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Flowers for Algernon (1965) [pdf]

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Re: Flowers for Algernon (1965) [pdf]

#131

Post by squigz »

Ntrails wrote: post #125
user_7832 wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're asking what's worse, body dying with a a good mind, or mind dying eg in dementia but good body, the answer is almost 100% the latter being worse. I know someone who had Alzheimer's. Was in excellent physical shape, had biomarkers of someone 20 years younger. Would go for daily walks for decades, consistently did yoga etc. The issue, with late stage Alzheimer's (and possibly dementia in general), is that the…

> It's far from "living with dignity", even if the body is still physically capable. It would be abhorrent if you understood what was going on, but if you did you wouldn't be in that state. I'm not sure whether in general terms Dementia is as traumatic for the sufferer as the observer who attaches value to a historical person (who for all intents and purposes is gone )

Out of curiosity, have you seen dementia first-hand, or are you just making academic assumptions?

Re: Flowers for Algernon (1965) [pdf]

#132

Post by Cthulhu_ »

throwaway98797 wrote: post #79

this is why i don’t take adderal i dare not glimpse what i can be for to lose it seems like a terrifying fate

I know a lot of people who are on ADHD medication and they're universally positive about it; nobody says they lost something. What they gained is mental silence so that for the first time in their lives they can think and focus clearly. Also emotional stabilisation.

Re: Flowers for Algernon (1965) [pdf]

#133

Post by Cthulhu_ »

nottorp wrote: post #35

Isn't this a grievous act of piracy? Daniel Keyes only died in 2014 so this story should be under The Holy Copyright (r) (tm) until 2089! All repent and praise the Mouse!

I was gonna say, I don't think piracy like this is allowed on HN. Of course, piracy and the like is only a thing if someone enforces it, so as long as there's no takedown notices to HN or the site that hosts it there's nothing to do I suppose.

Re: Flowers for Algernon (1965) [pdf]

#134

Post by stanac »

I am currently reading the book (halfway trough) so I am not going to read the paper out of the fear of spoilers. I just want to recommend the book and say that the book is incredible, emotional roller coaster like nothing I have read so far.

Re: Flowers for Algernon (1965) [pdf]

#135

Post by vidarh »

klibertp wrote: post #122
hattmall wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you prefer to suffer through something like cancer, fully aware of your decline and unable to do anything but with the will to do so? Or just be completely unaware of what is going on but not necessarily in poor health? Dementia is certainly terrible in a unique and disturbing way for the afflicted and people that care about them, but Im not so sure some of the more understandable alternatives would be preferab…

> Or just be completely unaware of what is going on but not necessarily in poor health? It's not either-or, it's both. It takes time to reach the point where you're "unaware". Before that, you're fully aware of what's happening and that there's no escape. After that point, it will probably get "better" for you, the patient. But it also gets way, way worse for everyone around you. With cancer, you're still yourself -…

Exactly, as I've mentioned elsewhere, both my grandmothers got Alzheimers, and I have basically nothing but a couple of vague memories of them for the last few years of each of their lives, but their partners spent years tending to people who were already gone, both seeing them whither away, but also in effect losing so much of what was left of their own lives.

To me, they pretty much died once they stopped recognizing us. For one of them that was very soon after we realised something was wrong, and yet her body survived a decade after her mind was gone and it was awful seeing how it reduced her husband who spent all of those years in the same nursing home doing nothing but tending to her.

My other grandfather died of cancer a few years into his wife's alzheimers hospitalisation and frankly it feels to me like he got the better way out of him and his wife (but largely because it was a very aggressive cancer and he went during an attempted operation; maybe I'd have thought differently about it if he'd struggled with it for years).

Re: Flowers for Algernon (1965) [pdf]

#137

Post by macintux »

neogodless wrote: post #98
eismcc wrote: post #51

After my class read this book in high school, we wrote the author and he responded. How often does that happen in today’s schools?

Just yesterday, my spouse was unpacking and came across a stack of envelopes containing correspondence I had received from authors I'd written to as a kid. I know then it felt really magical to have them write to me, especially since most of them were actually hand-written and discussed what I said meaningfully. I don't remember it being a result of a teacher prompting me, though I suspect it was. They weren't books…

The only celebrity mail I recall writing, definitely as a class requirement, was to Carl Sagan. I was very disappointed to receive a form letter from his secretary in response.

Re: Flowers for Algernon (1965) [pdf]

#138

Post by NeoTar »

0xEF wrote: post #94
NeoTar wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone thinks they are familiar with the Dunning Kruger effect. Probably 95% of people get it wrong. [I am not a psychologist, but here is my summary of how I think the real effect works... Let's say we have a skill we can be assessed on a scale of 1-10. 1 is worst, 10 is best. The popular perception of the Dunning Kruger effect is that people lower on the scale, say 2 or 3, rate themselves highly - say 7 or 8. And…

You can't call out a percentage of people you plucked from thin air on not understanding something, then qualify your understanding as your own interpretation. Are you aware that your whole post just said "Nobody understands the version of this thing in my head?" This us a studied thing. You need sources and conclusions drawn from them, not your own speculation (not that it was horribly off the mark, but come on, man…

Fair point - I just didn't want to make a post saying '95% of people get this wrong, but I'm not going to tell you how!' - the message is presenting, in my own simplified form, what I understand is the popular understanding of Dunning Kurger, versus how I understand the effect manifested in the study.

Of course my understanding is also based on some probably misremembered media, combined with a five minute refresher on the Wikipedia page, so it may be equally erronious. Please do you own research.

Re: Flowers for Algernon (1965) [pdf]

#139

Post by mrexroad »

sorokod wrote: post #37
myth2018 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's an interesting insight. I didn't notice that Charlie's trajectory also works as an allegory for the regular mental decline of the average person

Charlie's trajectory may be your trajectory, not as an allegory. You may be that average person.

s/allegory/analogy/

It may just be a side effect of my dyslexia coping, but I read it as ‘analogy’ until reading your comment. Even then, I’m am pretty sure everyone knew they meant ‘analogy’ and just moved on. It’s okay to point out mistakes, but please be civil when doing so.

Re: Flowers for Algernon (1965) [pdf]

#140

Post by _yb2s »

nanolith wrote: post #107
klibertp wrote: post #93

My biggest fear. The nightmares I had for years after reading. They returned, years later, when observing Alzheimer's from up close, in family members. No way out, no cure. Memory, reasoning capabilities, character, everything that makes you yourself decline, disappear; you're still breathing, but you're more dead day after day. And then, when you stop being aware of all that... does it make it better? or worse? I do…

I'm of the belief that in such a situation, a pre-cognitive decline "living will" or dead man switch is appropriate. If I were diagnosed with dementia, I'd build automation to ensure that I'd appear to die a natural death when I enter the steep slope of cognitive decline. It's as easy as tying the results of frequent cognitive tests into a moving average that triggers my medication dispenser to start mixing in a toxi…

Having ADHD I've often wondered how I could even do a deadman switch. I'd eventually forget to renew it when I was otherwise perfectly fine.
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