The post in question: “Persistent Vegetative State – Buddhist View”
Good observations, Lang!
In #4, the gandhabba is alive but is TOTALLY unaware of what is going on.
– Since there are no arammana (thought objects) coming in, the mind is totally INACTIVE. It is similar to being unconscious or in deep sleep. If the brain is totally damaged, even thoughts of past memories cannot come in, as we will discuss in the next post.
– Since there is no hope of repairing the brain, it seems taking such a patient off of the life-support should be fine.
– In a way, it is sort of like releasing that gandhabba from a prison. Once the physical body is dead, the gandhabba can come out and be “eligible” to get into another womb.
In #5, the gandhabba is fully aware of what is going on. As those videos show, some of them can fully recover.
– If there is only minor damage to certain areas of the brain, the brain can “repair itself.” This is called “brain plasticity.” One can Google “brain plasticity” and read about it. That is how some of them recover with time.
– So, it is correct to say that disconnecting life-support would count as taking a life in this case.
– In this case, physicians can use the brain scan technique of #7 to ask and get a “yes” or “no” answer from the patient whether he/she wants to continue on life-support (if the family wants to pursue that path). But as we can see, in some cases, patients may recover even after many years!