Live data from Hacker News

What Happened to Lee

wired.com

71–80 of 299 posts

Re: What Happened to Lee

#72
post #24

The question that occurs to me is: if you knew that was in your future, would you spend your last 10 good years toiling at a startup?

Yes. His family are financially secure, thanks to his Cloudflare millions. I could die much more easily knowing my family were safe after I'd gone.

Re: What Happened to Lee

#73
post #67
post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FYI, preexisting conditions stopped being a major issue with heath insurance after the Affordable Care Act (Obama Care) got passed: https://www.policygenius.com/health-insurance/pre-existing-c... Insurers cannot deny health coverage, cannot charge higher costs, or subject people with pre-existing conditions to a waiting period You may be better off getting life/long term care insurance before getting tested, but othe…

I don't know if we can count on the ACA staying around forever.

It survived both political parties in power. It might get chipped away over the next 30 years or replaced with public option etc, but bringing back the preexisting condition issue would be extremely unpopular. Also, it does not actually cost insurance companies much money as they can all just raise premiums.

Re: What Happened to Lee

#74

Perhaps this is too philosophical, but for anyone who has dealt with someone with a long decline into dementia, it's very difficult for me to understand a belief in God after going through that (I certainly understand some people have the exact opposite reaction, so I'm in no way saying this belief is correct). It's just difficult for me to envision a crueler God if that is indeed the case. A person who has died long…

I truly feel for your loss. Two of my grandparents have gone or are going through dementia. I don't think that this has any bearing on the existence of God, however. Humans are the ones who have created such an overwhelming and toxic physical environment and disconnected social one. For God to truly endow us with free will, He had to allow us to fail, even this miserably, and to cause our contemporaries and descendan…

If freewill is so sacred why does the OT and NT have so many examples of freewill being removed? Like in 2 Kings 1:10 and other places, if God is fine with freewill being ignored, and God never changes, then he can act, and if he can act would he not be considered unjust by Jesus words in Luke 18:1-8? Not a gotcha or academic question, just something on my mind recently.

Re: What Happened to Lee

#75
post #24

The question that occurs to me is: if you knew that was in your future, would you spend your last 10 good years toiling at a startup?

Yes. It would probably make me do so harder because it’s my life’s work and I have only that much time to do it.

Re: What Happened to Lee

#76
I'd like to add to discussion [1] which shows relation between stress and autoimmune disease, [2] (Russian) case study of a Russian businessman who burned out (lost a part of cortex due to autoimmunte disease) and [3] encephalitis provoked by emotional stress.

[1] https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/autoimmune-disease-and-s...

[2] https://www.forbes.ru/karera-i-svoy-biznes/392253-kukushechk...

[3] https://www.shmabstracts.com/abstract/stress-is-the-enemy-a-...

And he was clearly overworked, by my guess.

Re: What Happened to Lee

#77
I know someone with this disease as well. The saving grace seems to be that he doesn't seem to notice his own ongoing demise. He was fired from work and divorced from his wife before the diagnosis, so obtaining coverage from work has required lawyers and is still unresolved. His care is expensive. It's such a tragic story because this happened in the prime of life, and like the article said the adverse behaviors were initially thought to be a mid-life crisis.

Re: What Happened to Lee

#78
post #29

Perhaps this is too philosophical, but for anyone who has dealt with someone with a long decline into dementia, it's very difficult for me to understand a belief in God after going through that (I certainly understand some people have the exact opposite reaction, so I'm in no way saying this belief is correct). It's just difficult for me to envision a crueler God if that is indeed the case. A person who has died long…

If God exists, they are cruel and uncaring.

Not necessarily. He/she/it/they could be limited in their capabilities or working under unguessable design constraints.

Re: What Happened to Lee

#79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> It was interesting to see for Lee how this seemed amplified after heart surgery. My Dad had really bad "post-operative delirium" for about a month after major heart surgery, and while he recovered somewhat, that was definitely the start of his major decline. That is a strange coincidence. Could changes in bloodflow have an impact on brain cells?

My suspicion would be that the general anesthetic is the primary cause.

I have been sedated a few times for minor procedures, propofol, I think, with no issues, and I’ve had a general once, for a laparoscopic cholecystectomy - about as trivial as abdominal surgery comes, only a few hours under.

It had side effects.

For the better part of a year afterwards, I kept finding myself unconsciously substituting completely incorrect words into written correspondence, I was irritable almost constantly, my short term memory was shot, and I had hallucinations and attacks of aphasia - I’d be walking down the street, or in the shower, or in a damn meeting, and I’d not only forget where I was but I’d lose object permanence and recognition - couldn’t tell taps from cats, cars from shoes.

It got better, over time, but there was very definitely a long mental hangover from it. I do have medical quirks, like I can’t tolerate opioids (they worsen pain and make me vomit), and I’m a carrier of a whole bunch of degenerative diseases (thanks, inbred aristo dad), and when I had surgery I was weakened from years of still mysterious illness - they thought my GB was the root cause, but no - stress - leaving tech fixed me.

Anyway. I can readily see how, with someone with a poised avalanche of genetic mental disorder, it can be enough to completely push them into the abyss.

Re: What Happened to Lee

#80

Perhaps this is too philosophical, but for anyone who has dealt with someone with a long decline into dementia, it's very difficult for me to understand a belief in God after going through that (I certainly understand some people have the exact opposite reaction, so I'm in no way saying this belief is correct). It's just difficult for me to envision a crueler God if that is indeed the case. A person who has died long…

The weirdest thing was when in one of Oliver Sacks' book (maybe The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat), after countless stories of people losing their personality, their mind, almost their humanity in some cases, he talked about his continued belief of the existence of an immortal soul, when I precisely myself find his stories vivid evidences that such a thing as a "soul" is a complete absurdity and an illusion.
Post reply on HN