X-Message-Number: 8711
Newsgroups: sci.cryonics
From:  (Will Ware)
Subject: Re: Wacky Brits at it again
Message-ID: <>
References: <>
Date: Tue, 4 Nov 1997 05:29:32 GMT

Randy () wrote:
: [ copy of article about monkey head transplants ]

This is a fascinating article (assuming it's not an April Fool's
piece) but I was just floored by the malice and stupidity in this
passage:

: "It is indicative of the disastrous route that Western medicine is 
: taking," said Richard Nicholson, editor of the Bulletin of Medical 
: Ethics. "Is any individual so important to society that we should 
: tolerate attempts to lengthen their existence in a way which most
: people would find abhorrent?" 

What the hell is this??

  Is any individual so important to society that we should 
  tolerate attempts to lengthen their existence...

When Richard Nicholson says "we", it sounds like he wants to assemble
an angry mob, complete with torches and pitchforks. Why should
Nicholson or his mob have any say about anybody's access to medical
care? Mob rule has had a consistently bad record throughout the
twentieth century, and now Nicholson wants to use it as the forum
for deciding complex questions of medical policy.

Why is "importance to society" the criterion for deciding who should
get medical service? If Nicholson is lying in the emergency room with
massive internal bleeding, and somebody "important" comes in with a
scraped elbow, should Nicholson be pushed into a corner? But surely
Nicholson himself would be the one to decide who is important, so of
course this couldn't happen in practice.

  ...in a way which most people would find abhorrent?" 

Medical procedures should be outlawed if "most people" would find them
"abhorrent". Where would we be, had Nicholson's advice been followed
throughout the progress of modern medicine? We couldn't have surgery
or dentistry, because many people find them disgusting. Forget about
hypodermic needles for any purpose. A host of other "abhorrent"
practices would never have come into being.

This kind of barbaric reasoning might make sense to Torquemada or
Stalin or Jiang, but it has no place in the free world. It's a bit
chilling that somebody with a veneer of scientific credibility is
making statements of this sort. One can only hope he will attract the
apathy and disdain he deserves.
-- 
 -------------------------------------------------------------
 Will Ware		email: wware[at]world[dot]std[dot]com
 PGP fp (new key 07/15/97) 67683AE2 173FE781 A0D99636 0EAE6117

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