Human life is over-valued

[pmccarthy]

In various threads here we have vigorous discussion about car safety systems, rules of warfare and so on. Most are based on the modern idea that human lives are valuable and must be protected at great monetary and social cost. Any analysis of history before recent decades shows this was not true. Wars wasted millions of lives. Cars without complex safety systems caused more deaths. Miners died underground. People lived in cheap uninsulated houses.

 

The current cosseted generations expect their lives to be cotton wool protected. It is nonsense. Life was better when I could drive a VW beetle, have a few beers at a pub on Sunday before driving home, enjoy cracker night, afford an asbestos house. All the expense and constraint of the modern world do not stop people dying - there is only one way out of this world.

[nomadpete]

Hey you sure know how to get the ball rolling.

Well done!

[Bruce Tuncks]

When I was at engineering school last century, the value of a life was $50,000. This was never explicitly stated but you could figure it out from how much extra you should spend on a road to save a life.

One of my fav discussion subjects is the value of a life to a ww1 general. I reckon it was much less than $50,000. In fact I reckon they had to lose a lot of soldiers every week to stop their logistics from failing.

[octave]

40 minutes ago, pmccarthy said:

Life was better when I could drive a VW beetle, have a few beers at a pub on Sunday before driving home, enjoy cracker night, afford an asbestos house.

 

 

That is a personal point of view. I don't think I was happier when I was 20, probably the opposite. Of course, when I was 20 I had much more of a future ahead of me and my back never ached and I did not need to take any medication but this does not mean I was happier.                                                                                                                                               

Modern concern for life is not just this binary dead or alive proposition. My grandfather died of asbestoses.  Now we don't use asbestos.   If asbestos had been restricted earlier he probably would have lived longer but the more important thing is he would have had to endure an awful death.  Modern safety is not just about avoiding or delaying death but also quality of life and avoidance of unnecessary suffering. I like others here probably take one or more medications per day to keep me going.   This comes at a cost to society.   Judgments are made about what medicines society will subsidize and what treatments society will offer.   For whatever reason society subsidizes the drugs I take that extend life but more importantly, allow me to live an enjoyable active life. Thanks, society,

 

I am about to travel interstate to visit my 90 yo mother who is in aged care.  Her care is subsidized by society and it would be much cheaper not to bother.   The important thing to me is not how long she lives but whether she suffers. In traveling interstate, I know I can be pretty certain I will arrive safely at my destination because modern airline travel has become so safe. 

 

I might be unusual but I think in most aspects modern life is better.   When my son was born the odds of him or my wife dying were quite small unlike in the past.  In the past, we wouldn't even have been having this conversation with people we have not met in all corners of the country.

 

Whether things are better or not now can be measured in many ways but whether an individual is happier now than in the past is a personal thing.  I guess maybe I am lucky that I am pretty happy.

 

Anyway got to catch a plane for a very safe and probably not too unpleasant flight.  

 

 

 

[pmccarthy]

Not a single death has ever been prevented. Only postponed.

[old man emu]

It's taken 13.4 billion years to produce me. That's a pretty large investment in time, experimentation and product development. I might not know anyone in Gaza, or the Ukraine or an inhabited tropical island in the Pacific, but each of those people is here by the same processes that got me here. Therefore, I think their lives have the same value a mine.

 

1 hour ago, Bruce Tuncks said:

the value of a life was $50,000. This was never explicitly stated but you could figure it out from how much extra you should spend on a road to save a life.

The monetary value of a life is as hard to figure as the results of a One-Dayer using the Duckworth-Lewis method. Does my life at three score years and ten have a different value than my sub-teen grandchildren?

[facthunter]

You can still do plenty of things that are dangerous and will scare you, but I don't want your actions to endanger ME, PMC.  and the Person you portrayed is  a menace to the rest of us. We are a society with standards and laws to protect Innocent People from  drink drivers and unsafe cars. Saying Peoples LIVES have little value can and will lead to some outrageous, uncivilised, antisocial  behaviour.  that many would not want.  Nev

[octave]

25 minutes ago, pmccarthy said:

Not a single death has ever been prevented. Only postponed.

But pain and suffering are often averted or diminished.

[facthunter]

PMC would you like to live where life has little value?   Nev

[Bruce Tuncks]

I reckon that your life sure is worth less than those teens OME. Yet we value our old carcasses just the same...  silly huh. We should all be trying out for hitmen, on account of how we will die anyway soon enough.

 

[nomadpete]

12 minutes ago, octave said:

But pain and suffering are often averted or diminished.

The question  did not raise the issue of 'what value does human suffering have'.

That is a valid, and connected, but different question.

 

To address the real question, I would first need clarification as to 'from what perspective' ?

 

Human life or any other animal's life has little or no value to Gaia or to the universe.

 

My human life has so much value to me that I cannot over value it..

[Bruce Tuncks]

I have half a recollection that suicide is common among educated oldies, and this is correct I reckon.....  in fact, suicide should be encouraged and enabled for oldies. They are completely different from youngies.

