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Post by laszlo4new on Nov 25, 2024 22:40:59 GMT
Apologies for not responding to comments and tagging on social democracy. I was away for a few days and my mobile is not very friendly with the site. If there is interest, I will write some comments on it.
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Post by laszlo4new on Nov 25, 2024 22:47:25 GMT
The only catholic priest I had some contact with (he died in 1991) was the one who married my parents and baptised me and my brother.
Oddly, when talking to him.after my grandmother's funeral, he expressed support for assisted dying (it was and it is against the law in Hungary). However, he was a "peace priest" - meaning that while retaining his ethical beliefs (which were rather diverse), he made a consensus with the state socialist regime. Even more oddly, he expressed that he wanted assisted dying (he knew he would die in 12 months), yet, although he had an option (not offical, but potential), he turned it down.
I brought it up only because of the complexities of social norms, norms of segments of societies, and individual values and the inevitable conflicts among these.
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Post by turk on Nov 25, 2024 22:50:54 GMT
Just to be clear re assisted dying it is clearly a subject that needed to be debated in Westminster and the MP’s left to there own conscience when they vote, which I understand is happening.
I have sympathy with a person who is genuinely in pain and near life’s end and wants to hasten there own death as long as that decision is left to the person involved and or the medical profession
However the problem with all acts of Parliament is over the course of time amendments are added I wonder what safeguards will be in the act if it’s passed that stops the gradual erosion of the original bill as we have seen in Canada.
I would also say if I was a doctor I would refuse to hasten death on the principal that I had agreed in principle to the old Hippocratic oath that included the words not to assist suicide or more loosely translated do no harm. I would however try to make that persons pain as manageable as possible.
However that would be my personal decision I certainly would not sit in judgement on any doctor that would administer the fatal drugs that would be for there conscience and I perfectly understand that there view would be I’m stopping that person from suffering a painful death so that justifies my action.
It’s a real shame that palliative care is not of a high countrywide standard I would have liked this debated along side the assisted dying bill.,together with more clarity as to what safety net will be in place for doctors who comply with this law for there mental well being and what legal protection is in place should they be sued by an aggrieved relative.
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Post by lefthanging on Nov 25, 2024 23:03:24 GMT
That's really where the problem starts - life as sacred because it has been created by the deity. That's the illogical hill we need to move off, then we can get to a sensible level of debate Sorry Alec, but the teachings of monotheistic religions have never been uniformly against suicide - and where they were, this was usually grounded in natural law theory. This is basically a form of virtue ethics, ultimately descended from Aristotle, which grounds ethics in the intrinsic nature and telos of human beings - and as such is agnostic as to the question of God's existence and is explicitly opposed to 'divine command' theories of ethics which ground them in belief in a divine law-giver. Nothing to do with life being 'sacred' anyway, which is not really a thought category in the ancient or medieval world. Agree with you on the vanity of obsessing over assisted dying without wanting to do anything to make palliative care and death-prevention more generally better though. |
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Post by mercian on Nov 25, 2024 23:13:58 GMT
Apparently there's a row going on in America because a bloke who's grown his hair long and wears a dress has been elected as a Congress"woman" in the recent elections and wants to use the women's bathrooms. He calls himself "Sarah" McBride but apparently is a biological male (i.e. hasn't become a eunuch or had some sort of pretend vagina fitted). If he had, then it's a different argument. He might genuinely have the delusion that he's a woman but how does a single person's delusion top the apprehension felt by all the real Congresswomen at the thought of a biological man can walk into spaces previously reserved for women? Obviously such mentally deluded people should be tolerated and not persecuted, but society cannot be expected to indulge their illusions. Quos Deus vult perdere, prius dementat but Sarah McBride's response in comparison was notably dignified compared to the rantings of the culture war brigade: “I’m not here to fight about bathrooms, I’m here to fight for Delawareans and to bring down costs facing families. Like all members, I will follow