MixedNuts comments on Female Test Subject - Convince Me To Get Cryo - Less Wrong

5 Post author: Epiphany 30 September 2012 05:13AM

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Comment author: Epiphany 30 September 2012 07:54:11AM *  2 points [-]

Ok, I won't be able to speak, enjoy food, express emotion, have sex or do any of the things I normally do with my hands. I would be severely disabled. That would be almost like being a paraplegic but with wheels. And I might not be able to see or hear well (does R2D2 have the ability to enjoy HD quality or is it more like recognizable blurs and discernible murmurs?).

What the hell would I realistically do with myself if I couldn't even communicate? I find meaning in doing constructive projects. Where would I find meaning in a body like R2D2? Without the ability to experience even sensory pleasures, I would become so bored. Imagine staring at a wall for a whole week. That's how I think it would feel to be trapped in an R2D2 body - but maybe I'd be stuck like that for years.

If you've looked into the concept of "flow" (From the book "Flow: The psychology of optimal experience.") you'll know that not being able to do activities that provide an appropriate challenge might mean you aren't able to be happy. Gifted children, for instance, develop learned helplessness in schooling environments that go at a much slower pace than they do. I am not satisfied by games - I couldn't just zoom around on my wheels in patterns and be amused. I am not a gnat, I'm a human being and I need fulfillment. Boredom is a formidable affliction which I don't dare underestimate.

I think I have to classify the R2D2 body as life support, and say pull the plug or put me back in cryo. I'd rather not just wheel around in little circles while my brain tortures me because of boredom. No R2D2 body.

Good try though.

Comment author: MixedNuts 30 September 2012 12:21:37PM 1 point [-]

You're only expressing personal preferences, but I feel enormously uneasy to hear you say "Human beings need fulfillment, therefore I'd rather die than be like a paraplegic with wheels". People who can't speak, are fed through tubes, get around on wheels, express emotion in nonstandard ways, lack functioning hands, and can't have most forms of sex, don't usually want to die, but when they're murdered by an "angel of mercy" serial killer you get people saying stuff like

How much life did she really take? All of the victims weren’t even living. They enjoyed nothing, experienced nothing and were going to die. The families at the time of death were relieved at the end of suffering . . . I know they had no right to play God . . . but when you decide how much of her life should be taken or lost to prison, shouldn’t it be equal to what was taken from their victims?

  • Ken Wood, ex-husband of one of the Grand Rapids killers

You might be a very atypical person who'd prefer death to severe disability, but if you are, could you pepper statements like that with disclaimers? That's kind of a dangerous meme to reinforce.

Comment author: Epiphany 30 September 2012 11:08:34PM *  2 points [-]

If they want to live, I have no problem with it. I am not advocating killing them. I realize this is my personal preference. Feel better now?

I don't know what kind of disclaimer I would even add. "Don't become a serial killer because I said this?"

And I question whether it really is uncommon for people to choose death over severe disability. Why do so many people have living wills?

I don't think this is dangerous. What's dangerous is if the person doesn't realize that not everyone shares their personal preference.

Comment author: mwengler 30 September 2012 03:14:05PM 2 points [-]

You might be a very atypical person who'd prefer death to severe disability, but if you are, could you pepper statements like that with disclaimers? That's kind of a dangerous meme to reinforce.

This idea that we need to censor ourselves when having honest discussions is a meme I would not like to see reinforced. I would propose to work against this meme by arguing emotionally and rationally against it rather than by trying to censor it.

You might be a very atypical person who'd prefer death to severe disability,

Your values are leaking all over your statements of fact. It is not plausible to me that you have not seen the idea of preferring death to severe disability in lots of places at this point in your rational career. From this I conclude your describing those who feel that way as "very atypical" is not only false, but badly motivated as well.

On the (in my estimation) extremely small chance that you really don't know what a common idea preferring death to severe disability is, google "living will," "kervorkian" "suicide law oregon" to get a jump start into the large world of people who discuss a myriad of versions and implications of this pretty common meme.

Comment author: RichardKennaway 30 September 2012 01:08:34PM 0 points [-]

People who can't speak, are fed through tubes, get around on wheels, express emotion in nonstandard ways, lack functioning hands, and can't have most forms of sex, don't usually want to die

Except when they do.

You might be a very atypical person who'd prefer death to severe disability, but if you are, could you pepper statements like that with disclaimers? That's kind of a dangerous meme to reinforce.

Tony Nicklinson's case is by no means the only one I've heard of. How do you know that these people are "very atypical" of the severely disabled?

Of course, the idea does lend itself to rationalisations, and according to this blog post, Ken Wood, who you quoted, is doing exactly that:

This view contrasts sharply with the reality that most of the patients killed were not particularly debilitated and perpetrator Cathy Wood’s own statement that “we did it because it was fun” (quoted in Cauffiel, 1992, p. 254).

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