The only problem is how to stop impatient inheritors from bumping off the oldies who don't want to go.

[nomadpete]

Do we as a society over value human life?

 

I do not believe we genuinely place much value on other humans lives.

[nomadpete]

1 minute ago, Bruce Tuncks said:

They are completely different from youngies.

Why do you say that older humans have less value than young ones? I can't  see how they are completely different apart from some age related issues late in life.

[octave]

The original post mentions cars and safety systems. My point is that modern safety systems are there to reduce deaths by accident but they are also there to reduce pain and suffering.  You could argue for things like random breath testing solely from a standpoint of reducing injuries and suffering, the side effects may also be reducing mortality.     The value of modern safety standards in not merely postponing death.   The value of life is not just about life and death but the quality of living.

[nomadpete]

I agree that quality of life is a reason to live. Therefore it has a lot of value. But society does not coherently place a value on it.

 

I interpreted the thread as questioning how much society values 'life vs death'.

[facthunter]

The survival instinct it strong  in every living thing. Thats why those life  forms still exist today.. In any case it's no one's right to decide such existential matters  and IMPOSE it on others. You speak of doing what you WANT   but it can't be JUST you can it?   Nev

[old man emu]

1 hour ago, Bruce Tuncks said:

I reckon that your life sure is worth less than those teens OME.

Would it surprise you that I agree with you? I look at my grandchildren and revel in their application of their potential. I have one grandson who I tried to teach for years to catch and throw. He couldn't catch bus. Now a couple of months ago he was introduced to baseball. I'm told that now he could catch a speeding bullet and hit a ball "outta de park". Academically, he's average, but out of school he's a thinker and a "whatffer". I reckon he'll do OK.

 

The only sadness I have on reviewing my life is my failure to have been able to instil the Life lessons that hard knocks have taught me into my children. Luckily they have absorbed my morality, which I absorbed from my parents. They have modified it a tad to suit new social mores, but they have not wandered far from the path I set them on. The sadness comes from the failure of at least one of them to attend to the things that protect against Life's vicissitudes - making a Will, getting Super or Life Assurance, and paying taxes. These are things that we encounter in those years when our kids are too young to realise the importance of those things. We have learned about them, but when we try to emphasise the importance of getting one's paperwork in order, our words are just the mumblings of a fool.

[nomadpete]

1 hour ago, old man emu said:

The only sadness I have on reviewing my life is my failure to have been able to instil the Life lessons that hard knocks have taught me into my children.

I can't resist  - ME TOO!

I'm sure I could have saved my progeny a lot of headaches!

 

Maybe that is the penalty for retrospect. The older you get, the more you have.

 

We all start life with great potential. i do not measure the value of life by the potential one might have.

 

Unfortunately the nature of life is that whenever we make a choice, it automatically denies some potential or other in a different arena.

 

So it follows;-

Early in life, the world is filled with so many exciting possibilities. (Potential)

 

Late in life we see so many missed opportunities. (Reality)

 

 

[Bruce Tuncks]

Of course we have less life in front of us than the young have. If a day of life is worth say $1000 dollars, then our old carcasses are not worth as much.

But it's not how we feel....  I reckon that my life is better now than before and I doubt that I would go back ( memory wiped) if I could...  well maybe to the start of retirement, but not before too much.

I was very lucky to retire young, and I reckon life has been wonderful ever since, and I actually had a good job!

[red750]

When I consider the number of people who have passed at a younger, often much younger, age than I am, I consider myself lucky and blessed. I am not wanting to die, but when it happens, I hope it is without suffering. I don't wish to live to "a ripe old age", as there are not many more things I want to do, and a few of those I can't do, for other reasons.  I would be happy to go to bed one night and not wake up, or as I have said in the past, to doze off in the shade of a tree and not wake up. I feel for whomever discovers me, and the family I leave behind, but they have all dealt with loss of a loved one at some stage, and will cope with it. Others will hopefully remember me for a short while but memories will fade.

[octave]

As I get older the fact I have less future life to look forward is compensated by the years of life I have already enjoyed.  I have achievements and good times to look back on. Obviously I am not done yet but the future although still with potential to achieve things has less time and possibilities, I am fine with that.

[spacesailor]

Consider this ! .

Now the ' government ' force's " compulsory " medication down out throat . Why doesn't it just terminate our, 

lives at a ' predetermined ' age . Hopefully at a much later age than " Logans Run " .

Say; in the ' next ' generation or two , when the population has surpassed ,the Earth's ability to sustain any more .

spacesailor

 

[facthunter]

At this stage I'm at I'm not going to change the world, but someone needs to. I don't care who gets the credit for it. Nev

[spacesailor]

It's all GOD'S fault .

He gave the young , " bendy-bones, tireless energy , good ears & eye's .

EVERYTHING 

We Oldies " need. " .

spacesailor