5 ms·

Would it be the inevitability of death that disturbs you?

Odenwaelder 10y ago
What unsettles me is cancer. I did my PhD in cancer research, lost relatives to it and discovered how bad it is. I would do anything to prevent getting it, but I know there's no way. May his family and friends find peace.
- fsloth 10y ago
  Can you elaborate what makes cancer any more frightening than any other things that may get us? Is it the threat of pain? As long as we are mortal our journey is a finite one anyway.
  - amelius 10y ago
    If you have lost relatives to cancer, it means it runs in the family. That, I suppose, makes it worse than any other disease, i.e., the threat becomes more real.
    - Odenwaelder 10y ago
      Luckily, there's no evidence that it really runs in my family genetically. The threat still becomes more real as I have witnessed it.
    - fsloth 10y ago
      I think the genetic component of cancer depends very much on the kind of cancer one has. Lots of other conditions have a strong genetic component - poor cardiovascular health, depression, schizophrenia, alzheimer's, strong disposition towards substance abuse, etc. I would not call it "worse" than for example the genetic likelihood of 80% of developing alzheimers at an early age (which luckily I don't personally have). Perhaps this is a very personal view - but as I've lost relatives to all sorts of maladies including cancer I find it really hard to see cancer as the absolutely worst bogeyman in the room. That's not to say it's not bad.
  - Odenwaelder 10y ago
    I guess it's more frightening because we're more likely to develop cancer than most other diseases, it occurs for the most part purely randomly and chances are high that it leads to a slow and painful death. Cancers evolve to resist drugs and radiation, and due to the nature of evolution, you are unable to tell if and when it happens. As I wrote under another article, cancer is a fundamental dread of all higher multicellular life. Is that comforting? Maybe on a bigger perspective. What makes it bad for humans is that they know what's happening.
    - icantdrive55 10y ago
      My father died of liver cancer. A piece of me died in those weeks of his misery, and pain right up to his horrid death. My father was not a kind man. He was petty, selfish person, but I still would have done anything for him. Looking back, he was under medicated while in Palliative Care. He was at home, but that shouldn't be an issue? No one in the family could figure out why he wasen't given more medication. He saw a Hospice Doctor once, I believe, and a couple of nurses dropped by. Getting him pain meds, and benzodiazepines was a battle. It's such a stressful situation, and getting meds should be difficult? He never seemed to have enough. I look back, and don't know what the problem was with the lack of strong medication. Maybe the doctors didn't want too much around? I don't know? They should alleviated his pain better though. I understand no cures, but alleviate the misery with drugs. We do have drugs? There were times, I felt like, if I knew where to buy it; I would have bought him heroin. I accept death. We can make patients comfortable when they are dying with medication? Maybe we were the the family that wasen't vocal enough? I don't know, but in my dads death; Hospice did a terrible job. Hospice has a lot of money. I was surprised, because I heard they were a good organization. (I didn't want to read this post. I had a feeling it was Peiter. I don't know the man, but truely admire his courage.)
      - fsloth 10y ago
        There might be some screwy regulations that if you drug a person too much - no matter how terminally ill they are or how in pain - you are doing a criminal offense. Also, there is this strange worship of suffering in some circles - how just bearing ones load is somehow more noble than being blissfully stoned. Not a medical professional, though. I think parts of me died for both of my parents death. All the strength. My mother spent her last month as psychiatric patient at an alcoholics ward, and only after she had died autopsy discovered she had pancreatic cancer. She was mostly incoherent, frightened and delusional. They said she screamed through the nights. Despite her history I cannot even after years stop wondering was that really the correct place to tend to her-and why did her mental condition lapse so thoroughly before the end. Death and lack of dignity sucks.
DanielBMarkham 10y ago
Nyah. I'm 51 years old and buried my parents. Death is real and probably closer than I imagine. Perhaps it's the productization of death? I received this news as a retweet in my Twitter feed. Next to it was a bit.ly link about Configuration Management tools, the announcement of a speaker at a conference, and a famous quote from Einstein. Right now on HN it's #4. Next to it is a blog post about tools and frameworks and a post about a PostgreSQL extension. The response to Pieter's tweet is lengthy and very kind. It would be a privilege to hear those thoughts in my own life before I leave. But the thoughts will still keep coming, probably long after he's gone. I met a nice lady three years ago. She was a "social media consultant" in the local area, which basically consisted of teaching small business owners how to navigate the web. We met for lunch several times when I was in town. Soon, though, she learned she had stage 4 lung cancer. I had lunch with her one more time. I'll never forget how weary she looked. She held on for almost a year, then she passed. For many weeks after that, however, Facebook was full of her many friends offering their condolences. Facebook would remind me that she liked certain things as a way to sell me on things. Every so often people would think of her and post on her wall. These posts appeared in my feed. Last week I finally had to unfriend her. She was dead. But it didn't stop the computerized social network that Facebook to stop trying to monetize as much of her presence as they could. Even if somebody had set her account to deceased, Facebook will always own some part of her existence. It feels like turning a tender, emotional, precious thing into a bucket of bits. I find that repugnant.
- throwanem 10y ago
  It is precisely that.
- meric 10y ago
  Some of her consciousness lives through your memories and mirror neurons. Not just in the bucket of bits. Thanks for sharing.
  - throwanem 10y ago
    This use of 'just' is curious. It suggests that some degree of a person's consciousness inheres in their Facebook account. Is this intentional? If so, will you explain how you arrive at that conclusion?
chris_wot 10y ago
In my mind, death is a travesty. As someone who thinks about death (my own) when I'm incredibly stressed and upset, I know I can't carry out the act. But it's distressing and horrific, and it fucks with my mind. There is no other word violent or crude enough to describe it, so that's a very deliberate choice of phrasing I make.