the rules as outlined by Speaker Johnson, even if I disagree with them. This effort to distract from the real issues facing this country hasn’t distracted me over the last several days.” Her statement on X continued: “Serving in the 119th Congress will be the honor of a lifetime, and I continue to look forward to getting to know my future colleagues on both sides of the aisle. Each of us were sent here because voters saw in us something that they value. I have loved seeing those qualities in the future colleagues that I’ve met and I look forward to seeing those qualities in every member come January. I hope all of my colleagues will seek to do the same with me.” McBride of course presents no danger to women. Perhaps right wing commentators might care instead to turn their attention to the president elect, an adjudicated rapist and someone who, like several of his high-level picks for posts, has been accused of multiple sexual assaults. But no, it seems men attacking women and extreme misogyny is just fine with the right. I occasionally express my opinions strongly, but no more so than some other posters who invariably use derogatory nicknames for their political betes-noir. I agree that McBride's statement was dignified, but if someone is mentally disturbed that doesn't mean a lot. How do you know that McBride presents no danger to women? He might not, but that doesn't mean that actual women would not feel a bit apprehensive about sharing a bathroom with a biological man. If the speaker has ruled that he can't and he accepts it, then no problem. As I said, these people deserve sympathy but that doesn't mean everyone else has to pretend to believe their delusions. |
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Post by mercian on Nov 25, 2024 23:26:39 GMT
I have to say I have a small fondness for mercian as he is clearly proud of his 'old fogie out of touch with the modern world' persona and a lot of his posts are tongue in cheek. However, this post is gratuitously offensive and totally uneccesary. You can debate the rights that trans people should have as society and parliament is doing (just as 40 years ago we had wearily had all the same crap about the rights of gay people - Section 28 anyone?) but there's absolutely no defence for this totally obnoxious post. mercian please get a grip! Why's it obnoxious? I said these people should be tolerated. I just don't think their rights should trump everybody else's. |
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Post by mercian on Nov 25, 2024 23:34:24 GMT
mercian Nice of you to visit from the 1950's Do you mean this "Sarah" McBride Btw why have you put Her name in quotation marks it's her name. If I threw on a frock and called myself Brunhilda I don't think I'd look as good. I think you should apply the common principle that seems to elude all right wing bigots that how people regard their sexuality and gender and what they call themselves is nobody's bloody business but their own. View Attachment I put his name in quotation marks because he's a man and it's a girl's name. I agree that how they regard their sexuality and gender is their own business, but the rest of society shouldn't have to adapt to it to the extent of having women's facilities invaded if it upsets even one woman. |
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steve
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Post by steve on Nov 25, 2024 23:44:27 GMT
I have personal experience of what might be described as assisted dying already.
My father had been on dialysis for around 8 years he'd had a fall and was in hospital and basically decided enough is enough, he refused further dialysis which at his age and condition was a guarantee of a relatively quick death,which he was fully aware of.
The hospital placed him on a morphine drip but not until he'd had the opportunity for a dignified goodbye to me and Faith and his grandchildren we had a few minutes of quality time after which he fell asleep and died the next morning without waking again.
My mother on the other hand died in abject terror having spent the last 6 weeks of her life screaming , she was in the severe stages of dementia but her fear wasn't apparently of staying alive it was of dying.
We had lasting power of attorney and I suspect if the assisted dying law had been in place and it permitted us to make a decision at any point in the miserable last 6 months of her life we would have said yes.
But whether this would have honoured her wishes I've no idea.
Both my parents were very old when they died much of their lives had been meaningful to them and I think my father's informed choice was pretty clear but when an individual can't make that decision but appears to be fighting to survive but can't actually tell you their wishes it's an incredibly difficult choice.
It's not a black and white issue, how could it be.
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steve
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Post by steve on Nov 25, 2024 23:46:59 GMT
mercianJohn Wayne's real name was Marion. Did that make him a woman?
