21
" Technological society has forgotten what scholars call the 'dying role' and its importance to people as life approaches its end. People want to share memories, pass on wisdoms and keepsakes, settle relationships, establish their legacies, make peace with God, and ensure that those who are left behind will be okay. They want to end their stories on their own terms. This role is, observers argue, among life's most important, for both the dying and those left behind. And if it is, the way we deny people this role, out of obtuseness and neglect, is cause for everlasting shame. Over and over, we in medicine inflict deep gouges at the end of people's lives and then stand oblivious to the harm done. "
― Atul Gawande , Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End
25
" Prophecy of Balance (Year of the Cat)
“There must be balance,” Source repeated,
“For mankind to flourish on the Earth-Throne he’s seated.”
His life is a gift from the gods, they created,
And the power to wield choice, but the outcome is weighted.
Seeing the harm and chaos humans manifest,
Wore heavily upon the goodness within their immortal breast.
But the gods disagreed, and two groups they split,
Each one possessing their own talent and wit.
One side fights for freedom of Man’s soul,
But the other wants slavery, and Man to control.
So Source cried, “Enough! Now Observers will be sent,
To assist with human minds you’ve cleverly bent!”
For balance, the pendulum won’t sway too far to one side,
And Universal Laws each god must abide.
The gods agreed, but did not stop with their plan,
To influence mankind as much as they can. "
― Kendi Thompson , Year of the Cat: The Thirteenth Realm (Book 1)
28
" Where there were once several competing approaches to medicine, there is now only one that matters to most hospitals, insurers, and the vast majority of the public. One that has been shaped to a great degree by the successful development of potent cures that followed the discovery of sulfa drugs. Aspiring caregivers today are chosen as much (or more) for their scientific abilities, their talent for mastering these manifold technological and pharmaceutical advances as for their interpersonal skills. A century ago most physicians were careful, conservative observers who provided comfort to patients and their families. Today they act: They prescribe, they treat, they cure. They routinely perform what were once considered miracles. The result, in the view of some, has been a shift in the profession from caregiver to technician. The powerful new drugs changed how care was given as well as who gave it. "
― Thomas Hager , The Demon Under the Microscope: From Battlefield Hospitals to Nazi Labs, One Doctor's Heroic Search for the World's First Miracle Drug
31
" The term terrorism is widely misused. It is utilized in its generic sense as a form of shorthand by governments and the media and is applied to a variety of acts and occurrences that approximate terrorism in form but not in substance or, worse yet, that have no real resemblance to terrorism at all. Terrorism, if nothing else, is violence, or threats of violence, but it is not mindless violence, as some observers have charged. Usually, when employed in a political context, it represents a calculated series of actions designed to intimidate and sow fear through-out a target population in an effort to produce a pervasive atmosphere of insecurity, a widespread condition of anxiety. A terrorist campaign that causes a significant threshold of fear among the target population may achieve its aims. In some instances, terrorism is potentially a more effective, especially from a cost-benefit perspective, strategy that conventional or guerrilla warfare, however, the goal of terrorism is not to destroy the opposing side but instead to break its will and force it to capitulate. "
― Neil Livingstone