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A Personal Statement from Iain Banks

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Re: A Personal Statement from Iain Banks

#301

Post by polyfractal »

reasonattlm wrote: post #126
polyfractal wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hmm...except that cryopreservation is still, as of this point, a complete crock of shit. Trying to find a necromancer would be more productive. As an ex-biologist, I can assure you that horrible cellular damage is being committed to these "preserved" people. I used to flash-freeze all sorts of cells, ranging from bacteria (e. coli) to animal (IMCD3 and MDCK kidney) to human (Human Embryonic Kidney, Primary cortical a…

You don't seem to be all that up to date on present practice and theory in cryonics. Take some time to read up on the publications, such as by groups like 21st Century Medicine: http://www.21cmpublications.com/ Or for a simpler starting point, the FAQs for scientists at Alcor: http://alcor.org/sciencefaq.htm You might also look at ongoing results from the Brain Preservation Technology Prize: http://www.fightaging.org…

I don't doubt that cryonics is a valid science, but it is not a valid business model right now. The things I did in my lab were valid science, but I would be thrown in jail for ever giving those reagents to actual patients.

Like I said, the current state of "businses cryonics" is basically astrology and wishful thinking. I also don't doubt that in ten, twenty, fifty years, scientists will have figured out how to do it (much better).

But right now? I'm saying nope.

(Addendum: most of those publications listed at 21cm are about thin slices, which isn't exactly relevant. The even better ones are oocytes, which are practically tanks of the cellular world. Drosophila oocytes are so large you can see them with your naked eye and can withstand enormous punishment before dieing. Using them as case studies of vitrification is not really being honest.

This brings me back to my original point: the science is solid...at an academic level. Once you move past 50 micron tissue slices, it all goes to hell.)

Re: A Personal Statement from Iain Banks

#302

Post by michaelochurch »

xenophanes wrote: post #258
michaelochurch wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

See, that's my exact point. I didn't say that they make $125k (that's about average for a half-decent VC-istan programmer) because I knew scientific salaries to be low (I'm surprised to hear that they're that low) and they shouldn't be. Those salaries should be at least 3 times higher. You should make more working on scientific research that helps everyone than you'd make ($100-150k for typical programmers) writing y…

> Those salaries should be at least 3 times higher. Why? What about supply and demand? Do you mean salaries shouldn't be determined by supply and demand, or demand "should" be higher? If demand for these skills should be higher, but isn't, that is an opportunity for entrepreneurs. Your or anyone else, if correct, could make a killing using these skills at low prices (salaries). The more people who do that, the more t…

What about supply and demand? Do you mean salaries shouldn't be determined by supply and demand, or demand "should" be higher?

Time-behavior + value-creation vs. value-capture.

Market demand for science R&D is pretty much nil. Basic research requires some kind of altruistic/passive funding (government, universities).

Market demand for the technologies that come out of basic research, decades later, is nearly infinite.

No one is going to pay, on the market, $150,000 per year for a biologist to analyze some weird protein. But when that work results in a cure for several common cancers, 20 years later, I'd say it's paid itself off by several orders of magnitude.

Re: A Personal Statement from Iain Banks

#303

Post by _delirium »

hyperbovine wrote: post #147
venus wrote: post #44

This is horrible news. We are all poorer today, all of us. Banks is an inspiration to all who read him - of what could be, what can be, what is to be. Cancer has claimed a terrible toll in my life. Three in my immediate family and counting, the countdown very fast for one of them. And now it seems to have turned its unwelcome gaze to my intellectual treasures. I hate this disease, I despise it so much it's hard to ex…

More money is not what is needed here--we already pour tons of money into cancer research. What's needed are new ideas. If you really want to fight cancer, skip the startup and go to graduate school. Computational and mathematical approaches to understanding and fighting cancer are still in their infancy. There is a lot of scope for smart, motivated people to do good.

Lack of money is precisely why you should not go to graduate school, because graduate students (and post-docs, and adjunct faculty) in these areas already massively outstrip available funding. The claim that more people should go into the field would be more credible if there were good jobs available for those who already did.

Part of the reason for the lack of good jobs is that there is actually not much money put into cancer research, relative to Valley-type companies. Google's declared 2012 R&D budget was $6.7 billion. The National Cancer Institute's entire budget in 2012, which is parceled out among all eligible institutions in the country, was $5.1 billion. It's no surprise that, as a direct result, it's easier to find good jobs in the Valley than in cancer research: Google alone can offer more funding to aspiring researchers than the entire national cancer strategy can.

Re: A Personal Statement from Iain Banks

#304

Post by geuis »

geuis wrote: post #29

He shouldn't just accept this. There has to be something to be tried. With his notoriety, the option to try some experimental new treatment should at least be considered.

Wow this got a lot more responses than I expected. I say this for two reasons:

My dad died in 1990 when I was 10 from cancer. He fought until the end. I spent 2 years from the time I was 8 till March 1990 watching this man do what he could to survive. I've sworn that if I ever develop cancer, I too will do whatever I can to survive. The point is that if there's a remote chance of me beating it, I can deal with temporary suffering for long-term survival.

The second reason is more that Ian Banks is one of my favorite authors. My imagination has been shaped by the worlds and stories he's created ever since I was a boy. I was introduced to his Consider Phlebas while my dad was sick and have read nearly all of his work since then. For me, this is all closely tied together emotionally.

Either way, I can respect his choices. They won't be my choices, but I can understand why.