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Post by mercian on Nov 25, 2024 23:58:35 GMT
mercian John Wayne's real name was Marion. Did that make him a woman? No, just that his parents were weird, or it's not a gender-specific name in the USA. There are quite a few anomalies like this. For instance I understand that Robin is usually a woman's name in the USA, which they must find confusing if they hear takes of Robin Hood. |
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Post by lens on Nov 26, 2024 0:08:02 GMT
The expectation is that the cost of heat pumps will decline anyway with economies of scale, and as the numbers of engineers trained to fit them goes up. But we will be in the kickstarter phase for quite a while - which implies subsidies........ Nowadays, solar makes most sense when combined with home battery storage. The fall in the cost of the latter can't be underestimated. It means when solar panels are generating more electricity than the house demands, save it for use when there's no sun. But it doesn't end there. As well as from your own solar, it enables charging the battery in the middle of the night from the grid when kWh costs can be very low, and may mean never having to pay standard rate for any electricity ever again. But it comes at the cost of capital upfront, for much reduced ongoing costs in future. A bit pointless trying to give exact figures as there may be so many case by case variables, and heat pumps just add one more variable to the equation. The cost of electricity vs gas is a barrier currently too :- www.hvnplus.co.uk/news/european-heat-pump-study-backs-urgent-uk-cuts-in-electricity-costs-01-08-2024/ - absolutely true, but also why heat pumps combined with battery storage and solar are such a good combination. Specced right, it can mean a kWh cost roughly the same (even lower) than for gas, and for the electricity used by the heat pump you also get the multiplier effect where a kWh of electricity gives the same heating as 3-4kWh of gas. |
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steve
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Post by steve on Nov 26, 2024 0:19:15 GMT
Mercian
Marion is a women's name in the U.S. If you're interested look up why Marion Morrison was named such.
Robyn is the usual female derivative in the U.S. Robin as in Robin Williams is normally given to males.
But it's gender neutral in most countries.
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Post by graham on Nov 26, 2024 0:20:50 GMT
Whatever the law might say, if someone is determined to end their lives , a way can be found.Quite a few people in Care Homes simply decide to 'give up' on life - perhaps not long after losing a spouse etc. They stop accepting food etc and within a few weeks they drift away. Of course, it is not like taking a lethal injection or whatever , but it does happen a lot.
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Danny
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Post by Danny on Nov 26, 2024 6:04:29 GMT
In answer to my question-will you still be stopping the sale of gas boilers in 2030, he said I dont think so. They will have to change that policy and revert to gas for many homes, which will mean a change to energy policy-a longer gas transition ( including UK produced gas) to nuclear. Im still waiting for anyone to explain how a technology which produces electrcity 24 hours a day at the same cost as turning it off (ie turning it off saves essentially no cost), is suitable to replace gas as our fuel source. It guarantees we will not transition to renewables, because once a nuclear plant has been built at great cost, there is no benefit in turning it off however bright the sun is or windy to drive turbines. If leccy was cheap and plentiful enough, you wouldn’t need a heat pump for those buildings, old-fashioned leccy heating could suffice. Storage heaters etc… Indeed, which is why nuclear is a problem, its not cheap taking into account lifetime costs. |
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Post by jib on Nov 26, 2024 6:14:03 GMT
In answer to my question-will you still be stopping the sale of gas boilers in 2030, he said I dont think so. They will have to change that policy and revert to gas for many homes, which will mean a change to energy policy-a longer gas transition ( including UK produced gas) to nuclear. Im still waiting for anyone to explain how a technology which produces electrcity 24 hours a day at the same cost as turning it off (ie turning it off saves essentially no cost), is sitable to replace gas as our fuel source. It guarantees we will not transition to renewables, because once a nuclear plant has been built at great cost, there is no benefit in turning it off however bright the sun is or windy to drive turbines. To be fair to nuclear, it would deliver a base load level of power which would support industry etc. However, I remain to be convinced that the economics of nuclear add up* and that isn't cheaper just to build more undersea cables and buy nuclear energy from the French. Let them deal with the legacy. * especially considering how expensive it is construct anything in the UK with our bloated inefficient civil engineering sector. |
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Post by jib on Nov 26, 2024 6:16:18 GMT
According to the Telegraph;
"Court drops Trump’s election interference case
President-elect also freed from investigation into alleged retention of sensitive documents"
#thatdidn'tgotoplan
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steve
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Post by steve on Nov 26, 2024 6:16:52 GMT
The village idiot elect vows punitive tariffs on Canada , Mexico and China, he still hasn't grasped that it's Americans who pay these tariffs .
