On Aug 25, 11:17Â am, ta
nc.rr.com> wrote:> On Aug 25, 1:43 am, "andy-k" wrote:
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>> ta wrote:
>>> but I am also living.
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>>> My physical body is slowly and gradually deteriorating, but "I" am
>>> also living and evolving.
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>>> If life and death are not one and the same, then how can I be both
>>> living and dying at the same time?
>
>> *Look* at how the terms are used in common speech.
>> "Life" and "living" are being used synonymously to denote the
>> *state* that obtains between the events of birth and death.
>> "Death" is the *event* that terminates life.
>> "Dying" is the *state* of being in the terminal phase of life/living.
>> If we don't confuse a state with an event then there is no
>> conundrum -- I can be both living and dying at the same time.
>
> Ok -- so at what point does the "terminal phase of life" begin? When
> you have 5 years until death? 5 months? 5 days? What is the criteria
> used to judge when "dying" begins?
You're imagining that language defines being.
Modeling language as a construction of your argument.
Playing around with words.
"Historically, attempts to define the exact moment of death have been
problematic. Death was once defined as the cessation of heartbeat
(cardiac arrest) and of breathing, but the development of CPR and
prompt defibrillation have rendered that definition inadequate because
breathing and heartbeat can sometimes be restarted. This is now called
"clinical death". Events which were causally linked to death in the
past no longer kill in all circumstances; without a functioning heart
or lungs, life can sometimes be sustained with a combination of life
support devices, organ transplants and artificial pacemakers.
Today, where a definition of the moment of death is required, doctors
and coroners usually turn to "brain death" or "biological death":
People are considered dead when the electrical activity in their brain
ceases (cf. persistent vegetative state). It is presumed that a
stoppage of electrical activity indicates the end of consciousness.
However, suspension of consciousness must be permanent, and not
transient, as occurs during certain sleep stages, and especially a
coma. In the case of sleep, EEGs can easily tell the difference.
Identifying the moment of death is important in cases of
transplantation, as an organ for transplant must be harvested as
quickly as possible after the death of the body.
The possession of brain activities, or ability to resume brain
activity, is a necessary condition to legal personhood in the United
States. "It appears that once brain death has been determined … no
criminal or civil liability will result from disconnecting the life-
support devices." (Dority v. Superior Court of San Bernardino County,
193 Cal.Rptr. 288, 291 (1983))
Those people maintaining that only the neo-cortex of the brain is
necessary for consciousness sometimes argue that only electrical
activity there should be considered when defining death. Eventually it
is possible that the criterion for death will be the permanent and
irreversible loss of cognitive function, as evidenced by the death of
the cerebral cortex. All hope of recovering human thought and
personality is then gone given current and foreseeable medical
technology. However, at present, in most places the more conservative
definition of death — irreversible cessation of electrical activity in
the whole brain, as opposed to just in the neo-cortex — has been
adopted (for example the Uniform Determination Of Death Act in the
United States). In 2005, the case of Terri Schiavo brought the
question of brain death and artificial sustenance to the front of
American politics.
Even by whole-brain criteria, the determination of brain death can be
complicated. EEGs can detect spurious electrical impulses, while
certain drugs, hypoglycemia, hypoxia, or hypothermia can suppress or
even stop brain activity on a temporary basis. Because of this,
hospitals have protocols for determining brain death involving EEGs at
widely separated intervals under defined conditions."
HTHelps.
