Trump
- kcar - Apr 25, 2024 - 10:53pm
Joe Biden
- kurtster - Apr 25, 2024 - 9:24pm
SCOTUS
- islander - Apr 25, 2024 - 9:19pm
Wordle - daily game
- NoEnzLefttoSplit - Apr 25, 2024 - 9:07pm
The Obituary Page
- RParadise - Apr 25, 2024 - 8:44pm
NY Times Strands
- maryte - Apr 25, 2024 - 3:43pm
NYTimes Connections
- maryte - Apr 25, 2024 - 3:34pm
Talk Behind Their Backs Forum
- islander - Apr 25, 2024 - 2:28pm
Breaking News
- islander - Apr 25, 2024 - 2:25pm
Things You Thought Today
- Manbird - Apr 25, 2024 - 2:12pm
Poetry Forum
- Manbird - Apr 25, 2024 - 12:30pm
Neil Young
- buddy - Apr 25, 2024 - 11:57am
Ask an Atheist
- R_P - Apr 25, 2024 - 11:02am
Mixtape Culture Club
- miamizsun - Apr 25, 2024 - 10:36am
Afghanistan
- R_P - Apr 25, 2024 - 10:26am
Israel
- R_P - Apr 25, 2024 - 10:06am
Science in the News
- Red_Dragon - Apr 25, 2024 - 10:00am
Today in History
- Red_Dragon - Apr 25, 2024 - 9:56am
What the hell OV?
- miamizsun - Apr 25, 2024 - 9:46am
The Abortion Wars
- Isabeau - Apr 25, 2024 - 9:27am
Radio Paradise Comments
- Isabeau - Apr 25, 2024 - 9:21am
Photography Forum - Your Own Photos
- Proclivities - Apr 25, 2024 - 7:33am
Vinyl Only Spin List
- ColdMiser - Apr 25, 2024 - 7:15am
What's that smell?
- Manbird - Apr 24, 2024 - 10:27pm
Song of the Day
- oldviolin - Apr 24, 2024 - 10:20pm
April 2024 Photo Theme - Happenstance
- oldviolin - Apr 24, 2024 - 9:50pm
260,000 Posts in one thread?
- NoEnzLefttoSplit - Apr 24, 2024 - 10:55am
Would you drive this car for dating with ur girl?
- rgio - Apr 24, 2024 - 8:44am
TV shows you watch
- Beaker - Apr 24, 2024 - 7:32am
The Moon
- haresfur - Apr 23, 2024 - 9:29pm
Dialing 1-800-Manbird
- Bill_J - Apr 23, 2024 - 7:15pm
China
- R_P - Apr 23, 2024 - 5:35pm
Economix
- islander - Apr 23, 2024 - 12:11pm
USA! USA! USA!
- R_P - Apr 23, 2024 - 11:05am
One Partying State - Wyoming News
- sunybuny - Apr 23, 2024 - 6:53am
YouTube: Music-Videos
- Red_Dragon - Apr 22, 2024 - 7:42pm
Ukraine
- haresfur - Apr 22, 2024 - 6:19pm
songs that ROCK!
- Steely_D - Apr 22, 2024 - 1:50pm
Bug Reports & Feature Requests
- q4Fry - Apr 22, 2024 - 11:57am
Republican Party
- R_P - Apr 22, 2024 - 9:36am
Mini Meetups - Post Here!
- ScottFromWyoming - Apr 22, 2024 - 8:59am
Malaysia
- dcruzj - Apr 22, 2024 - 7:30am
Canada
- westslope - Apr 22, 2024 - 6:23am
Russia
- NoEnzLefttoSplit - Apr 22, 2024 - 1:03am
Broccoli for cats - you gotta see this!
- Bill_J - Apr 21, 2024 - 6:16pm
Name My Band
- DaveInSaoMiguel - Apr 21, 2024 - 3:06pm
Main Mix Playlist
- thisbody - Apr 21, 2024 - 12:04pm
George Orwell
- oldviolin - Apr 21, 2024 - 11:36am
• • • The Once-a-Day • • •
- oldviolin - Apr 20, 2024 - 7:44pm
What Did You See Today?
- Welly - Apr 20, 2024 - 4:50pm
Radio Paradise on multiple Echo speakers via an Alexa Rou...
- victory806 - Apr 20, 2024 - 2:11pm
Libertarian Party
- R_P - Apr 20, 2024 - 11:18am
Remembering the Good Old Days
- kurtster - Apr 20, 2024 - 2:37am
Words I didn't know...yrs ago
- Bill_J - Apr 19, 2024 - 7:06pm
Things that make you go Hmmmm.....
- Bill_J - Apr 19, 2024 - 6:59pm
Baseball, anyone?
- Red_Dragon - Apr 19, 2024 - 6:51pm
MILESTONES: Famous People, Dead Today, Born Today, Etc.
