Life and Death

Dr. Jack Kevorkian's death on Friday, June 3rd was reported by NPR as: "Dr. Jack Kevorkian, the assisted suicide advocate, died Friday at 83. Supporters say he was a compassionate caregiver who paid a steep price for helping chronically and terminally ill patients end their suffering. Critics, however, say Kevorkian's zealotry clouded his ability to behave like a responsible physician." more.

I must admit that I didn't pay as much attention to Dr. Kevorkian's activism as I should have back then. During the 90's when he was in the news for actively seeking publicity, and more importantly forcing the society to have a frank conversation about end of life situations (he failed in that respect, IMHO), I was young and foolish so I thought why would you want this Dr. Death's assistance to kill yourself. I also took it for granted that if you wanted to take your own life, there aren't any barriers the society can put in front of you. I guess, I didn't realize that when you do want to take your own life for medical reasons, it is too late to make any provisions to do so due to the same medical reasons.

In this report on NBC Nightly News Dr. Nancy Snyderman quite eloquently places the Kevorkian conundrum in front of the viewers. Kevorkian's antics made it a bit too much to take the message seriously. At the same time, had he not done all he could to bring it in front of the TV cameras, we wouldn't have had any conversations about it. (And, if I remember correctly, a couple of states now have laws on books allowing for assisted suicides, due in part to his early efforts to get people talking about it.) Then again, I think, we haven not had this conversation as a society and that's why some political hack can slap the "death panels" label on anything and scare the hell out of half the population. As Dr. Snyderman said, we care for our suffering pets better than we do for our fellow humans. That's a sad state of affairs.

That's brings up several questions. First, let's say you are suffering from a terminal illness and you have decided to call it a day. Unfortunately, you live in a state where it is difficult to find a physician who is willing to assist you. There really isn't a whole lot you can do. Other than going via methods with spectacularly messy outcomes, you can't purchase the required, ahem, ingredients for the drug cocktail that will bring about the end. For a country that prides itself in having best individual rights and focuses a bit too much on "me, myself and I," this important right seems to have fallen by the way side.

That brings to my second question. Who decides what is meant by "suffering"? And, does it have to be a medically diagnosed, terminal condition before we can seek "assistance"? Says who? Don't we generally take the individual rights over and above that of the society (when they don't clash)? If I'm not infringing the right of the others to pursue their right to life, liberty, etc the shouldn't I be free to seek assisted suicide regardless of the medical condition? Is mental agony a sufficient condition? What if your current life situations don't give you any other options; is that sufficient? What if you are just tired of it all?

Like Dr. Kevorkian has said, this is about the necessity of physician's ability to assist.

Help! I'm trapped in the Matrix

I've been listening to the RadioLab podcast The (Multi) Universe(s) over and over again on my mp3 player. In it, Brian Greene, professor of Physics and Mathematics at the Columbia University, talks about what math and physics tell us about universes.

These are the key items I picked up from his talk: (a) given there is a finite set of particles in our universe and provided that the universe is infinite (really infinite, ie: there's no limit to our universe), then the particular arrangement of particles that make up our little area of the universe must be repeated (simply a probabilistic argument) again and again, rarely, yet many times. That means, there's, at least, another one of my typing this same blog somewhere else, and there's another one of you reading this same blog. And we are not so unique as we think we are. (b) Einstein's theory of relativity accounts for repulsive gravity and where that changes to zero is where energy turns into particles and so various universes pop up. That means, in theory, there are an infinite number of universes, inside each of which, the previous (a) is also true. (c) Then there is this whole Matrix thing. That means, given the above two sets of infinite possibilities, there could be a sufficiently advanced civilization where they are able to simulate an entire universe, or at the very least, an entire world. Okay, it is quite rate in a random area of a random universe for a life form to evolve into a civilization like ours. But if a technologically advanced civilization were to figure out how to simulate an entire universe, then it is quite possible that they could roll out a great multitude of such simulations. So, the probability is in the favor of us being a Matrix-like simulation than a real one.

So, in the words of Robert Krulwich, we could be the 5th grade science project of some kid in planet Zantar. Actually, I think it is a little bit more subtle than that. The 5th grader's project is probably something like Mars or Mercury. The middle schoolers probably have done the gas giants as a class project. That explains the many moons of Jupiter. Some exceptionally bright kid in 7th grade probably did the rings for Saturn. Making the water planet and placing it in the habitable zone for the possibility of life is probably a high-school level project. Setting the course for the evolution, that's gotta be the undergrads of Zantar. And, the human civilization, their idiosyncrasies and its impact on the planet ... that's gotta be a PhD thesis project.

I don't know about you, but I've had many moments in my life when things have happened quite unexpectedly. Then there have been other moments where at the time seemed quite insignificant but later turned out to be pivotal. And, some of both types have been crucial events to make drastic changes in my life. Looking back, I know, that had I picked a different choice at each of those moments, the life would have gone on a different direction. So, that means, the Zandar kids aren't just initiating the simulation and doing a "set it and forget it" thing. I think, they are poking things here and there and changing the parameters in the simulation at various times to see what happens as a consequence. It is sort of like me not being in control or not having the free will (of which I've written previously under this blog, and Brian Greene in this podcast also says as an illusion.)

So, I want the red pill. I want to see how far down this rabbit hole goes. I want to see the PIC (People in Charge).