BRCA sucks. My sister died from ovarian cancer. She was positive and refused preventive removal.
I need to get checked. And if I am a carrier, my daughters will need to get checked, too.
But life had other plans
201–210 of 247 posts
Re: But life had other plans
#202Life finds a way. My wife had generalized tonic-clonic seizure for an entire year (non previous seizure history) without any cause being detected by multiple MRIs. She was taking increasing doses of Levetiracetam that somehow controlled the scope of the seizures but not avoid them completely. After a year of this, we go for another ER visit after the latest one and she ask, somehow randomly, to have a pregnancy test,…
Hearth-breaking. All the love to you and your family.
Re: But life had other plans
#203Earlier quoted context omitted.
> It's pretty clear what 'free' means here, the person getting the treatment is not billed for the treatment. Actually I think that’s a pretty good example of what confuses me about this usage of “free”. Usually when I call something “free” I am making a claim about who pays for the thing, but as you pointed out, in this case it has something to do with who is billed by the service provider. > In that way, a society…
> in this case it has something to do with who is billed by the service provider. What else could it even be? You started your gotcha with the truism that it's not free, so, yeah, nothing is free, and the whole discussion is meaningless. You're arguing in bad faith, but that just makes your argument meaningless. > no current Earth society comes close to that criteria. For example, if someone has a currently untreatab…
I agree with much of what you said, but I don’t think they’re arguing in bad faith at all.
Re: But life had other plans
#204Life finds a way. My wife had generalized tonic-clonic seizure for an entire year (non previous seizure history) without any cause being detected by multiple MRIs. She was taking increasing doses of Levetiracetam that somehow controlled the scope of the seizures but not avoid them completely. After a year of this, we go for another ER visit after the latest one and she ask, somehow randomly, to have a pregnancy test,…
I'm so sorry for your loss.
Re: But life had other plans
#205Several years ago my wife and I agreed we'd actively start making a baby and quit contraceptives. She was on the pill (progestogen-only) and we'd been using it for the better part of three years. Worked fine, she took it religiously at the same time every day. So we agreed to quit, and the next day she comes to me, awkwardly, saying "It worked!" half-jokingly. I stared at the pregnancy test, positive and unambiguous…
Typically, it’s 99% per year or something like that. Even with perfect use that’s a 1 in 10 chance per decade.
Yeah I always wondered what the 99% actually means. 99% of the times you have intercourse? 99% out of 100? 99% per some time frame?
The pill always worried me a bit when younger because most women I knew didnt take it religiously at the same time everyday and it wasnt clear if we were then... 75% safe? 50% safe? 98% safe?
I guess it was enough safe enough for me but I imagine it could have gone the other way pretty easily.
Re: But life had other plans
#206Earlier quoted context omitted.
I’m…not sure I follow. Are you implying that her contraceptive pill was somehow less effective against the sperm of someone else?
That there are situations where women have affairs and get pregnant in very narrow timelines then have their partner think it’s their child. Putting the morality of this aside and speaking practically, unsuspecting men should have a DNA test if the timeline of conception feels off or extraordinary.
I don't know why DNA tests are not standard practice. It's easy and you are already at the hospital.
Re: But life had other plans
#207Something to consider (or if you're dead set against this idea, don't): Sounds to me like God wacking you over the head with a 2X4 and saying "Hey! Hello?! I'm here. (Yes, for both what you humans call "good" and "bad" ) So be in touch, and stop calling Me "Life"!! "
And all the people with bad luck? What's that, the devil?
Including this couple's 15 years of infertility, 3 miscarriages, cancer diagnosis, and months of surgery-related constant pain. If I believed in a benevolent god I think I'd have to give them the benefit of the doubt and assume this wasn't their plan. "It feels like a prank" is probably the nicest way you could put it.
Re: But life had other plans
#208Earlier quoted context omitted.
> And in fact for a proportion of the population it is in fact free or nearly so because they have never paid any income tax or the cost was so high that the taxes they did pay plus the proceeds of selling very possession they had and selling their children into servitude still wasn't enough to pay for it. Okay, so if the person receiving the service doesn’t pay taxes, then they do not pay for the service. And for ev…
Wait until you hear about insurances, where it is perfectly normal (in fact the whole point) that the vast majority of people pay in more than they get back.
I generally don’t refer to a repair subsidized by my car insurance as free. Do you?
Re: But life had other plans
#209Earlier quoted context omitted.
> in this case it has something to do with who is billed by the service provider. What else could it even be? You started your gotcha with the truism that it's not free, so, yeah, nothing is free, and the whole discussion is meaningless. You're arguing in bad faith, but that just makes your argument meaningless. > no current Earth society comes close to that criteria. For example, if someone has a currently untreatab…
I agree with much of what you said, but I don’t think they’re arguing in bad faith at all.
I only see two options, bad faith or childishly naive, so I suggested the more flattering option. In either case it's tiring to argue this 'gotcha' strawman - no one here on HN believes that things just materialize.
But I do think it's bad faith, because I doubt burrows picks the same kind of pointless argument about semantics when someone offers him a free sample at Costco, or a free beer, or is confused when reading the Washington Post online, even though it says 'Post' right there in the name, and that the printed New York Times doesn't really tell you the time, and that Fox News is not about foxes at all (even though it absolutely should be).
Re: But life had other plans
#210Earlier quoted context omitted.
> It's pretty clear what 'free' means here, the person getting the treatment is not billed for the treatment. Actually I think that’s a pretty good example of what confuses me about this usage of “free”. Usually when I call something “free” I am making a claim about who pays for the thing, but as you pointed out, in this case it has something to do with who is billed by the service provider. > In that way, a society…
> in this case it has something to do with who is billed by the service provider. What else could it even be? You started your gotcha with the truism that it's not free, so, yeah, nothing is free, and the whole discussion is meaningless. You're arguing in bad faith, but that just makes your argument meaningless. > no current Earth society comes close to that criteria. For example, if someone has a currently untreatab…
> What else could it even be?
As I said, my usage is closer to calling a thing “free” if I consume it without paying for it, and importantly it doesn’t matter who receives the bill.
If my wife buys a new couch for our home with a credit card that is nominally her’s, but for which I make the payments, I would not call the couch free despite the credit card bill being in her name.
> You started your gotcha with the truism that it's not free, so, yeah, nothing is free, and the whole discussion is meaningless. You're arguing in bad faith, but that just makes your argument meaningless.
I just asked a question about the meaning of “free” in this context.
> Your counterargument is that there exist diseases that cannot be treated anywhere?
My counterexample to the claim, “There are current Earth societies where no one is unable to get treatment because of insufficient funds”, is anyone in these candidate societies with a currently untreatable disease.
I don’t understand your point about typhus.