Tuesday, March 29, 2005
Is a bioethicist a person?
Listening to Rush's inspired discussion of bioethicists, and their strange non-scientific ideas about personhood.
So I sez Ho Kay, Bioethicists, let's apply your own standards. Awareness, for someone who claims to be a scientist, should include being aware of an extremely basic scientific idea: You're not supposed to infer inner states from observable behaviors.
B. F. Skinner is most closely associated with this idea; though his ideas have been misused by Marxists, he was essentially right.
So Terri is not aware, and thus killable? Stephen Hawking might not agree with that. Until you have tried all possible methods of communication, you don't know shit about the inner awareness of a human.
And all possible methods now includes some pretty nearly miraculous eye-gaze and brain-wave detection systems. (Hawking uses eye-gaze to write his "unaware" and "unconscious" books, which somehow exceed all previous standards of human intelligence.)
If you doubt, look at the 'success stories' at these sites:
http://www.eyegaze.com
http://www.brainfingers.com
Focus especially on Carol, near the bottom of the Success Stories at brainfingers.com. Look familiar? See the letters PVS? ¶ 10:28 AM
So I sez Ho Kay, Bioethicists, let's apply your own standards. Awareness, for someone who claims to be a scientist, should include being aware of an extremely basic scientific idea: You're not supposed to infer inner states from observable behaviors.
B. F. Skinner is most closely associated with this idea; though his ideas have been misused by Marxists, he was essentially right.
So Terri is not aware, and thus killable? Stephen Hawking might not agree with that. Until you have tried all possible methods of communication, you don't know shit about the inner awareness of a human.
And all possible methods now includes some pretty nearly miraculous eye-gaze and brain-wave detection systems. (Hawking uses eye-gaze to write his "unaware" and "unconscious" books, which somehow exceed all previous standards of human intelligence.)
If you doubt, look at the 'success stories' at these sites:
http://www.eyegaze.com
http://www.brainfingers.com
Focus especially on Carol, near the bottom of the Success Stories at brainfingers.com. Look familiar? See the letters PVS? ¶ 10:28 AM