What unsettles me is cancer. I did my PhD in cancer research, lost relatives to it and discovered how bad it is. I would do anything to prevent getting it, but I know there's no way. May his family and friends find peace.

fsloth 10y ago
Can you elaborate what makes cancer any more frightening than any other things that may get us? Is it the threat of pain? As long as we are mortal our journey is a finite one anyway.
- amelius 10y ago
  If you have lost relatives to cancer, it means it runs in the family. That, I suppose, makes it worse than any other disease, i.e., the threat becomes more real.
  - Odenwaelder 10y ago
    Luckily, there's no evidence that it really runs in my family genetically. The threat still becomes more real as I have witnessed it.
  - fsloth 10y ago
    I think the genetic component of cancer depends very much on the kind of cancer one has. Lots of other conditions have a strong genetic component - poor cardiovascular health, depression, schizophrenia, alzheimer's, strong disposition towards substance abuse, etc. I would not call it "worse" than for example the genetic likelihood of 80% of developing alzheimers at an early age (which luckily I don't personally have). Perhaps this is a very personal view - but as I've lost relatives to all sorts of maladies including cancer I find it really hard to see cancer as the absolutely worst bogeyman in the room. That's not to say it's not bad.
- Odenwaelder 10y ago
  I guess it's more frightening because we're more likely to develop cancer than most other diseases, it occurs for the most part purely randomly and chances are high that it leads to a slow and painful death. Cancers evolve to resist drugs and radiation, and due to the nature of evolution, you are unable to tell if and when it happens. As I wrote under another article, cancer is a fundamental dread of all higher multicellular life. Is that comforting? Maybe on a bigger perspective. What makes it bad for humans is that they know what's happening.
  - icantdrive55 10y ago
    My father died of liver cancer. A piece of me died in those weeks of his misery, and pain right up to his horrid death. My father was not a kind man. He was petty, selfish person, but I still would have done anything for him. Looking back, he was under medicated while in Palliative Care. He was at home, but that shouldn't be an issue? No one in the family could figure out why he wasen't given more medication. He saw a Hospice Doctor once, I believe, and a couple of nurses dropped by. Getting him pain meds, and benzodiazepines was a battle. It's such a stressful situation, and getting meds should be difficult? He never seemed to have enough. I look back, and don't know what the problem was with the lack of strong medication. Maybe the doctors didn't want too much around? I don't know? They should alleviated his pain better though. I understand no cures, but alleviate the misery with drugs. We do have drugs? There were times, I felt like, if I knew where to buy it; I would have bought him heroin. I accept death. We can make patients comfortable when they are dying with medication? Maybe we were the the family that wasen't vocal enough? I don't know, but in my dads death; Hospice did a terrible job. Hospice has a lot of money. I was surprised, because I heard they were a good organization. (I didn't want to read this post. I had a feeling it was Peiter. I don't know the man, but truely admire his courage.)
    - fsloth 10y ago
      There might be some screwy regulations that if you drug a person too much - no matter how terminally ill they are or how in pain - you are doing a criminal offense. Also, there is this strange worship of suffering in some circles - how just bearing ones load is somehow more noble than being blissfully stoned. Not a medical professional, though. I think parts of me died for both of my parents death. All the strength. My mother spent her last month as psychiatric patient at an alcoholics ward, and only after she had died autopsy discovered she had pancreatic cancer. She was mostly incoherent, frightened and delusional. They said she screamed through the nights. Despite her history I cannot even after years stop wondering was that really the correct place to tend to her-and why did her mental condition lapse so thoroughly before the end. Death and lack of dignity sucks.

DanielBMarkham 10y ago

Nyah. I'm 51 years old and buried my parents. Death is real and probably closer than I imagine. Perhaps it's the productization of death? I received this news as a retweet in my Twitter feed. Next to it was a bit.ly link about Configuration Management tools, the announcement of a speaker at a conference, and a famous quote from Einstein. Right now on HN it's #4. Next to it is a blog post about tools and frameworks and a post about a PostgreSQL extension. The response to Pieter's tweet is lengthy and very kind. It would be a privilege to hear those thoughts in my own life before I leave. But the thoughts will still keep coming, probably long after he's gone. I met a nice lady three years ago. She was a "social media consultant" in the local area, which basically consisted of teaching small business owners how to navigate the web. We met for lunch several times when I was in town. Soon, though, she learned she had stage 4 lung cancer. I had lunch with her one more time. I'll never forget how weary she looked. She held on for almost a year, then she passed. For many weeks after that, however, Facebook was full of her many friends offering their condolences. Facebook would remind me that she liked certain things as a way to sell me on things. Every so often people would think of her and post on her wall. These posts appeared in my feed. Last week I finally had to unfriend her. She was dead. But it didn't stop the computerized social network that Facebook to stop trying to monetize as much of her presence as they could. Even if somebody had set her account to deceased, Facebook will always own some part of her existence. It feels like turning a tender, emotional, precious thing into a bucket of bits. I find that repugnant.

throwanem 10y ago
It is precisely that.
meric 10y ago
Some of her consciousness lives through your memories and mirror neurons. Not just in the bucket of bits. Thanks for sharing.
- throwanem 10y ago
  This use of 'just' is curious. It suggests that some degree of a person's consciousness inheres in their Facebook account. Is this intentional? If so, will you explain how you arrive at that conclusion?

chris_wot 10y ago

In my mind, death is a travesty. As someone who thinks about death (my own) when I'm incredibly stressed and upset, I know I can't carry out the act. But it's distressing and horrific, and it fucks with my mind. There is no other word violent or crude enough to describe it, so that's a very deliberate choice of phrasing I make.