- Bill_J - Apr 19, 2024 - 6:44pm
2024 Elections!
- steeler - Apr 19, 2024 - 5:49pm
Country Up The Bumpkin
- KurtfromLaQuinta - Apr 19, 2024 - 7:55am
how do you feel right now?
- miamizsun - Apr 19, 2024 - 6:02am
When I need a Laugh I ...
- miamizsun - Apr 19, 2024 - 5:43am
Live Music
- oldviolin - Apr 18, 2024 - 3:24pm
What Makes You Laugh?
- oldviolin - Apr 18, 2024 - 2:49pm
Robots
- miamizsun - Apr 18, 2024 - 2:18pm
Museum Of Bad Album Covers
- Steve - Apr 18, 2024 - 6:58am
Europe
- haresfur - Apr 17, 2024 - 6:47pm
Business as Usual
- black321 - Apr 17, 2024 - 1:48pm
Magic Eye optical Illusions
- Proclivities - Apr 17, 2024 - 10:08am
Just for the Haiku of it. . .
- oldviolin - Apr 17, 2024 - 9:01am
HALF A WORLD
- oldviolin - Apr 17, 2024 - 8:52am
Little known information... maybe even facts
- R_P - Apr 16, 2024 - 3:29pm
WTF??!!
- rgio - Apr 16, 2024 - 5:23am
Australia has Disappeared
- haresfur - Apr 16, 2024 - 4:58am
Earthquake
- miamizsun - Apr 16, 2024 - 4:46am
It's the economy stupid.
- miamizsun - Apr 16, 2024 - 4:28am
|
Index »
Entertainment »
Books »
Oliver Sacks on Learning He Has Terminal Cancer
|
|
R_P
Gender:
|
Posted:
Feb 26, 2015 - 7:32am |
|
|
|
meower
Location: i believe, i believe, it's silly, but I believe Gender:
|
Posted:
Feb 23, 2015 - 5:02am |
|
A most amazing man.
|
|
R_P
Gender:
|
Posted:
Feb 21, 2015 - 1:04pm |
|
|
|
ScottN
Location: Half inch above the K/T boundary Gender:
|
Posted:
Feb 21, 2015 - 11:07am |
|
I too learned of Sacks' condition a few days ago. Sad. Yet...
This man who was such a fine example of the the richness of living may now be an exemplar of the dignity of one's dying. Nevertheless: sad, very sad.
|
|
R_P
Gender:
|
Posted:
Feb 21, 2015 - 10:46am |
|
Sad news from one of my favourite authors... (...) It is up to me now to choose how to live out the months that remain to me. I have to live in the richest, deepest, most productive way I can. In this I am encouraged by the words of one of my favorite philosophers, David Hume, who, upon learning that he was mortally ill at age 65, wrote a short autobiography in a single day in April of 1776. He titled it “My Own Life.” “I now reckon upon a speedy dissolution,” he wrote. “I have suffered very little pain from my disorder; and what is more strange, have, notwithstanding the great decline of my person, never suffered a moment’s abatement of my spirits. I possess the same ardour as ever in study, and the same gaiety in company.” I have been lucky enough to live past 80, and the 15 years allotted to me beyond Hume’s three score and five have been equally rich in work and love. In that time, I have published five books and completed an autobiography (rather longer than Hume’s few pages) to be published this spring; I have several other books nearly finished. Hume continued, “I am ... a man of mild dispositions, of command of temper, of an open, social, and cheerful humour, capable of attachment, but little susceptible of enmity, and of great moderation in all my passions.” Here I depart from Hume. While I have enjoyed loving relationships and friendships and have no real enmities, I cannot say (nor would anyone who knows me say) that I am a man of mild dispositions. On the contrary, I am a man of vehement disposition, with violent enthusiasms, and extreme immoderation in all my passions. And yet, one line from Hume’s essay strikes me as especially true: “It is difficult,” he wrote, “to be more detached from life than I am at present.” Over the last few days, I have been able to see my life as from a great altitude, as a sort of landscape, and with a deepening sense of the connection of all its parts. This does not mean I am finished with life. On the contrary, I feel intensely alive, and I want and hope in the time that remains to deepen my friendships, to say farewell to those I love, to write more, to travel if I have the strength, to achieve new levels of understanding and insight. This will involve audacity, clarity and plain speaking; trying to straighten my accounts with the world. But there will be time, too, for some fun (and even some silliness, as well). I feel a sudden clear focus and perspective. There is no time for anything inessential. I must focus on myself, my work and my friends. I shall no longer look at “NewsHour” every night. I shall no longer pay any attention to politics or arguments about global warming. This is not indifference but detachment — I still care deeply about the Middle East, about global warming, about growing inequality, but these are no longer my business; they belong to the future. I rejoice when I meet gifted young people — even the one who biopsied and diagnosed my metastases. I feel the future is in good hands. (...)
|
|
|