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Daniel Kahneman opted for assisted suicide in Switzerland

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Re: Daniel Kahneman opted for assisted suicide in Switzerland

#451

Post by AtNightWeCode »

lordnacho wrote: post #3

I had an old teacher who died almost a year ago. Great guy, very sociable, knew everyone in the little town he lived in. Kept in touch with a lot of students. Good neighbour, friendly guy who'd talk to everyone. He got Alzheimers. He started forgetting stuff, and it frustrated him. He got caught driving dangerously, and cursed the doctor who took away his license. He argued with me about the state of some chicken he…

I think you are bit wrong. Once someone close to you dies you remember them by their legacy. Also, you just have to laugh at some of the chaos these elderly cause. They call you in the middle of the night being lost somewhere and you have to guide em home. Or help the cops guide em home.

I am pro assisted suicide. Not sure about Switzerland but some countries allows it for young people with mental health problems. That I can't accept that.

Re: Daniel Kahneman opted for assisted suicide in Switzerland

#452

Post by gausswho »

jkhdigital wrote: post #441
LorenPechtel wrote: post #395

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody's saying that anyone should be encouraged to die. That is an evil thing. But that does not mean that people should not be permitted to choose to die vs suffer.

There’s no bright line. Suffering is a subjective experience. Lack of prohibition is tantamount to encouragement.

I'm afraid that's a logical leap too far. To allow does not equate with to encourage.

Re: Daniel Kahneman opted for assisted suicide in Switzerland

#453

Post by taejavu »

joomla199 wrote: post #444
taejavu wrote: post #438

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since you’re giving an edgy take in a thread discussing the death of a respected author, I’ll be pedantic: you’re wrong about those people not reading a word of Smith or Keynes, since it’s impossible to avoid reading at least one of their common quotations if you have even a passing interest in the field.

You’re in the wrong thread then. This one is discussing a book. Perhaps the word thread doesn’t work too well with your intent.

Fighting pedantry with pedantry, nice.

Re: Daniel Kahneman opted for assisted suicide in Switzerland

#454

Post by jakubmazanec »

xtracto wrote: post #109
SeanAnderson wrote: post #5

Daniel wrote one of my favorite books, Thinking: Fast and Slow ( https://www.amazon.com/Thinking-Fast-Slow-Daniel-Kahneman/dp... ). If you haven't read it, and you're into economics, behavioral psychology, and thinking about thinking then I'd highly recommend it. The first half of the book is especially compelling. You will be missed! Sad to hear he passed, but glad he was able to go out on his own terms.

I had read so many raves about that book, and heard the author got a Nobel prize for his ideas, so I started reading it. I just could not digest it. I understood the words but I couldn't make whatever message he was trying to convey... it felt too "dense" for me. Maybe im just stupid, but I could not get past I think the first two chapters.

Don't worry, it doesn't matter, because at best a lot of claims in this books just cannot be replicated, and at worst the book is completely useless because it's based on shitty science - depends on your POV.

Re: Daniel Kahneman opted for assisted suicide in Switzerland

#455

Post by antegamisou »

InsideOutSanta wrote: post #234
antegamisou wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Euthanasia in Switzerland ^ has been a notorious profitable practice for years, compared to the Netherlands where it's almost exclusively practiced on those with terminal debilitating disease. ^ Yes, it's "illegal" but it's effectively nulled if the means to it are made legal.

It is illegal to profit from assisted suicide in Switzerland. All organizations that are involved in assisted suicide are nonprofits. Every assisted suicide is then investigated by the police to ensure no profit motives exist.

Why does one have to pay an extraordinary amount for it then? Does all money go to the facilities and the staff? (which mind you by law isn't mandated to consist of physicians)

Again:

Yes, it's "illegal" but it's effectively nulled if the means to it are made legal.

Re: Daniel Kahneman opted for assisted suicide in Switzerland

#456

Post by groby_b »

lordnacho wrote: post #3

I had an old teacher who died almost a year ago. Great guy, very sociable, knew everyone in the little town he lived in. Kept in touch with a lot of students. Good neighbour, friendly guy who'd talk to everyone. He got Alzheimers. He started forgetting stuff, and it frustrated him. He got caught driving dangerously, and cursed the doctor who took away his license. He argued with me about the state of some chicken he…

> it totally sours everyone's view of you.

