{"id":176,"date":"2009-11-24T09:41:21","date_gmt":"2009-11-24T15:41:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ericsiegmund.com\/gazette\/2009\/11\/24\/091124_braindead\/"},"modified":"2009-11-24T09:41:21","modified_gmt":"2009-11-24T15:41:21","slug":"091124_braindead","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ericsiegmund.com\/fireant\/2009\/11\/24\/091124_braindead\/","title":{"rendered":"Brain Dead Man Not –\u00a0Or Not"},"content":{"rendered":"

Update: Some instances of so-called “Facilitated Communication” have been scientifically debunked. Here are some media reports<\/a> on those debunkings. Particularly damning is this one<\/a> detailing the results of a double-blind test in which not one of 180 FC tests yielded the proper response.<\/i><\/p>\n

By now, you’d have to be in a coma not to have heard the account of the Belgian man who was diagnosed as being “brain dead” for 23 years<\/a>, but was recently found by doctors to have normal brain function and who further claims that he had been conscious through the entire period. He’s now communicating via a special keyboard and thus is able to finally share his heartbreaking story with the world.<\/p>\n

Or is he?<\/p>\n

I saw a televised report of this story this morning on a national news show, and what I saw was a “facilitator” using the man’s finger to type on a keyboard. I was puzzled about a minor detail: how does she know what he wants to type? The “facilitator” is said to be specially trained to detect – and interpret<\/b> –  faint movements by the subject, and translate them into coherent communications. This is a wonderful skill to possess…if indeed it actually exists.<\/p>\n

James Randi thinks it’s a “cruel farce,” and lays out his impassioned case<\/a> against “Facilitated Communication,” of which, he says, this is simply the most recent example.<\/p>\n

I sincerely hope Randi is wrong about this, for the sake of the man’s family at the very least. And I’m torn between wanting to believe that this man’s new-found communication ability is real and his relationship with his loved ones restored, and wanting to believe that he didn’t really endure 23 years of conscious silence. I have a hard time imagining anything worse than the latter.<\/p>\n

[Link via Neatorama<\/a>, but original skepticism all mine.]<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Update: Some instances of so-called “Facilitated Communication” have been scientifically debunked. Here are some media reports on those debunkings. Particularly damning is this one detailing the results of a double-blind test in which not one of 180 FC tests yielded the proper response. By now, you’d have to be in a coma not to have… Continue reading Brain Dead Man Not –\u00a0Or Not<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[36,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-176","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-medicine","category-society-culture","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ericsiegmund.com\/fireant\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ericsiegmund.com\/fireant\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ericsiegmund.com\/fireant\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ericsiegmund.com\/fireant\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ericsiegmund.com\/fireant\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=176"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ericsiegmund.com\/fireant\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ericsiegmund.com\/fireant\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=176"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ericsiegmund.com\/fireant\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=176"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ericsiegmund.com\/fireant\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=176"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}