Posts by adamah

285

Dead pregnant woman forced to stay on life support, due to TX State law

by adamah in

there's an interesting medicolegal issue arising out of tx, a pregnant women who suffered a pulmonary embolism in november and died (when she was 14 weeks pregnant).. however, the body has been kept on life-support all this time (against her and her husband's wishes), due to an ambiguous tx state law (tex hs.

code ann.

166.049) which actually blocks the ability of the patient and family to decide:.

adamah

FHN said- Adam, neither of these addresses a pregnant woman. The doctors in Texas knew the mother was brain dead.

Yeah, that's the entire point, FHN. It's why I've been saying that you cannot look at applicable statutes in isolation, but must look at how they operate as a whole.

In Texas, 671.001 (the part of the law that defines clinical death) and 166.049 (the part of the law that mentions pregnant pts on life support) operate as a team, but JPS lawyers had conceded only hours before the hearing that doctors had clinically-determined her as dead on Nov 28th (a fact they hadn't admitted publicly until the day of the hearing, some two months later even though it was written in the charts, and Erick said they flip-flopped when the family was preparing to say their final goodbyes on the 28th after her death).

Hence the judge ONLY ruled on applicability of 671 (which was an easy ruling, since the JPS lawyers agreed not to contest the point), and the issue of pregnancy (raised in 166.049) didn't even arise. Since there was no requirement of legal death following clinical determination of death in 671, the judge ordered JPS to declare her as legally-dead and unhook her body from life support within 4 days of his ruling (the hospital didn't appeal the decision but complied, likely disappointing some right-to-lifers who'd claim even severely-compromised quality of life is worth fighting for).

That's why I said the ruling is seemingly a "one off", and there's nothing within TX law that would prevent this same exact scenario from repeating tomorrow by forcing another family to take the hospital to court to get a ruling for THEIR family member, ordering them to disconnect the pregnant cadaver (this case doesn't set any precedents applicable to other cases, since JPS could use the same strategy of not pronouncing legal death for months).

9

Did Satan Sin

by enigma1863 in

i have been thinking about basic theology a lot and the more i think about it the more rediculous it sounds.. so adam and eve died from a small sin of eating a piece of fruit.

if sin causes death why is satan not dead?

why didnt adam and eve die that very day like god said?

adamah

enigma asked- So the Watchtower says death is the result of sin. What is sin? Is it something only earthly beings can do?

Sin is broadly defined as any action (or even thought, since the Bible defines some thoughts as sinful, merely by thinking of contemplating sinful acts) which is contrary to God's expressed Divine will.

Satan is the epitome of a sinful spirit being, but the sin = death scripture applies to mortal humans: that was ancient men's way of explaining why all humans and animals eventually die.

9

Did Satan Sin

by enigma1863 in

i have been thinking about basic theology a lot and the more i think about it the more rediculous it sounds.. so adam and eve died from a small sin of eating a piece of fruit.

if sin causes death why is satan not dead?

why didnt adam and eve die that very day like god said?

adamah

Enigma said- I have been thinking about basic theology a lot and the more i think about it the more rediculous it sounds.

It is, and you really don't need to go beyond Genesis to see that it's all a load of Fruit Loops.

Enigma asked- So Adam and Eve died from a small sin of eating a piece of fruit. If sin causes death why is Satan not dead?

Technically, Satan doesn't even appear in the story: that's a later Xian doctrinal interpretation that's inserted, saying the serpent is symbolic for Satan. Jews have never seen the serpent to be anything but the cleverest of the "beasts of the field", likely done to later justify use of animals (beasts of the field) for sacrificial purposes to atone for the sins of humans.

Besides that, Satan is supposedly an immortal being, not mortal; hence, he doesn't experience mortality (death).

Enigma asked- Why didnt adam and eve die that very day like god said?

Yeah, the time frame shifts, since the serpent says "the day you eat from the fruit, your eyes will be opened" and that occurred the same day to Adam and Eve. OT and NT authors tried to cover for God's lie ("The DAY you eat from the fruit, you shall positively die") saying that a day to God is 1,000 yrs to mankind, so God wasn't speaking in HUMAN days, but referring to days in Heavenly Standard Time. M'kay....

Either that excuse, OR, the JWs claim it was a 'spiritual death' only, with Adam being cut off and removed from God's presence (as they claim DFed individuals are), so basically Adam and Eve were as good as dead, the walking dead.

