Posted on 09/16/2014 10:57:30 AM PDT by wagglebee
As regular readers of this blog know, I loathe the V-word used for human beings instead of peas.
So, why did I deploy it in my headline? Because another case of a supposedly unconscious man, found to be actually aware, has apparently been discovered–and many would have denigrated him as nothing but a V before he went into the scanning machine.
A dozen volunteers watched Alfred Hitchcock for science while lying motionless in a magnetic-resonance scanner. Another participant, a man who has lived in a vegetative state for 16 years, showed brain activity remarkably similar to that of the healthy volunteers — suggesting that plot structure had an impact on him. The study is published in this week’s Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
What we don’t know about the brain, the mind, and their workings should make us humble about presuming to dismiss anyone as unconscious and unaware.
And it should make us loathe to dehydrate these helpless people to death.
P.S. The Nature reporter used the term “brain dead” as a synonym for diagnosed as unconscious. They are not the same thing! A science publication writer should know better.
LifeNews.com Note: Wesley J. Smith, J.D., is a special consultant to the Center for Bioethics and Culture and a bioethics attorney who blogs at Human Exeptionalism.
I’d not want that nurse helping my family member. My dad was in ICU for over a week under sedation because he had a tube in his lungs. I don’t know how much he understood but I’m sure it was enough. Thankfully we had an excellent doctor/surgeon looking after him.
I suspected this ever since my first caesarian. Because it was an emergency, I had general anesthesia. I heard much of what the nurses were saying in recovery. I knew I had a big, baby girl long before my doctor came around and started shouting at me to wake up. With every surgery I’ve had, my hearing and awareness come back before my muscles could respond.
Please, be careful what you say around supposedly unconscious people. They just might not be unconscious.
I would.
Always choose life.
Funny, but that's almost word for word, the excuse she gave me.
While she was on all counts, a good nurse- I still think it's a bad idea to refer to people in less than human terms, or to even let yourself start to think of them as less than human.
I know her name is Terri Schiavo. I used her maiden name on purpose.
Hawking. Yep.
Sorry, I did not realise that. My apologies.
Yes, and all this time he has known how very much he is loved.
A few years ago there was a soldier and his wife on a morning show. He had been blown up by an IED and when she got to Germany to see him the doctors were telling her she needed to consider removing him from all life support as they felt he could not recover. She decided not to, and her husband did slowly recover. He said he heard the doctors discussing removing his life support with his wife in his room and he could not respond.
The brain is something doctors really know very little about.
That must have been terrifying for the soldier. I cannot imagine what he went through.
Jeepers... thanks for the ping!
Hey wagglebee, how you been?
Anyway, don’t frame arguments on the pain of starving and dehydrating these “v” people. Liberals can fix that with a “merciful” shot. That will be the solution in answer to the pro-life complaint. They believe that people who have a life not worth living should be put down. They will progress to tagging their thought enemies as living a worthless life. Our argument is that all innocent human life is worth living...liberals don’t get to pick and choose who to murder.
When I watched that show I was horrified the soldier was aware of that discussion his doctors had with his wife. Through his recovery his wife said she never mentioned the discussion the doctors had with her but one day he told her he had heard them. That is so awful that he had to hear that.
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