Needless to say Canada ,Mexico and China are the US's three largest export markets and the maniac in a repeat of national shoot yourself in the foot day is planning to impose trade sanctions on himself.
Estimates are that this particular stupidity will cost an average American family $2000+ a year.
But cheaper eggs!
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neilj
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Post by neilj on Nov 26, 2024 6:39:55 GMT
steveAgree Some thought it was the usual Trump nonsense during the election campaign that he would introduce such punitive tariff, I'm not so sure he won't. What I am certain of is in a trade war everyone loses www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/nov/25/trump-mexico-canada-tariffs-borderDonald Trump said on Monday he would sign an executive order imposing a 25% tariff on all products coming in to the United States from Mexico and Canada, and additional tariffs on China.
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Danny
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Post by Danny on Nov 26, 2024 6:47:45 GMT
There are a range of reasons for having an air source heat pump. I'm having one installed in January. Cost to me (after govt grant of 7.5k and a range of incentives from Octopus) is 6.1k This includes installation, a new hot water tank and 7 new radiators. Thats very cheap compared to typical costs quoted in the media. Some people have issues about installing the equipment, but everyone has a problem with the cost. Although simply replacing the boiler is just £2k, and thats before we consider any subsidy you are getting. (so with the same subsidy you could have a condensing gas boiler and pocket £4,000) Ah. Your situation isnt so bad, but heat pump does make sense for people who are unable to use fossil fuels, so no mains gas, no garden for an oil tank etc. Isnt that a very generous export price by modern standards? An early offer? At your rate it might actually be cheaper to sell the electricity and buy gas?(were that an option) It seems you are already heavily invested in alternative energy sources. But surely any kind of local burning of solid fuels is very expensive compared to other heat sources? If you have your own scrub woodland then it may make sense (as I used to), but not if you are buying it in. Hmm. 21 sounds hot to me, certainly from the economy point of view and government recommend 18C. You must be a higher than average energy user. Also, while its likely cheaper per KWH of delivered heat to run heating 24 hours a day, its always more costly than only running it part time. I dont think you are a typical customer. Of course this makes a lot of difference, most people arent, and when they are they spend quite a bit of it tucked up in bed. Obviously depends what you mean by 'lower temperature', but at the same temperture, no it doesnt use more energy. Thats fundamental physics. Part of why your quote seems cheap is most people do not replace their radiators, which they needed to do to take advantage of switching to condensing boilers 20 years ago. Heat pumps work effectively at even lower temperatures than condensing boilers so the issue is worse if you go that way, of course. You have some special circumstances, but in general its never going to make back the costs for most people unless the cost of gas shoots up or cost of installation plummets. The latter is significantly limited by the chicken and egg problem of volume production, the shortage of plumbers coupled with it always being a one-off labour intensive process to install the kit. Oh, and whatever your fuel, the best investment is insulation so the expensive heat doesn't just escape. Which is why the best decarbonisation method has always been attic insulation where that is inadequate. Then cavity wall, double glazing, even under floor and external cladding (but those last two are getting quite destructive and expensive for retrofitting). Although there is a big problem with making a house energy efficient: owners tend to do as you have done and turn up the thermostat a bit, thereby defeating the energy savings. People tend to have a fixed budget rather than fixed desired temperature.
