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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

#591

Post by Noaidi »

ghssds wrote: post #499
Noaidi wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My brother had schizophrenia. No one thought well of him. I guess he should have killed himself as well by the logic some are professing on here. Oh, he tried, but he ended up dying of heart disease. > 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 of an illness. Yes, this is the focus. Science has stalled when it comes to neu…

> I guess he should have killed himself as well by the logic some are professing on here. Maybe people are able to answer that question by themselves and don't need the judgement of other people answering differently.

[flagged]

Re: Daniel Kahneman opted for assisted suicide in Switzerland

#592

Post by dang »

xpe wrote: post #13
kqr wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

His next big book, Noise, is possibly even better.

[flagged]

I'm sorry to pile on, since I just replied to you at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45560985, but this is such a bad case that I think two replies are warranted.

You started and perpetuated a completely unnecessary flamewar here, and of all the offtopic things to do that about, someone's use of the word "next" is particularly superfluous.

An isolated comment of that sort is forgivable, but perpetuating the flamewar and crossing into personal attack, as you did below, is not. We ban accounts that do that, so please don't do that.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: Daniel Kahneman opted for assisted suicide in Switzerland

#593

Post by raw_anon_1111 »

Noaidi wrote: post #587
raw_anon_1111 wrote: post #578

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is own life not his to take?

Does he own his life? How can a thing own itself? Did he obtain this life or was his life giving to him by his parents? If he was created by his parents do his parents own his life? Are we even sure that our life ends when we die? I’ve had to have someone come back and tell me one way or the other. I think we are so certain of things that once you really start thinking about them that certain you can disappear quickl…

Slavery has been against the law for a few years. Are you saying the state owns his life? I’m sure at 90 years old his parents are dead and don’t own his life.

I also don’t know if there are little green men living on the moon. But I’m almost sure that the earth wasn’t created in 6 days less than 7000 years ago. Can you tell me abt religious belief that makes sense?

Re: Daniel Kahneman opted for assisted suicide in Switzerland

#594

Post by leakycap »

Noaidi wrote: post #513
leakycap wrote: post #509

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It has the same source so it does not matter if it’s a big suffering or a little suffering. What religious belief are you trying to explain here?

I’m sorry, I’m not one of those people. I don’t have “religious beliefs“. There are things I’ve learned in my rather long life and through my suffering and happiness and reading a lot of different spiritual books as well as a lot of materialist books. (my current fascination is the possibility of tubules being the source of a quantum consciousness.) All I wrote was a remark about how suffering has the same source. Wh…

Suicide is not evidence someone failed to understand pain; it's often proof they understood it too intimately, lived within it until nothing else remained.

What you've attempted is a philosophical sleight-of-hand that collapses under minimal scrutiny. Your "suffering is suffering" assertion—tracing all human agony back to a singular, universal source is a fallacy of composition. I encourage you to look into this concept, as you seem like a person who would like to be thoughtful in the way you approach these subjects.

The deer example highlights that you are mashing vastly different experiential realities to avoid dealing with the contextual depth of human distress. The resilience of a wounded deer, driven by biological signaling, offers no insight into the psychic anguish, societal shame, or cognitive collapse that is often part of human despair. Pretending these are equivalent is intellectually bankrupt from the start.

Claiming the person noted the article "was not suffering at all" and "knew so little about suffering" is stunningly out of touch.

The issue here is intellectual humility: your personal framework cannot possibly encompass the private hell another person lived with - well, until they couldn't anymore.

Re: Daniel Kahneman opted for assisted suicide in Switzerland

#595

Post by anjel »

dns_snek wrote: post #297
sillyfluke wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The parent described someone who went above and beyond the norm of other members in his community in his constant positive interaction with his neighbors, collegues, and former students. It is highly likely this kind of person would give a considerable shit if he knew he would become a nightmare for the same community. There may be others reading in the thread who also can relate to the personality of the teacher and…

There's a difference between "I don't want the disease because I don't want to become a menace to others" (what you're saying) and "I don't want the disease because it would make me lose social status" (what the original commenter said).

There are lots of degenerative diseases particularly striking the various biological systems of the body. But neurodegeneration, whether Glio, ALS or dementia are especially cruel and horrific in that they attack and erode the patient's personality, a fundament of individuality and self.

Re: Daniel Kahneman opted for assisted suicide in Switzerland

#596

Post by Noaidi »

raw_anon_1111 wrote: post #593
Noaidi wrote: post #587

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does he own his life? How can a thing own itself? Did he obtain this life or was his life giving to him by his parents? If he was created by his parents do his parents own his life? Are we even sure that our life ends when we die? I’ve had to have someone come back and tell me one way or the other. I think we are so certain of things that once you really start thinking about them that certain you can disappear quickl…

Slavery has been against the law for a few years. Are you saying the state owns his life? I’m sure at 90 years old his parents are dead and don’t own his life. I also don’t know if there are little green men living on the moon. But I’m almost sure that the earth wasn’t created in 6 days less than 7000 years ago. Can you tell me abt religious belief that makes sense?

do you think I’m a Christian or something? Because I’m not.

And I’m not staying the state owns his life, I’m saying I don’t know who owns it. I’m saying that’s a really difficult philosophical question.

But in the United States, you cannot die by suicide legally. So the state does have control over your life.

But let’s say I own my life. Why would I want to destroy something I own? Who is the I that benefits from that action?

If you own your life then why do you allow your life to suffer? Why don’t you just stop you’re suffering if you own your life by other means then killing yourself?

You see it gets very tricky.

