My dad could still be alive, but he's not

Then there were aspects that we had pretty quickly figured out made no sense (no hiking by yourself, no leaving to do solitary things). Worse, they were broadly ignored by most people-- I was worried I'd get busted in a parking lot with my telescope when I knew people who were having dinner parties.

Then the very strict orders continued well after the containment was ineffective and the rest of the country had, to some extent, eased up. A couple of weeks to flatten the curve became "wait until there's a vaccine" which is not what we'd all signed up for, and unnecessarily restrictive even for these purposes.

It would have been better to pick a "set point" for policy that could have been actually upheld, rather than setting a very strict policy that was often ignored and then enforced arbitrarily.

Yes!

My own story of heavy industrialized medical process goes the other way. My daughter could be dead, but she isn't. At birth, she presented with some abnormalities around her stomach. Not good. We lived in a somewhat remote location where the hospital's capacities were modest. Really not good.

Within 8 or 10 hours of birth, she and I were aboard the smallest plane I've ever been on, with a pilot, and neonatal specialist nurse and respiratory therapist (all had arrived on the plane). Daughter was in an incubator and I couldn't touch her.

Five or six hours later we were in one of the largest children's hospitals in Canada. Another hour or two and a probable diagnosis was sussed out, and a plan made for a surgical exploration / opportunistic fix.

I'm at an age where there are real professionals who register to me as children, and in the pre-op meeting, this is how the anesthesiologist struck me. He was even wearing a Star Wars t-shirt. I didn't mind either the age or the t-shirt, but it was jarring because it situated me somehow as a more responsible participant in the whole situation - a grown-up. Failing to tell him to use the force will proably be the esprit d'escalier that follows to my grave. (I mean, don't turn off the targeting computer, but use the force too.)

Anyway. Another six or seven hours - the worst of my life by far - and finally the good news emerges. Seven years ago now.

There were probably close to 100 people directly involved in providing care to her that day, and I couldn't imagine the number for indirect involvement.

To be honest, all of it was the first experience of gratitude in my life.

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We are all burned daily by the rough edges of our approximating policies and norms - life's outrageous slings and arrows.

I'd spent a lifetime being too smart and too aloof to be impressed with anything. Suddenly the most important thing to have ever happened to me went sideways, and put me completely at the mercy of the great machine. It really came through for me. It's a good time to be alive.

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aside: People will have lots of reasonable principled and pragmatic objections to $MEGACORP laundering image via $OUTREACH_EFFORT, but I'll also take the moment to say that Ronald McDonald House is the real deal. Lifesaver. Extraordinary reach to provide a sense of "new-normalcy"

utterly snide and unnecessary dig: The weakest meal (although not bad by any means) that I had at McDonald House came from Microsoft. Hard for a tech company to compete with groups named "3rd Street Grandma's Club" in terms of banger comfort food. Thanks for the pizza, MS.

I answered your question clearly: research misconduct and her reasoning for it indicates a willingness to lie that should not be allowed in a high trust field such as medicine. She has been banned from receiving Canadian federal funding for life. Her medical license was reinstated but it was a split vote (3-2) and widely criticized, but she is banned from conducting research and has to be monitored by a therapist.

I get that you like to argue, but you should probably learn to admit when you're wrong.

The moloch reference is a shibboleth for the rationalist community. It’s not an actual religious reference. There’s another reference to “updating” further down which is another rationalist term meaning “updating your priors”.