This is where many arguments and theories come in. Was she truly alive? By that, I mean was the cognitive portions of the brain functioning at all.
On a theological line, is there a soul? If so, was the sole still with the body or did it leave when the brain lost cognitive functions? One argument is "God will take here when he is ready and we should not interfere". Perhaps God wanted to take her and the feeding tube is keeping her here instead of another place.
Should she have been kept alive a little longer? How long should that be and at what point should the feeding tube be removed? One purpose served from her death is the family can finally move on and resolve that she never was going to come back to a near normal life. It has to be difficult for both sides.
I do not profess to know the answers to any of these questions. Doubt that anyone on earth does. Only thing I'm sure of is that the politicians should stay out of it.
On this point, there seems to be some conflicting testimony. Several of her caregivers testified that some of her actions were of higher order than merely breathing. However, her husband refused to allow anything that resembled therapy or rehab -- example given was that she grasped a washcloth and the attending caregiver allowed her to continue to do so -- the husband became angered and made her take it away saying, "that's therapy and that will not happen!" Could it be that by denying therapy earlier, brain atrophy was exacerbated?
Of course those who supported the death sentence simply respond with, "I don't believe that". However, when you look at other death sentence cases (and that is what this was, the judge declared that the woman would die by dehydration and starvation), if a credible witness is found who might prove that a death sentence would be unjust, further facts in the case are probed. In this case, the only thing that seems to have been done is to obtain the testimony of equal but opposite experts. It surely should have been possible to produce video testimony of the woman responding to various stimuli, allowing both sides to show their reasoning.
If the Lord had other plans for her, the feeding tube would not have prevented taking her to that other place.
One problem with this line of reasoning is that it carries us down the road of thought that "some lives are more worth living than others". That's a road that has no ultimate limit and that widens the farther one travels down said road. In this particular case, it was easy to gen up an argument that this woman's life was of very substandard existence indeed. Want to bet that the next time, the standards will be just a little bit looser? At some point, the thought process will be extended to those who are physically functional, but severely mentally limited. There will be strong support for "mercifully ending the existence of those whose reasoning capabilities will never reach those of a two-year old". What it really means is, "we don't want to be burdened with their care (and no, I have no problem with supporting the state in taking care of those who need such extraordinary care and not placing this burden solely on the families and relatives)" ... and so it will go with more and more reasons found for various elements of society to be "relieved of their pain of existence".
The direction that this is taking should scare those from all sides of political thought.
Not sure who said it, but one wise person once observed that the morality and steadfastness of a people could be judged by the way in which they took care of those least able to take care of themselves. It appears that our society's answer to that question now appears poised to be to eliminate them.
They already were. Do you really believe that just because they were wearing black robes those making the rulings were no less political than those elected to serve in other branches of government?
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+ The absence of accidents does not mean the presence of safety Army General Richard Cody
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
When this thread started, a long time ago, it had at least a few "on topic" words in it: Pine and Dovetailed corners.
Just about every one of the 50+ posts I have seen since makes me think you all have sawdust in your cranial cavities.
Take it some where else! #1 Your not going to solve your religous / medical debates ever. #2 You shouldn't be trying to solve them in a woodworking newgroup. #3 The unfortunate circus that occurred in Florida regarding Terri Schiavo has nothing to do with the subject of this thread which was regarding the materials and manufacture of a wooden casket.
Can you see the difference or have you been sniffing the varnish too long? No wonder people bitch about all the off-topic posts around here.
First of all, you wrote that example as though you know it is true. Had you writen, "There is a report that...." your writing would have had less emotional impact but the reader could have inferred that you were being objective, and recognized the limits of your knowledge.
When I wrote about the condition of her brain I was relying on an analysis of an image that was presented at the same time. It may be that the analysis is wrong or the image is not hers, but there is NO doubt that the image exists.
You refer to an incident that may or may not have occurred as though it is established fact.
Secondly, there is a school of thought, with good evidence, that therapy can either reduce atrophy or assist the brain to sompensate for damage by 'reprogramming' remaining healthy tissue.
There are two discoveries, perhaps still controversial to the effect that in some brain conditions atrophy takes place in a stages. In the first phase, the dendrites that interconnect the neurons shrivel so that the neurons become isolated. The second discovery is more controversial. That initial stage is reversable, even in an adult, the dendritic connections between neurons can be restored.
However if the atrophy progreses the neurons die. That is at present, irreversible, though there is hope that someday stem cell therapy may reverse it.
That choice of words pretty much puts to rest any notion of objectivity or fairness on your part.
interfere".
Nor would I suppose that you believe God's plan could be defeated at all, let alone defeated by something so trivial as the removal of the feeding tube.
You are, of course, familiar with "chain of consciousness" or associative thought processes, are you not? This thread has evolved as a living "free association" of thoughts by some dedicated amateur (and some very professional) woodworkers that started with an observation of the construction of the pope's coffin, followed by the circumstances regarding his death, followed by association with other deaths that have received significant publicity at the same time. To have cut off discussion after observing the construction details would have denied the diverse thought processes of the woodworkers involved in the discusssion. To have instructed them to pursue said discussions in another group would have removed said discussion from its context and been the equivalent of requiring that a group of acquaintances jump into a room full of strangers to discuss a subject because it was not germaine to the original party in which it was started.
This is no different than other water-cooler discussions that occur in the wetware world. A quick perusal of the group and even this topic indicate the overwhelming preponderance of on-topic posts.
