People such as scientist Stephen Hawking wouldn’t have a chance in the U.K., where the National Health Service would say the life of this brilliant man, because of his physical handicaps, is essentially worthless.
That’s some wingnut in the US panicking about the dreaded dictatorial “Obamacare” health reform plans. Using Hawking as his example because of course any brilliant world-famous scientist must be a Murrican. Whoever heard of a British scientist?
Source:
Jay Bookman – It doesn’t take Stephen Hawking to figure this one out via TPM via @amandamarcotte
But he must be American! He has an American accent!
If only that post had a comment facility.
I saw Hawking on Star Trek:TNG and The Simpsons, so he’s clearly not only American, but also one of those Hollywood scientist types.
Oy. Wow…
They really do need a comments section.
I wonder what would happen if someone gave Hawking a new voice synthesiser sound-bank voiced by a Britisher? It must be technically feasible, as there are plenty of voice-synthesised systems around the UK keeping aspiring British actors in beans and toast to fill the demand. Presumably Hawking just doesn’t particularly care, and is used to what he has already.
If he did get a new sound-bank with a British accent, would someone of this nongish persuasion accuse him of betraying the US of A?
FWIW, I emailed the editorial team over there. I have no doubt I won’t get a response, but *shrug*. At least I feel better. Cuz, like… really? REALLY? They couldn’t even look Hawkings up on Wikipedia?
tigtog: I don’t have a link handy (there’s a mention of it on his Wikipedia page, but without citation), but I’m pretty sure Hawking has stated that he quite strongly identifies with the current voice.
It makes sense that he would identify strongly with it after all this time. I’ve read that the vocabulary has been customised extensively for Hawking along with its programming flexibility, so it would have become a very personal extension that will have become anthropomorphised to some extent as well.. If he were to change to another sound-bank it would probably feel like he’d suddenly been attached to a stranger.
I wonder what would happen if someone gave Hawking a new voice synthesiser sound-bank voiced by a Britisher? It must be technically feasible, as there are plenty of voice-synthesised systems around the UK keeping aspiring British actors in beans and toast to fill the demand. Presumably Hawking just doesn’t particularly care, and is used to what he has already.
I think Hawking once said that if he changed to a different voice he was worried no-one would recognise him. LOL
But in the US, he would obviously have been able to access and pay for the care he needed, just like all those other disabled people in the US living their carefree lives, unblighted by socialist medicine! (Except for the ones on Medicare, which is…also not socialist?)
Thanks to A BRIEF HISTORY OF TIME, Hawking is now a wealthy man and can afford to buy in whatever specialised personal care support he needs from whichever providers he chooses – the fact we have the NHS doesn’t stop him doing this.
Prior to his writing work, the main way he avoided institutionalisation as his physically health rapidly declined was by marrying a woman willing and able to provide him with most of the personal care he needed. For the first couple of years there probably would have been no difference in his outcomes regardless of whether the funding was NHS or private US medical insurance, but what about long term?
Does anyone believe a US insurer would have continued to fund personalised home care support rather than force him into a nursing home because care there was cheaper – in effect ending his career?
Does anyone else suspect a private insurer would probably have cancelled his policy for not dying within three years as he was supposed to?
The NHS helped keep Stephen Hawking well and working for many years until he was able to afford to pay his own way. Does anyone believe that would have been possible in the US under a private medical insurance scheme?
When I looked this morning, they’d taken the paragraph about Hawking out!
That’s classic, Bekk.
So how long before they claim it was never there and reports of its presence are lies?
For once I didn’t think to take a screencap. I hope that somebody else did.
Screencap found.
Excellent. I had faith that someone out there would have one.
I took screencaps, but it looks like a few ppl were doing it!
Straight from the horse’s … um, vocaliser.
I thank you.
Comment over at Pharyngula by one “BlueIndependent”:
I was going to point that reporting out to you too, but have been too busy sleeping to actually do it. Glad somebody else did!