Re: Daniel Kahneman opted for assisted suicide in Switzerland

#597

Post by prmoustache »

Noaidi wrote: post #588
Der_Einzige wrote: post #572

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“Choosing to die to avoid suffering does not guarantee non-suffering.” Either it does or you’re claiming to be religious and implying you know for sure what happens after we die.

I am not stating either the above. I am only stating I don’t know what happens after we die. So to me dying is not a guarantee of some relief of my suffering. It’s just a logical statement. There’s no religion behind it. Do you know what happens after we die? If you do, can you tell me how you know it?

> I don’t know what happens after we die.

It is quite simple actually, you are dead and you as a whole only exist as a memory in other people's brains and your identity as paperwork, tombstones and for those that couldn't refrain from attracting attention history books, old journals artworks and memorials. Your molecules and atoms are disponible for anything else the cycle of nature needs. Expecting anything else is at best delusional.

Re: Daniel Kahneman opted for assisted suicide in Switzerland

#598

Post by MyOutfitIsVague »

Noaidi wrote: post #434
MyOutfitIsVague wrote: post #432

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The historical Jesus was with a high degree of certainty quite different than the way he is currently remembered and the way he is portrayed in much of the new testament. The majority of the stories involving him either did not happen or were significantly changed between when the event occurred and when, generations later, it was recorded. I see your last paragraph as naive, and cruelly dismissive of what true suffe…

> You are in a privileged position to have never seen a beloved family member die a slow and terrible death, can I say this is not true without going into details? is it because I had insight of my suffering that were different than yours that you don’t believe me?

It's probably because I've experienced a family member's suffering that I wouldn't wish anybody to do through, and also had health events myself that led to such a "reduced quality of life" (read: constant discomfort bordering on torment, allowing no comfort, relaxation, sleep, or ability to focus on anything even mildly enjoyable.) for several months on end that I considered that if believed it would never get better from that point, I really wouldn't want to live anymore. It was effectively an anxiety attack that stayed at maximum intensity for three months solid, and didn't respond to any kinds of drugs, even benzos. I was constantly terrified that I was going to die, and I couldn't hold conversations during the entire period. During this period, I considered that there are people who experienced my condition as a lifelong experience, rather than a temporary, albeit long, episode. For people with dissociative disorders and dementia, they experience something like that, but with significantly higher terror and without even a reasonable grasp on reality. My horrible experience that made me ponder how much more I could survive is somebody else's "good day".

"It's going to get better" is a reasonable position. "It's not going to get better, but still keep hanging on while you experience intolerable torment for all the time you have left, however long it may be" is sadistic and sick.

Re: Daniel Kahneman opted for assisted suicide in Switzerland

#599

Post by cindyllm »

MyOutfitIsVague wrote: post #598
Noaidi wrote: post #434

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You are in a privileged position to have never seen a beloved family member die a slow and terrible death, can I say this is not true without going into details? is it because I had insight of my suffering that were different than yours that you don’t believe me?

It's probably because I've experienced a family member's suffering that I wouldn't wish anybody to do through, and also had health events myself that led to such a "reduced quality of life" (read: constant discomfort bordering on torment, allowing no comfort, relaxation, sleep, or ability to focus on anything even mildly enjoyable.) for several months on end that I considered that if believed it would never get bette…

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Re: Daniel Kahneman opted for assisted suicide in Switzerland

#600

Post by tsimionescu »

Noaidi wrote: post #562
tsimionescu wrote: post #542

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are not replying to my core point. Do you believe that a person with severe late stage Alzheimer is the same person they were before the disease reached that point? Do you believe that their old mind and personality still exists at that point? If so, why? For many other neuro-psychiatric diseases, we know that moments of psychosis are reversible, at least to some extent, with drugs and therapy and the kindness of…

You are not the same person you were when you were nine years old are you? Literally all your cells that you had then are gone and replaced. You’ve also had new experiences and that’s changed self-concept as well. We are not one continuous person that something like Alzheimer suddenly changes. It’s because we associate so much with our experience as memories that makes us think that that is what we are. Are people wi…

You very much are your experiences. You are the sum result of your formative experiences and memories - no more and no less. Sure, I've grown since I was 9 years old, but there is an uninterrupted stream of experiences from when I was 9 years old up to now, and some of the things I learned back then are a part of who I am today. The raw concept of consciousness as the observer of your mental states, the "thing that reads your experiences", is not recognizable as a real mind - if it has no experiences of its own, it is a blank slate, with no desires, fears, intentions etc: those all come from formative experiences and lessons learned.

Alzheimers destroys this stream. All of a sudden, key formative experiences that made me me disappear irreparably, and so what survives is not me, it is a new consciousness formed of other experiences (mostly a subset of the ones I had, though Alzheimers can also sometimes create fake memories from pieces of real memoeies, conjectures, maybe even dreams or old desires etc). And while this is a consciousness, it is not a regular human consciousness, since it doesn't have anything similar to the regular human uninterrupted stream of experience, it is a consciousness made up of fragments of the consciousness of another person. And it is uniquely well positioned to hurt the people that the original person loved the most in the world, without realizing they are doing so. Plus, the life of the new person inhabiting your mind will be, inevitably, horrible. Because, again, they will be in constant shock and confusion because of their missing, incomplete, disordered memories.

So yes, the person we're talking about took a choice to avoid this horrid change. He was afraid of change, yes, because he knew well how horrible said change is, entirely inevitably so. It's normal to be afraid of horrible change. If someone is about to cut your leg without anesthesia, it's normal and good to be afraid of said change, and try to avoid it if you can.

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