My apologies! Thank-you for calling this to our attention, Sir! We will all now straighten up and fly right! Sir!
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+ The absence of accidents does not mean the presence of safety Army General Richard Cody
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
I wrote that example as it was stated by one of the witnesses. I thought that was clear from my writing.
And this is different from my citing the testimony from one of the personal caregivers, how?
I cited this as an example given by one of the witnesses, it has the same veracity as the expert witness you cite who may or may not have been correct and who may or may not have examined an image of what may or may not have been from Terry Schaivo. When you originally cited this expert testimony, you cited it as fact. i.e, you indicated that her brain had been examined by CAT scan and had been found to have been absorbed by her body. Nowhere in my cite did I go anywhere beyond indicating the testimony of one witness who indicated she had cared for the person in question and one example of several that she had cited indicating to her that there was more than just mere brainstem activity in process.
... and it was darn well intended to remove any doubt as to my opinion of the action that was taken regarding this woman. To discuss the dehydration and starvation of a human being in some detached fashion seems quite inhuman. There was way too much of that in the various news stories, using the terms "persistent vegetative state" and "braindead" with the intent of making this appear to be the simple disconnection of a person from life support.
One of the things I have observed about you in your various contributions to the various discussion threads that have occurred in this group is that you take a very superior, condescending attitude towards the various posters and attempt to inject the notion that you have arrived at all of your opinions by making a careful, solemn study of all aspects of the various topics under discussion, then arrived at your conclusions via a rational, logical analysis and that if others would only do the same, they would arrive at the same conclusions. Funny thing is, I can always tell what your opinion is going to be; seems like someone who has undertaken such a detached, impartial study would occasionally align with other schools of thought --I haven't seen that happen. A more cynical person would suspect that there perhaps there is an underlying worldview towards which your analyses always tend to arrive.
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+ The absence of accidents does not mean the presence of safety Army General Richard Cody
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
That's quite an interesting point - while the Schindlers' supporters seemed to think that a feeding tube categorically was not life support, but rather "food and water," the doctors who devised the procedure were at great pains to point out that feeding someone through a tube was a long time in development before it became a reality. It's a non-trivial procedure, and I think it's very much a form of artificial life support.
Well, no. The judge declared that Michael Schiavo had the power to decide on his wife's treatment, and that his word was the one that mattered. Michael Schiavo could just as easily have decided to leave the feeding tube in. You've been sucked in by this "death sentence" nonsense that only clouds the issue.
Hm. That's a bit at odds with what has happened in a number of actual capital cases, where the defense has attempted to get new facts or witnesses introduced and failed.
As I understand it, there was quite a bit of that sort of thing - hours of tape, far beyond the 5-10 seconds we routinely saw on TV. One would think that the judge had the opportunity to see it, as did the court-appointed guardian, a neutral party who also determined that Mrs. Schiavo had left the building, so to speak.
It seems unlikely. Yeah, there are some whackjobs out there who'd like to euthanize everyone who's handicapped or whatever, but the overwhelming majority of the argument revolves around whether terminally ill people or those who are for all intents and purposes brain-dead should be kept alive against their own will or that of their next-of-kin.
If that time were to come, I'd fight alongside you. But allowing Terri Schiavo to die was not a step forward (or back), or a quantum leap in any particular direction. You're kidding yourself if you think the case in and of itself is unique or special. Similar scenarios play out all over this country all the time, with families and spouses fighting over who gets to decide whether or not to pull the plug.
The only reason the Schiavo case became the absolute circus it did is because her parents latched on to the charlatans and hucksters that inhabit some of the darker corners of conservative media and politics (I mean, Randall Terry? C'mon!). And there's something about lovely Floriduh that just seems to breed this kind of stuff. You had the whole Elian Gonzales thing, the 2000 elections, and now this nonsense. I can only wonder what the next one will be...
By that standard, we should just abolish courts of law and allow a mobocracy of the legislature. You think state-sponsored euthanasia is scary, go down
Which is, really, immaterial. Whether he accepted his own theories or not has no bearing on their validity. Now, Freud may have been full of it for other reasons, I dunno, but "he rejected his own theories" isn't a valid reason why he was full of it.
Interesting that the Greek/Roman tradition, as well as the Orthodox Jewish, regards breath as life. Anima , Latin for soul/life/breath, derives from the Greek anemos - wind or breath. If they can breathe, they are alive.
Right on. I am sick and tired of Terri this and Terri that. The poor woman's condition and wishes were made into a disgusting and sickening circus by Dubya, Congress and the religious right. Folks will remember come November.
And gave the impression that you accepted what that witness said, without question.
When I first made the statement, not at all different. I comitted the same error. Since then I've indicated sources. Per Mr Miller's request, I posted ilnks to two somewhat different interpretations of the imagery. When he asked, if I could interpret them independently (my paraphrasal) I told him no, and explained why I favored one over the other.
Without a citation, one does not see that as citring a witness.
Actually, this is the first time I have read that the witness testified. It is still not clear if you mean testified in the formal legal sense, under oath, or in the common sense.
contributions
I have observed the same of yourselves, though I think it would be fair to add that we both sometimes add in a bit of contempt.
Here my observations of yourself are different. You seem to simply be presenting conclusions you have been told by people you respect.
undertaken
Here again, my observations of yourselves mirror your observations of myself. However, I am not aware of being 'aligned' with any particular single school of thought, I suppose I may be aligned with many.
HomeOwnersHub website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here.
All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.