[ralfy]

Capitalism is ultimately dependent on consumerism.

[dohboi]

Sounds like a chicken-and-egg type of thing to me.

[americandream]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('dohboi', 'T')here were actually elements of limited democracy in some times and places in feudalism. Perhaps, though, we can come up with better forms of governance, perhaps forms not imagined yet?

[dohboi]

bbbbbut that would be common-ism!!

[americandream]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('dohboi', 'b')bbbbut that would be common-ism!!

[radon1]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ibon', 'D')o any of you see the possibility that the immediate generations to follow who will go through some severe consequences of constraints might well implement, out of necessity, some strong regulations regarding consumption for the greater good. Preserving a "free market" perhaps but the "freedom" part held within some real strict boundaries justified by preserving the commons; air, soil, biodiversity, resources. Is this wishful thinking?

[dohboi]

Thanks, radon. But do you think proclamations for ecological consciousness is much more than a facade or fashion statement for much of the developed world?

What specific trends or movements do you see as most real and hopeful?

[careinke]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('dohboi', 'T')hanks, radon. But do you think proclamations for ecological consciousness is much more than a facade or fashion statement for much of the developed world?

What specific trends or movements do you see as most real and hopeful?

[radon1]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('careinke', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('dohboi', 'T')hanks, radon. But do you think proclamations for ecological consciousness is much more than a facade or fashion statement for much of the developed world?

What specific trends or movements do you see as most real and hopeful?

[dohboi]

I agree that it must be a global response.

But as for "drop in the living standards of a fundamental nature"; I'm not sure exactly what that means. Universal health basic health care and high-quality education could be supplied at fairly low prices and would greatly boost many people's standard of living.

A big decrease in meat and dairy consumption and a big increase in how much of our transportation is done by foot/pedal power may seem like a lowering of standard of living to some, but will also bring many physical and mental health benefits.

As for working endless hours, most people doing that now are doing so to pay of bills from unscrupulous lenders that should be forgiven.

But I'm probably missing your point here, somehow?

[radon1]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('dohboi', '
')But as for "drop in the living standards of a fundamental nature"; I'm not sure exactly what that means.

[ennui2]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('dohboi', '
')Universal health basic health care and high-quality education could be supplied at fairly low prices and would greatly boost many people's standard of living.

[dohboi]

IIRC, 80-90% of medical expenses are incurred in the last 6 months of life, on average, in the US.

That seems an enormous expense for very little 'value,' and it should change.

[Ibon]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('dohboi', 'I')IRC, 80-90% of medical expenses are incurred in the last 6 months of life, on average, in the US.

That seems an enormous expense for very little 'value,' and it should change.

[dohboi]

Sorry to hear about you hand yours had to go through that, and of course for your losses. But this mania to keep the pulse going no matter what really does degrade the whole experience.

It does often more resemble torture than anything truly life affirming.

"I am determined to let the armadillos, vultures and mountain lions feed on me along with the worms and return to the web of life far far far away from any Fking hospital"

I have long considered that a kind of blessed death. I confess, though, that I hadn't thought about armadillos gnawing my hide. Maybe weasels!?

http://www.google.com/url?sa=i&source=i ... 9866502628

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0TcfL84Kgqc

On a related note, have you heard about or read this recent article in the Atlantic?:

http://www.theatlantic.com/features/arc ... 75/379329/

Why I Hope to Die at 75

An argument that society and families—and you—will be better off if nature takes its course swiftly and promptly

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '�')��I think this manic desperation to endlessly extend life is misguided and ...destructive.”

[Ibon]

I sure don't want frank zappa in the background as the armadillos are gnawing at me!

The Atlantic article is very true but I have to tell a story.

I had a friend in Seattle whose father was a doctor whose life work was perfecting a cocktail drug that was for euthanasia. A painless cocktail that first put you gently to sleep and then you passed away. He was a professor at UCLA at Berkeley. My friend told me his dad kept this formula, that was never commercialized (obviously) in his medicine cabinet and when his dad grew old he started developing Alzheimers and he told his son he would take the formula before he got too far into his disease.

What ended up happening is that at some point he forgot he had the formula and he never took it and he died in an institution. You would think that if there was one person who would have willfully taken that formula it would have been the guy who perfected it. And he didn't.

My friend whose mother passed recently told me that we all come from the arrogance of still being young and healthy when we proclaim, like the guy in the Atlantic article, that you will pull the plug, take the formula, let the armadillos eat you etc. but when that moment clearly arrives you hold on. Only the very very determined can muster the courage to actually let go.

We are not salmon going upstream to spawn as our bodies trigger decay and death.

If there would be one area I would support genetic engineering it would be to put that Salmon gene in all humans and have it trigger at 75 as that guy suggests!!!

It would do our species a lot of good. No more doubt about when you would go. You could spend the last couple of years totally in the moment enjoying your life and loved ones and have a grand celebration one week before the gene kicked in.

Wouldn't that be an improvement ????????????????

[dohboi]

My God, I suddenly had an image of thousands of septuagenarians leaping up water falls, then convulsing in orgies in shallow streamlets...

Thanks for that...or not...

All you say is true, but I do think it's important to start having these conversations as a society, so it becomes normalized to think about avoiding strenuous efforts to extend and already superannuated life.

And I'm not sure you really have to go to euthanasia, in the sense of actively dosing someone with a lethal cocktail. Simply allowing natural ailments to take their course rather than intervening heroically would do it in most cases. I would actually call that one means of honoring the OP!

[Ibon]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('dohboi', 'M')y God, I suddenly had an image of thousands of septuagenarians leaping up water falls, then convulsing in orgies in shallow streamlets...

Thanks for that...or not...

All you say is true, but I do think it's important to start having these conversations as a society, so it becomes normalized to think about avoiding strenuous efforts to extend and already superannuated life.

And I'm not sure you really have to go to euthanasia, in the sense of actively dosing someone with a lethal cocktail. Simply allowing natural ailments to take their course rather than intervening heroically would do it in most cases. I would actually call that one means of honoring the OP!

[dohboi]

"Family members who have been struggling providing care for the terminally ill that sometimes drags on for months DESERVE to have euthanasia administered as well."

Wow, so you don't want to stop at the oldster--you want euthanize the whole family, now!! Are you sure you are not MonteQuest come back from whatever purgatory he now resides in?

Seriously, though, that point was floating through my brain even as I wrote about it. (I also thought about grizzlies taking swipes at leaping oldsters, but decided to leave that one for you to bring up. I should point out that I speak as a near-oldster myself with many near and dear even closer to or deep within that category.)

My great-great-grandfather was a beloved country doctor, and family stories preserve discussions of premature and deformed babies being quietly put to death, the parents being told that it was a still birth or that the child died shortly after birth, both of which were common anyway. So besides morphine for the elderly, there is a tradition of euthanasia of children.

As so many other places, our technology has allowed us power to do things that are often more wisely left undone, in this case to preserve many that in other circumstances would have been let go.

My wife, who recently lost a mother and came close going into hospice care as a profession as a result, noted that this is another case where we have mistaken quantity for quality.

[Cog]

Most people are not going to munch their granola and do back-packing into the more remote parts of the NPS. But those areas are there and protected largely due to the soccer moms and dads who are able to access the parks by vehicle to see some of the natural beauty contained within. Its a balance, but one that the NPS has done a fairly good job of maintaining.