Re: A Personal Statement from Iain Banks

#305

Post by rdl »

gamblor956 wrote: post #266
michaelochurch wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

See, that's my exact point. I didn't say that they make $125k (that's about average for a half-decent VC-istan programmer) because I knew scientific salaries to be low (I'm surprised to hear that they're that low) and they shouldn't be. Those salaries should be at least 3 times higher. You should make more working on scientific research that helps everyone than you'd make ($100-150k for typical programmers) writing y…

It depends heavily on the specific area of biology. I have friends making $35-40k in the LA area doing pharamaceutalogical research, and others making $250k+/year (also in the LA area) in some specialized areas of biochemical research that I don't understand enough to describe.

Also, if you get closer to product, you get paid a lot more. I know a lot of people who work in pharma and all of them make $80-150k (in the bay area); even admin/support people, and many levels of management, compliance, and other crap.

Re: A Personal Statement from Iain Banks

#306

Post by Nick_C »

arethuza wrote: post #274
adrianhoward wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Terrible news. If you're not familiar with Iain's work you owe it to yourself to drop everything and start reading the Culture series[1] right now. In fact go give all of his books a try (hey - we're allowed to read non-SF here too aren't we ;-)

Iain's non-SF work is wonderful, and often so very Scottish. In particular, I love the opening to Espedair Street: " Two days ago I decided to kill myself. I would walk and hitch and sail away from this dark city to the bright spaces of the wet west coast, and there throw myself into the tall, glittering seas beyond Iona (with its cargo of mouldering kings) to let the gulls and seals and tides have their way with my…

Totally agree. Last year I decided to give Bank's non sci-fi a go. He draws such great characters. Espedair Street was my favourite, but The Steep Approach to Garbadale and Complicity were also great. Complicity is a really good intro to Banks; it's a nice Scottish thriller and an easy read.

He is a good literary writer, and I think that is what makes him such a good sci-fi writer. I had never read any sci-fi like it when I first read him. There are still very few good writers in sci-fi.

Re: A Personal Statement from Iain Banks

#307

Post by rdl »

Domenic_S wrote: post #246
SoftwareMaven wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your right. I shouldn't have said "exclusive". I shouldn't be posting when I'm sick. Mea culpa . Instead, what I should have said is, cancer rates are significantly higher in "western" countries and certain kinds of cancers have seen dramatic increases, such as breast cancer[1] and prostate cancer[2], as countries have "westernized". As countries westernize, rates of these cancers increase. 1. http://www.independent.…

Or perhaps western medicine is better at detecting those diseases.

Japan is basically Eastern genetics with Eastern diet and Western medicine, right? And a few very "Western" cultural trends (lots of work/high stress, smoking, etc.).

(The irony is that smoking is more on the rise in Asia/etc. than elsewhere, so at some point smoking and related illness will be a non-Western thing, too.)

Re: A Personal Statement from Iain Banks

#308

Post by rdl »

venus wrote: post #44

This is horrible news. We are all poorer today, all of us. Banks is an inspiration to all who read him - of what could be, what can be, what is to be. Cancer has claimed a terrible toll in my life. Three in my immediate family and counting, the countdown very fast for one of them. And now it seems to have turned its unwelcome gaze to my intellectual treasures. I hate this disease, I despise it so much it's hard to ex…

Re: 300.

I wish medical research were set up in a way to support hobbyists and part time involvement. There are lots of people in the high-profit, low-value-to-society parts of biotech and medicine (day jobs as pharma reps, sometimes MDs, people running clinical trials for yet another evergreening of an old drug, or a super-viagra, or whatever), who have skills, and have their personal financial situation set up, who could probably be effective part-time contributors to basic research. In software, that'd be a guy working in some enterprise somewhere developing a new programming language or library on the side. I don't think there really is anything like that for biotech, yet.

Re: A Personal Statement from Iain Banks

#309

Post by abraininavat »

nooneelse wrote: post #297
abraininavat wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To everyone who enjoyed Player of Games, I ask.. why? I'm not suggesting your opinions are wrong , of course, but I had a much different impression. Obviously Player of Games is well regarded by many people, so I'm curious to know what I missed. --- SPOILERS BELOW --- My general impression was that the Empire of Azad was that its conception lacked imagination. The peculiarities of the species (the three sexes, the so…

In Player of Games, the Culture doesn't represent we humans on Earth. The Azad do. They aren't alien and different because of that.

You're missing my point. The Culture and the Azadians were very anatomically similar. That's silly and lacks imagination.

Re: A Personal Statement from Iain Banks

#310

Post by Gatsky »

brazzy wrote: post #194
Gatsky wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, but there is a lot of assumption and ignorance in reply to your comment. 1. Modern supportive care means that chemotherapy does not involve constant vomiting, pain and torment. Some patients work and look after their family in between having chemotherapy. For example, in a large study on the efficacy of chemotherapy in biliary tract cancers including gallbladder cancer the rates of severe vomiting were only 5%…

It depends completely on which chemotherapy you get, which cancer you have, and sheer dumb luck. Both "chemotherapy" and "cancer" are blanket terms covering a multitude of radically different things. Best case: your cancer is contained to a single organ and susceptible to antibody therapy. Practically no side effects, and you'll most likely be healed. Worst case: your cancer has spread to multiple organs, requires th…

"You're better off setting yourself on fire -"

That plainly isn't true. Why come to HN to make hyperbolic generalisations about cancer therapy? There are many people with advanced widespread disease who choose to have treatment. Are you suggesting that they are all foolish or coerced by doctors? Really? Would you be happy to come down to my cancer hospital and tell the 33 year old woman with 2 young children that she is better off "setting herself on fire" than having chemotherapy?

Your last statement also is incorrect. I spend just as much time talking about stopping therapy and options that don't involve chemotherapy as I do about giving chemotherapy.

Source: I'm training to be an oncologist.

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