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Danny
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Post by Danny on Nov 26, 2024 6:50:04 GMT
barbaraGood luck with all that doing it from scratch including solar panels and battery storage and the heat pump at I assume around £15000+ total would unfortunately be beyond most families to afford. There is another problem here which quite a lot of people may face: If their electricty supply needs uprating then that may mean delays and significant additional expense. |
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Danny
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Post by Danny on Nov 26, 2024 6:55:34 GMT
Incidentally while we're Turk bashing. He has no all idea of how hard or long I or anyone else here have worked but I suspect I'm in limited company as someone who experienced attempts on their life at least three times while carrying out my job. I take your point, I hope I supported it in a post recently, but you did at least get training in self defence. Similarly very high risk being a soldier. |
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Danny
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Post by Danny on Nov 26, 2024 6:58:59 GMT
it still seems that renewables will pay for themselves in the end Depends how long the equipment lasts... |
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Danny
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Post by Danny on Nov 26, 2024 7:09:35 GMT
Religion is a personal thing. Let other people have their personal things. The problem comes when religions include as part of their faith the need to persuade others they are right, save their souls by force if necessary etc. And then of course, positions of power alway attract people who like using power, so press their followers to do more. |
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Danny
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Post by Danny on Nov 26, 2024 7:14:55 GMT
Assisted dying vote going to be very close: If the bill is lost it will see another drop in support for the new labour government. |
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Danny
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Post by Danny on Nov 26, 2024 7:17:04 GMT
Ah, but thats because government needed to privatise the electricity industry so that private owners could make lots of profit from it. Core conservative policy, and labour dont seem keen to claw back that private sector profit either. |
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Post by shevii on Nov 26, 2024 7:52:09 GMT
steve Agree Some thought it was the usual Trump nonsense during the election campaign that he would introduce such punitive tariff, I'm not so sure he won't. What I am certain of is in a trade war everyone loses www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/nov/25/trump-mexico-canada-tariffs-borderDonald Trump said on Monday he would sign an executive order imposing a 25% tariff on all products coming in to the United States from Mexico and Canada, and additional tariffs on China. It's a strange argument Trump is using- no surprise there! But not sure about the "everybody loses". America has a significant trade deficit with Mexico, a smaller one with Canada and a huge one with China. So we're into the argument of whether the jobs that might be returned to USA are of more benefit than the loss of trade and jobs lost there. This is complex and depends on a lot of different factors but having watched manufacturing jobs disappear in the UK and deprivation grow as no alternatives were found other than gig economy jobs, I don't think it's right to simply dismiss tariffs as being of no benefit to anyone. It's not impossible that "working class" voters in the US do benefit from this proposal and middle class consumers are the ones who end up paying the most. |
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Post by hireton on Nov 26, 2024 7:57:13 GMT
That's really where the problem starts - life as sacred because it has been created by the deity. That's the illogical hill we need to move off, then we can get to a sensible level of debate Sorry Alec, but the teachings of monotheistic religions have never been uniformly against suicide - and where they were, this was usually grounded in natural law theory. This is basically a form of virtue ethics, ultimately descended from Aristotle, which grounds ethics in the intrinsic nature and telos of human beings - and as such is agnostic as to the question of God's existence and is explicitly opposed to 'divine command' theories of ethics which ground them in belief in a divine law-giver. Nothing to do with life being 'sacred' anyway, which is not really a thought category in the ancient or medieval world. Agree with you on the vanity of obsessing over assisted dying without wanting to do anything to make palliative care and death-prevention more generally better though. Except that view is fundamental to the Roman Catholic church's opposition to assisted dying. This is from the Archbishop of Westminster's pastoral letter: "But this proposed legislation is quite different. It seeks to give a person of sound will and mind the right to act in a way that is clearly contrary to a fundamental truth: our life is not our own possession, to dispose of as we feel fit." He also says suffering is good for you: "The suffering of a human being is not meaningless. It does not destroy that dignity. It is an intrinsic part of our human journey, a journey embraced by the Eternal Word of God, Christ Jesus himself. He brings our humanity to its full glory precisely through the gateway of suffering and death." |
