Posted on 06/15/2011 6:58:15 AM PDT by Abin Sur
Three and a half years ago, Terry Pratchett, the beloved author of the Discworld series, announced that he has early-onset Alzheimer's disease. Now he's made an even more startling announcement.
Pratchett, who has campaigned in his native United Kingdom for the right of assisted suicide, has begun the formal process of assisted suicide in Switzerland, one of the few countries in the world to legalize euthanasia. Specifically, this would take place at Dignitas, a clinic that provides qualified doctors and nurses to assist with the patients' suicides.
Dignitas has sent Pratchett the paperwork he needs to sign to begin the assisted suicide process—but he has yet to sign it.
(Excerpt) Read more at blastr.com ...
Thus there are no rights, which would include the push for ‘right to die’ as that would also be nonexistent as well if rights came from man.
This is in line with Ronald Reagan's comment that "...the government that is big enough to give you everything you need is big enough to take away everything you have.
Abin Sur's belief system is very close to what I believed, until I shook my fist at God.
I generally like “difficult” sci/fi-fantasy authors, such as Gene Wolfe, but I couldn’t get into Pratchett. I tried to read Pyramids and Small Gods but neither one appealed to me at all.
Too bad about his condition.
Why not anymore?
Also a HUGE Robert Silverberg fan.
Gene Wolfe is tied with Vance as my favourite. I will say that Pyramids isn’t the strongest I’ve read, and I never got a chance to read Petty Gods. Maskerade, Wyrd Sisters, and Night Watch are some of the ones I thought were good.
Freegards
You guys are something else!
Usually trolls like that don't last very long. Then again, some trolls have been here a very long time.
The Cadwel Chronicles are awesome. The signedy signed Throy is even better.
Freegards
Yeah, we’ve had old trolls before.
*sigh*
We can’t catch them all!
But they will never defeat Bok Choy.
I can agree with that. However, I'll always be a staunch opponent of sanctioned suicide. Human nature is inescapable, and if suicide is ever truly legal, then there will be instances where the dying or the terribly disabled will be encouraged by someone to end it for a variety of reasons. That simply cannot be allowed to happen.
Succinct and perfectly stated.
Strata was the first novel of his that I read, and it was sci-fi, not fantasy. It's safe to say that he wrote both.
That's something of a stretch don't you think? Given that he requires 24 hour care, I think Hawking would find it difficult to find himself at the precipice of a cliff, able to wheel off without at least one other person complicit in the attempt.
Run along.
In case you hadn’t noticed, OP is pro-euthanasia.
FR is not.
Not a word has changed within a single book. One of the most valuable lessons I learned from my parents is that artists create works that stand on their own merit despite any personal foibles the artist may have. Hemingway was brilliant, suicide or no suicide. Van Gogh's paintings have endured the test of time, suicide or no suicide. Likewise, if Terry does kill himself, his books will stand testament to the creative man that put pen to paper, not the fearful man who ended his own life.
We seem to agree 100% on this issue, but seriously man, you have to quit calling everyone who sees things differently than you do a troll.
I've never fully understood this train of thought. If one believes that a better, infinite life is waiting for them after death, what exactly makes the mortal coil such a great gift?
Which seems to be the whole point of this "assisted" suicide business, isn't it? Get someone else to be responsible for "pulling the trigger"? As I alluded to earlier, that seems a bit cowardly. Just "do it yourself" if that's what you really, really want to do. Leave others out of it. Again, I don't advocate doing that, but it seems like a valid argument against the "I need someone else to do me" cop-out.
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