Enigma asked- Why punish a snake if it was just being used by satan? Would adam and eve have died from sinning if they ate from the tree of life first?

The serpent was serving as a representative member of his group ("beasts of the field": apparently ancient Jews thought of reptiles as members of same group that includes mammals (like sheep and cows), when they all belong to the Animal Kingdom, along with homo sapiens). Likely done to excuse use of animals for sacrifices (AKA blaming the victims, saying they brought it upon themselves; as seen in the original sin concept, Hebrews had no problem with inherited debt, whether mankind inheriting original sin of Adam, or all animals inheriting the original sin of the serpent).

The broader perspective though is the story serves as an explanation of how ancient listeners got to where they were, with the tale serving literally as their 'origins myth', telling them the story of their ancient past. If the story didn't do that, then it would've failed to serve its purpose.

Enigma asked- Is Satan still perfect if he disobeys god? Did humans make the first sin?

"Perfect" is a Xian insertion into the Hebrew account: Jews didn't think of the first pair as "perfect", and the word doesn't appear in the Hebrew story.

The account (esp the Xian interpretation) has more holes in it than Swiss cheese, a few of the continuity errors which are discussed here:

http://awgue.weebly.com/the-paradox-of-adam-and-eve-and-how-the-new-world-translation-fruitlessly-attempts-to-keep-it-hidden.html

285

Dead pregnant woman forced to stay on life support, due to TX State law

by adamah in

there's an interesting medicolegal issue arising out of tx, a pregnant women who suffered a pulmonary embolism in november and died (when she was 14 weeks pregnant).. however, the body has been kept on life-support all this time (against her and her husband's wishes), due to an ambiguous tx state law (tex hs.

code ann.

166.049) which actually blocks the ability of the patient and family to decide:.

adamah

FHN said- adamah, what about other states? I wonder how many states could end up with similar predicaments.

Wow, that's a major task, since it's not so much what the individual statutes say, but how they work together (as seen in this case). It's what's NOT stated in the law, too.

Here's Massachusetts state law requiring the physician to furnish the death certificate after declaring death (in Massachusetts, a patient determined to be brain dead is not just clinically-dead, but legally-dead, too, so this kind of situation couldn't have happened there, since she'd be declared medically/legally dead on Nov 28th, after the clinical determination was made):

https://malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartI/TitleVII/Chapter46/Section9

Section 9. A physician, after the death of a person whom he has attended during such person’s last illness, or the physician declaring such person dead, or the medical examiner, as provided for in section six of chapter thirty-eight, or, if the death occurred in a hospital, a hospital medical officer duly appointed by the administrator, shall immediately furnish for registration a standard certificate of death, or in the case of a medical examiner, a medical examiner’s certificate of death, to an undertaker or other authorized person or a member of the family of the deceased, stating to the best of his knowledge and belief the name of the deceased, the disease of which he died, defined as required by section one, where the same was contracted, the duration of the illness from which he died, and the date of death.

Here's Texas State law, HSC 671:

HEALTH AND SAFETY CODE

TITLE 8. DEATH AND DISPOSITION OF THE BODY

SUBTITLE A. DEATH

CHAPTER 671. DETERMINATION OF DEATH AND AUTOPSY REPORTS

SUBCHAPTER A. DETERMINATION OF DEATH

Sec. 671.001. STANDARD USED IN DETERMINING DEATH.

(a) A person is dead when, according to ordinary standards of medical practice, there is irreversible cessation of the person's spontaneous respiratory and circulatory functions.

(b) If artificial means of support preclude a determination that a person's spontaneous respiratory and circulatory functions have ceased, the person is dead when, in the announced opinion of a physician, according to ordinary standards of medical practice, there is irreversible cessation of all spontaneous brain function. Death occurs when the relevant functions cease.

(c) Death must be pronounced before artificial means of supporting a person's respiratory and circulatory functions are terminated.

Acts 1989, 71st Leg., ch. 678, Sec. 1, eff. Sept. 1, 1989. Amended by Acts 1991, 72nd Leg., ch. 201, Sec. 1, eff. Sept. 1, 1991; Acts 1995, 74th Leg., ch. 965, Sec. 8, eff. June 16, 1995.

That says it all: the physician alone gets to state when, "in the announced opinion of the physician", the person is to be pronounced dead and unhooked from life support. The doctors were in full control, and refused to interpret and pronounce the results of their tests that showed her to be brain-dead.