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neilj
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Post by neilj on Nov 26, 2024 7:58:07 GMT
steve Agree Some thought it was the usual Trump nonsense during the election campaign that he would introduce such punitive tariff, I'm not so sure he won't. What I am certain of is in a trade war everyone loses www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/nov/25/trump-mexico-canada-tariffs-borderDonald Trump said on Monday he would sign an executive order imposing a 25% tariff on all products coming in to the United States from Mexico and Canada, and additional tariffs on China. It's a strange argument Trump is using- no surprise there! But not sure about the "everybody loses". America has a significant trade deficit with Mexico, a smaller one with Canada and a huge one with China. So we're into the argument of whether the jobs that might be returned to USA are of more benefit than the loss of trade and jobs lost there. This is complex and depends on a lot of different factors but having watched manufacturing jobs disappear in the UK and deprivation grow as no alternatives were found other than gig economy jobs, I don't think it's right to simply dismiss tariffs as being of no benefit to anyone. It's not impossible that "working class" voters in the US do benefit from this proposal and middle class consumers are the ones who end up paying the most. You're missing the elephant in the room, inflation, which this will cause. Inflation does disproportionately effect the less well off who need to spend most of their money on basic items Also the supply lines between the US, Canada and Mexico are complex, with production often split between the countries and components transferred between them Lastly this will almost certainly cause retaliatory tariffs, which will effect companies in the US |
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neilj
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Post by neilj on Nov 26, 2024 8:17:40 GMT
Excellent thread on blusky about who wins and loses from the status quo of inheritance tax rules - and about ‘sub-optimal’ journalism bsky.app/profile/torstenbell.bsky.social/post/3lbrypqm5yk2fIn short the Times ran a ‘news’ piece on the demonstration in Westminster by farmers opposed to changes to inheritance tax. It's a typical Times one sided piece www.thetimes.com/uk/environment/article/tractors-break-through-barricades-in-whitehall-as-up-to-20000-farmers-fight-iht-betrayal-vdrv353djThey tell the story of John Kemp-Welch. Here’s how he’s described: “Kemp-Welch, 88, who owns 5,000 acres of "difficult hill farming land" in Perthshire where he and his children farm blackface sheep Clear impression is of someone who’s given their life to farming. They quote him sympathetically saying “It's not easy. Farming in Scotland is very tough but we are determined to go on." However, that same John Kemp-Welch managed to be chair of the London Stock Exchange from 1994 to 2000 Before that? He spent over three decades at the stockbroker Cazenove. After his period at the stock exchanges he joined the board of HSBC. The Times might want to at least consider the fact that stockbroker, banker, or businessmen would be better labels, at least to sit alongside that of struggling 'farmer’ |
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colin
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Post by colin on Nov 26, 2024 8:57:31 GMT
It’s a real shame that palliative care is not of a high countrywide standard I would have liked this debated along side the assisted dying bill.,together with more clarity as to what safety net will be in place for doctors who comply with this law for there mental well being and what legal protection is in place should they be sued by an aggrieved relative. Yes I agree. And i would like to know if there is any level of pain which cannot be relieved by the cocktail of drugs administered in a Hospice or hospital. The one I am familiar and have seen in use is morphine but i am sure there are others. If the answer to this question is none , then the desire for assisted suicide is being brought about by inadequate palliative care. Which can be fixed. If the answer is yes , and unlikely to be other than yes for the foreseeable future , then the case for state assisted suicide becomes greater in my mind. There are of course many other issues to be addressed about how that suicide is made available ; who is to be killed and why. |
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