice though). Instead I was getting downvotes for asking "why" just with a few more words. At the moment there is no reason to believe either side and plenty of reasons to dismiss both, not as cranks, but at least as cranky.

Given that this is your response, and you've chosen not to shed some light on the subject yourself, the options left to describe your motives are not positive.