And since clinical determination (and pronouncement of death) is NOT tied to legal death in TX (as it is in Massachusetts) that explains eg why JPS listed her in "serious condition" even after doctors had clinically-determined that she was brain-dead.

Adam

10

How does anxiety affect your heart rate?

by Splash in

-- w54 4/15 p. 233 scriptural aspect of psychosomatic medicine --.

"doctors have found also that anxiety slows down the heart beat as much as 27 beats a minute.

the bible shows that men become faint out of fear and the heart may stop.luke 21:26 (men become faint out of fear)".

adamah

Holy hell, that's from 1954? It's like the WT has never heard of the sympathetic nervous system (adrenergic, i.e. mediated by adrenaline release) responsible for the "fight or flight" reaction causing the heart rate to accelerate when under stress-inducing situations....

Of course, ignorance of the principles of human physiology is par for the course for "an intelligent designer" and the "inspired" writers of the Bible, who actually believed human cognition (AKA thinking) occurred in the human heart, and not the brain. It was no figure of speech when God spoke of "evil thoughts in the heart of men" in Genesis; God was depicted as believing as all ancient men did, since the account was written centuries before later Greek physicians discovered the actual roles of the heart and brain.

44

U.N turning on Religion...sounds like those nutjob survivalists...never happen!!

by Witness 007 in

american survivalists and cults believe in "the new world order".

a world government will take over and we will all have barcodes on our arms etc... how did this nonsense get into watchtower lore with the whole u.n thing.

the org.

adamah

EdenOne said-

Interestingly, you only seem to get fussy with it when it's applied to your so cherished rationalist-atheist worldview. Just sayin' ... And, btw, you DO know that pre-exile judaism isn't technically speaking "monotheistic", right? I would define it as "monadikotheism" ('monadikos' = unique). Errrm, no point in looking it up. I coined that expression today

Yeah, you seem to enjoy making up theological nonsense up on the fly (BTW, there's nothing unique about the Elohim concept; many other cultures had similar concepts, including ironically, the Greeks). However, if you can manage to package it as something to sell to others, you might start your own version of Xianity (to add to the 33,000; there's always room for one more).

44

U.N turning on Religion...sounds like those nutjob survivalists...never happen!!

by Witness 007 in

american survivalists and cults believe in "the new world order".

a world government will take over and we will all have barcodes on our arms etc... how did this nonsense get into watchtower lore with the whole u.n thing.

the org.

adamah

EdenOne said- That was very likely what he had in mind - because it holds true to any religion.

AND

Actually, it is also true for any kind of ideology, even atheist ideologies such as the ones of the Khmer Rouge in Cambodja.

Jump to extremes much? The ability to make hasty generalizations without breaking a sweat is a common trait of JWs and ex-JWs.

But if Jesus' advice condemns EVERY religion and even EVERY ideology, then what good is so-called 'wisdom' that actually offers nothing of practical value?

'You will know them by their fruits' is a contrite saying, just as useful (or useless) as any other aphorism since it's validity is completely dependent on if it's the correct right saying to use in any given situation. Hence the person is exercising their own "flawed" moral judgment to rely on them, since there are exceptions to the principle.

The advice to 'Look before you leap' and "He who hesitates is lost" both appear in Aesop's Fables, and both are truisms, but the catch is which one does the reader use? Both suggest the opposite, and hence it's really no advice being offered at all since the reader has to decide which one applies to their situation, and Aesop wins either way, since he covered all his bases by claiming both extremes.

7

Petition to deport Bieber on White House website gets 100k signatures in 6 days

by adamah in

and the white house administration will be forced to deliver an official response:.

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/gossip/la-et-mg-deport-justin-bieber-petition-20140129,0,394182.story#axzz2roy3bgrj.

.

adamah

The petition to deport Justin has 191k signatures as of this morning, but Bieber's fans have mounted a counter-petition a few days ago (and with only 3k signatures, they've got a long way to go to get to the 100k threshold before triggering an official response).

Pretty silly stuff, but a good demonstration of why justice isn't doled out based on popular opinion; instead, courts need actual evidence to convict someone of a crime worthy of deportation.

7

Petition to deport Bieber on White House website gets 100k signatures in 6 days

by adamah in

and the white house administration will be forced to deliver an official response:.

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/gossip/la-et-mg-deport-justin-bieber-petition-20140129,0,394182.story#axzz2roy3bgrj.