That's the part that doesn't matter at all. Your life isn't contingent on others having a specific view of you - the rest of the world can, for lack of better words, go fuck themselves.

What matters is if you want to live a life where you can't drive a car, you might poison yourself with your cooking, you lose your mental facilities, etc. That is the relevant choice here.

Re: Daniel Kahneman opted for assisted suicide in Switzerland

#457

Post by perching_aix »

sokoloff wrote: post #351
perching_aix wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It is absurd because it places subjective opinions over objective goods. Care to name even a single objective good, and explain how exactly it is objectively good?

I would posit that caring for helpless infants is an objective good. It’s not clear to me how I’d explain that to someone who doesn’t inherently understand it.

That's a bit contradictory, isn't it? If caring for helpless infants is an objective good only for those who inherently understand why that is, then that's a dependence on the observer's understanding and so it is subjective.

There's a world of difference between something being objectively a certain way, and between feeling really strongly some way about something and thinking that everyone else reasonable would feel the same way too. There are things that are encoded into (most of) our very instincts, things we (for the most part) find absolutely common sense, but this doesn't make them objective. I wish language was able to succinctly express these different levels of "being on the same page", but alas I don't believe it does at the moment, and abusing the word "objective" I can't say I love as an alternative.

Re: Daniel Kahneman opted for assisted suicide in Switzerland

#458

Post by dpark »

sokoloff wrote: post #351
perching_aix wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It is absurd because it places subjective opinions over objective goods. Care to name even a single objective good, and explain how exactly it is objectively good?

I would posit that caring for helpless infants is an objective good. It’s not clear to me how I’d explain that to someone who doesn’t inherently understand it.

I agree with you that it is good to care for helpless infants. The fact that this cannot be clearly explained to someone who doesn’t inherently agree indicates that this is not an objective good, though.

The devil’s advocate would probably also ask how it would be objectively good to protect baby Hilter, knowing that protecting his innocent infant life would lead directly to the deaths of millions.

Re: Daniel Kahneman opted for assisted suicide in Switzerland

#459

Post by raw_anon_1111 »

Noaidi wrote: post #402
raw_anon_1111 wrote: post #298

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I’m 95 years old with terminal cancer, my life isn’t going to get better. And please don’t bring some mythical being in the argument.

Both the Buddha andJesus were real people. I wasn’t bringing up God as I don’t believe in a Christian God, and Buddhists don’t believe in God at all. But those two characters taught us a lot about suffering. Where it comes from and how to face suffering with courage and not just throw your morals out the window once you have the glimpse of even future suffering. Maybe it’s just me, but I see every moment as the best…

My only definition of “morality” is are you doing something that affects other people. If you aren’t doing anything to hurt other people, I consider that “morally neutral”. If you aren’t doing anything to help other people, that’s “morally good”.

How is my hypothetically deciding to end my own suffering “morally bad”? I don’t owe suffering from a terminal illness to anyone.

Your calculation for what you will suffer to enjoy another day of life may be different than mine and that’s fine.

Re: Daniel Kahneman opted for assisted suicide in Switzerland

#460

Post by idiotsecant »

AQuantized wrote: post #92
lordnacho wrote: post #3

I had an old teacher who died almost a year ago. Great guy, very sociable, knew everyone in the little town he lived in. Kept in touch with a lot of students. Good neighbour, friendly guy who'd talk to everyone. He got Alzheimers. He started forgetting stuff, and it frustrated him. He got caught driving dangerously, and cursed the doctor who took away his license. He argued with me about the state of some chicken he…

> You really don't want to end up with dementia and related illnesses, it totally sours everyone's view of you. This seems like such an absurd conclusion to this, as though the opinions of other people of you are what matter when you functionally lose your personhood and then die. Maybe a better focus would be that there often isn't a good way for a community to manage a person who suddenly becomes irrational because…

It's not so absurd. The only afterlife that exists (in a materialist sense) is what other people think of you. The only part of 'you' still around us quite literally just a memory in someone's head. That's not nothing.

Whether we should care about that or not is a philosophical conversation, I suppose. I would take the side of if we care about what people think about us when we are alive, surely we should care what they think of us when we are dead. Otherwise, we only value their opinion of us as a function of what they will do for/to us, which seems not great.

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