- re: some outstandingly confused thinking. Or writing.
On Sat, 23 Jun 2001 15:25:31 GMT, mackeral@remove~this~first~yahoo.com
(J. Williams) wrote:
[ snip; Slate reference, etcetera ]
> ... My mother was 91 years
> old when she died a year ago and chain smoked since her college days.
> She defended the tobacco companies for years saying, "it didn't hurt
> me." She outlived most of her doctors. Upon quoting statistics and
> research on the subject, her view was that I, like other "do gooders
> and non-smokers," wanted to deny smokers their rights.
What statistics would her view quote? to show that someone
wants to deny smokers 'their rights'?
[ Hey, I didn't write the sentence ....]
I just love it, how a 'natural right' works out to be *exactly*
what the speaker wants to do. And not a whit more.
(Thomas and Scalia are probably going to give us tons
of that bad philosophy, over the next decades.)
What rights are denied to smokers? You know, you can't
build your outhouse right on the riverbank, either.
> Obviously,
> there is a health connection. How strong that connection is, is what
> makes this a unique statistical conundrum.
How strong is that connection? Well, quite strong.
I once considered that it might not be so bad to die 9 years
early, owing to smoking, if that cut off years of bad health
and suffering. Then I realized, the smoking grants you
most of the bad health of old age, EARLY. (You do miss
the Alzheimer's.) One day, I might give up smoking my pipe.
What is the statistical conundrum? I can almost
imagine an ethical conundrum. ("How strongly can
we legislate, to encourage cyclists to wear helmets?")
I sure don't spot a statistical conundrum.
Is this word intended? If so, how so?
--
Rich Ulrich, [EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.pitt.edu/~wpilib/index.html
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