.

adamah

BOTR said- The admin promises a response. The responses sound as tho college interns wrote them. I could not believe the topics of some petitions.

Point being, could it be that even a official government petition is largely fluff? Even one where Jay Carney (the White House spokesman) signs his name?

There was the petition to deport Piers Morgan after he pushed for gun control on his show, and the WH response (which explained 1st amendment rights):

https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/response/when-discussing-second-amendment-keep-first-mind-too

And let's not forget the petition compelling the WH to start construction of a death star by 2016, which hit it's goal and elicited a witty WH response:

https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/response/isnt-petition-response-youre-looking

Official White House Response to Secure resources and funding, and begin construction of a Death Star by 2016.

This Isn't the Petition Response You're Looking For

By Paul Shawcross

The Administration shares your desire for job creation and a strong national defense, but a Death Star isn't on the horizon. Here are a few reasons:

The construction of the Death Star has been estimated to cost more than $850,000,000,000,000,000. We're working hard to reduce the deficit, not expand it.
The Administration does not support blowing up planets.
Why would we spend countless taxpayer dollars on a Death Star with a fundamental flaw that can be exploited by a one-man starship?

However, look carefully (here's how) and you'll notice something already floating in the sky -- that's no Moon, it's a Space Station! Yes, we already have a giant, football field-sized International Space Station in orbit around the Earth that's helping us learn how humans can live and thrive in space for long durations. The Space Station has six astronauts -- American, Russian, and Canadian -- living in it right now, conducting research, learning how to live and work in space over long periods of time, routinely welcoming visiting spacecraft and repairing onboard garbage mashers, etc. We've also got two robot science labs -- one wielding a laser -- roving around Mars, looking at whether life ever existed on the Red Planet.

Keep in mind, space is no longer just government-only. Private American companies, through NASA's Commercial Crew and Cargo Program Office (C3PO), are ferrying cargo -- and soon, crew -- to space for NASA, and are pursuing human missions to the Moon this decade.

Even though the United States doesn't have anything that can do the Kessel Run in less than 12 parsecs, we've got two spacecraft leaving the Solar System and we're building a probe that will fly to the exterior layers of the Sun. We are discovering hundreds of new planets in other star systems and building a much more powerful successor to the Hubble Space Telescope that will see back to the early days of the universe.

We don't have a Death Star, but we do have floating robot assistants on the Space Station, a President who knows his way around a light saber and advanced (marshmallow) cannon, and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, which is supporting research on building Luke's arm, floating droids, and quadruped walkers.

We are living in the future! Enjoy it. Or better yet, help build it by pursuing a career in a science, technology, engineering or math-related field. The President has held the first-ever White House science fairs and Astronomy Night on the South Lawn because he knows these domains are critical to our country's future, and to ensuring the United States continues leading the world in doing big things.

If you do pursue a career in a science, technology, engineering or math-related field, the Force will be with us! Remember, the Death Star's power to destroy a planet, or even a whole star system, is insignificant next to the power of the Force.

Paul Shawcross is Chief of the Science and Space Branch at the White House Office of Management and Budget

285

Dead pregnant woman forced to stay on life support, due to TX State law

by adamah in

there's an interesting medicolegal issue arising out of tx, a pregnant women who suffered a pulmonary embolism in november and died (when she was 14 weeks pregnant).. however, the body has been kept on life-support all this time (against her and her husband's wishes), due to an ambiguous tx state law (tex hs.

code ann.

166.049) which actually blocks the ability of the patient and family to decide:.

adamah

Comatose said- Just watched Anderson Cooper interview the husband and mother.

Yeah Comatose, I saw the interview last night on-line: thanks for the heads-up.

Comatose said- Its so wrong what this hospital did... So wrong.

Sad thing is, there's currently nothing in Texas State law (Health and Safety Code, 671.001) that would prevent this same scenario from playing out over-and-over, since unlike other States (eg Massachusetts, Alaska, etc), there's nothing in Tx law which explicitly states a time-line for doctors to certify death (i.e. signing a death certificate) within a day or two of carrying out the diagnostic tests that determined the patient to meet the criteria of medically-dead (the doctors did the tests on Nov 28, but the judge ordered JPS to sign her as legally-dead last Friday).

In Tx, doctors are allowed to play a morbid game of keeping patients in a zombie-like state of being "medically dead, but legally undead", and they're not even breaking any laws by doing so....