The Damage That Doctors Do

[Gosso]

I was just thinking of something that may apply here, lets call it the "Damaged Beyond Natural Repair Threshold ".  If we choose to live or are raised with a certain lifestyle that is damaging to our bodies, then at some point the body will be unable to self-repair this damage.  I realize this threshold may be blurry or transitional, but I believe the body/mind can only be put through so much stress until it breaks.  Once someones passes this point then they will require the help of doctors, medication, surgery, etc.  No amount of Tony Robbins tapes will help them once they cross this point, although it wouldn't hurt 

I have no idea how we determine if someone has crossed this threshold...I'm just a simple-minded engineer.

Of course people can be born "broken" as well, or are genetically at a higher risk for diseases. 

The whole thing seems really tricky to me--I do not envy the decisions the doctors must make.

[stone]

smurf, I'm struck by the fact that horses will typically eat themselves to death within hours of breaking into a food store. Our way of dealing with that is to make sure that horse food stores are kept bolted up so that horses can't get in. The horses have no adverse emotional issues or genetic defects. A happy, healthy horse simply is programed in a way that means that it can't cope with unlimited access to concentrated food. As people we are not as extreme as horses but I think we are closer than some people make out. I think there is some value in acknowledging that many happy, healthy people benefit from in effect bolting their own access to concentrated food. Perhaps embracing this in a matter of fact way is better than getting hung up about it and seeing it as some deep problem rather than seeing it in the trivial way that we do with horses

[smurff]

It would be nice to embrace that way of thinking about it.  It's hard, because the humans would be doing the padlocking of the kitchen cabinet against their own selves (and they would still have access to the keys).

I saw a documentary on TV once about Prader–Willi syndrome.  It's a genetic disease (involving a missing or silenced gene) with many symptoms, most obvious being an almost unlimited appetite and the often morbid obesity that thus develops.  Apparently most of the people with this disease are undiagnosed and don't know they have it.  Here in the States it's often diagnosed after neighbor and relative calls to child protective services for state intervention because of the severe obesity of the children suffering with it.

Anyway I remember on the documentary that the only way the family was able to manage the child's appetite was by feeding regular balanced meals, then putting padlocks on the refrigerator, freezer, and all the kitchen cabinets and then mentally tuning out all the screaming demands for food.

[AdamA]

For anyone interested, this book is a quick, very entertaining read that addresses this topic wonderfully. 

Probably would take the average person 2-3 hrs to finish.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/141655154 ... mdp_mobile

It's called "Hippocrates Shadow."