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What Happened to Lee

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Re: What Happened to Lee

#81

Post by tylershuster »

fellowniusmonk wrote: post #74
tylershuster wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

I'm not positive that the 2 Kings example is exactly free will being removed, because Elijah asks God for what happens, and God does respond to prayer (praying with faith is another issue).

But I do see what you're asking — how God seems to step in more often in the OT. Thinking of all of human history from ~4000BC until now where Mankind "grows up" over time, the concept of God as Father works — parents put a lot of restrictions on their kids when they're young to keep them safe, and remove those restrictions over time. Even if the child does something unsafe at a certain point a parent just has to say "now that you know the consequences, you have to live with them."

Re: What Happened to Lee

#82

Post by raincom »

Late Dr. Oliver Sacks in his book "musicophilia" spent a chapter on Frontotemporal Dementia (FTD). That's chapter 28: "irrepressible: music and temporal lobes".

Re: What Happened to Lee

#83

Post by DeathArrow »

Although the brain is one of our most important organs it seems we neglect it the most. It seems appropriate to also get a brain check when we do our regular health checks, but most of us don't.

We spend lots of money on medical research but tiny amounts on researching brain illnesses. I'm not saying that we should spend less on other medical conditions - that's not such thing as an unimportant disease, but we should do much more towards ameliorating brain diseases.

Re: What Happened to Lee

#84

Post by [deleted] »

kemonocode wrote: post #19

Neurodegenerative diseases scare me out of my wits. All I can hope is whatever takes me is swift, or at the very least leaves my mind intact. Regardless of who you were and how rich and famous you might be, all what matters is what you'll be.

[deleted]

Re: What Happened to Lee

#85

Post by [deleted] »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #13

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…

[deleted]

Re: What Happened to Lee

#86

Post by Igelau »

david_w wrote: post #53
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #13

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…

Not to be cruel, but the preexisting, running total of human suffering and tragedy in this world points to the fact that transcendent reality, the realm of God or a God, must have an alternative interpretation for human events, one which humans cannot fathom. So for example, the tragedies which occur in your nightmares, after you wake, are given a different interpretation- the interpretation of "non-reality", i.e. it…

> the preexisting, running total of human suffering and tragedy in this world points to the fact that transcendent reality, the realm of God or a God, must have an alternative interpretation for human events

You're begging the question. It doesn't point to that at all.

Furthermore, I'd feel terrible accepting that "fact" if I were faithful. It would reduce my faith to that in a demiurge who can't (ergo impotent) or won't (ergo ignorant or malicious) build/maintain a reality that (1) makes sense in the enclosing context and (2) doesn't require the depth of horror and pain for its components/participants that this one does.

Re: What Happened to Lee

#88

Post by rurban »

What they are describing, at least in the first 70% of the story, is typical for a creative developer becoming an admin or maintainer, simply becoming an obnoxious asshole. It's the job, not some illness, mostly.

Re: What Happened to Lee

#89

Post by eastdakota »

cryptica wrote: post #32
billti wrote: post #25

> The neurologists delivered their verdict: He appeared to have a textbook case of frontotemporal dementia—known by the shorthand FTD Oh man, was that a kick in the guts when I got to that bit. My Dad was diagnosed with that in the past year, (after obviously struggling for a while), and declined rapidly. He had a different variant, and indeed the one thing that DIDN'T change was his personality. In fact, that's what…

>> 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?

It could be something physical. My sense was it was something else in Lee's case: a change in his routine. I think the routine of coming into work kept him in a pattern that kept him from deteriorating quickly (or, at least, kept us from recognizing his deterioration). When he had heart surgery, he took several months off to recover. When he returned, he seemed dramatically different. I also noticed a dramatic change immediately after he took time off for his wedding/honeymoon. And, after he left Cloudflare, the article talks about how it seemed like the effects of the disease accelerated. I'm not a doctor, and there very well may be some other connection, but my sense in this case was the routine of work actually allowed him to hold the effects of the disease off and, at those times when he didn't have it, those effects accelerated.
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