Always nice when you make it clear that that mask is just a mask.
Again: the Supremes said that the person being executed must be able to have a spiritual adviser in the room with them.
NASA chaplain? Suited up for EVA? 
I used to work with industrial nitrogen in food packing. The cans were always leaking at the connections. They were in an enclosure with 3 1/2 walls and no ceiling. The cold nitrogen would settle at the bottom in the room.
If you’re referring to RAMIREZ v. COLLIER, I don’t think that’s quite the holding. Rather, I think that if having a spiritual adviser in the room with the victim during an execution wouldn’t be too burdensome, then the state must allow it. Doesn’t mean that states have to select an execution method that ensures a spiritual adviser can share the room with the victim as the execution is going down.
Just shooting them in the head has the wrong look. The death penalty is purely about entertainment, and being so blatant and messy doesn’t provide the look the enthusiasts are looking for. They want something clean and clinical looking, something that looks medical or industrial; not a weapon applied to the skull. Using a gun looks brutal, and that sort of honesty spoils the show.
I can’t speak for @The_Librarian or their opinion, but just because someone had a substance abuse problem doesn’t necessarily make that problem involve IV drugs. That could have been a cocaine problem, or they were a crack addict, or any number of other things.
That said, I’m indecisive about the death penalty. I realize it doesn’t really do anything except maybe fulfill a desire for revenge.
But, by the same token, there are a few people (and here I’m thinking of Tim McVeigh) who kind of forfeit their right to be allowed to draw breath, due to the heinousness of their crimes.
Forfeit to whom? No person, organization, city, state or country gave him the right to breath in the first place.
By the same whatever that lets you and I draw breath currently, I suppose.
I’m not religious, so I’m not claiming a divine right or anything. How about whatever random universal near-constant that you and I currently enjoy?
Either that, or admit that I didn’t really think that part out as I was typing. Which is actually the case.
I am not sure I understand this right: is it a fact that when inhaling 100% N2 you lose consciousness within seconds, but if you hold your breath you would remain conscious for up to a minute or however long you can hold your breath? How come? N2 does not particularly bind to haemoglobyn as opposite to O2 or CO2, does it? Why the almost instantaneous unconsciousness?
I deduce from the word “repeatedly” that with helium the loss of consciousness is not as fast. I wonder what the mechanism is and why it is different for N2 and He. Neither are a narcotic, AFAIK.
If you inhale atmospheric air and hold it, you’ve got your lungs filled with about 20% O2 and 78% N2. There’s enough O2 in your lungs to keep your blood adequately oxygenated (to maintain consciousness for several minutes, i.e. the concentration of O2 in your lungs during this time is high enough to make O2 bind to the hemoglobin in your blood. Problems (i.e. altered/no consciousness) only arise when the O2 concentration in your lungs is no longer high enough to adequately oxygenate the hemoglobin.
It’s important to note that the hemoglobin in the venous blood coming from your body to your heart (and then going out to your lungs) is not 100% deoxygenated; normal pulmonary artery O2 saturation is reportedly about 75%. When you fill your lungs with oxygen-deficient gas, the O2 in the blood arriving at the lungs tends to separate from the hemoglobin and enter into the lungs. In other words, inhaling inert gas such as N2 or helium actually deoxygenates the blood that will be sent out to the body, resulting in a loss of consciousness far more quickly than a person can achieve by simply holding their breath.
I think the difference is that the people in the He videos aren’t deliberately trying to lose consciousness; they’re just doing the funny voice thing for a bit. So they take a shallow breath, talk for a bit. Since it’s a shallow breath, they don’t get much bulk He all the way down into their alveoli, and it takes maybe 20 seconds for the gas to diffuse all the way down. Some people unwittingly speed up the process by exhaling a bit and inhaling another partial lungful of He, enhancing the mixing and more rapidly reducing the alveolar concentration of O2.
If you are really intent on losing consciousness as rapidly as possible, this is the way to go:
- Exhale atmospheric air from your lungs as completely as possible
- Inhale pure inert gas as deeply as possible
- Repeat steps 1-2 a few times
It should be possible to get very close to the time of useful consciousness for extremely high altitudes (~5 seconds), and for the same reason: a very rapid reduction of the alveolar partial pressure of O2 to levels incompatible with life.
Make sure you are doing this with a ‘light’ gas. I remember a kids science show where the presenter did the breathe from a balloon thing and his voice went down due to whatever relatively dense gas he used.
He then spent a couple of seconds inverted, claiming plausibly that he needed to help expel the dense gas. I’m certain that it would naturally mixed out, but it at the time it seemed a reasonable precaution.
Thanks for the explanation. So if suffering unexpected catastrophic decompression at high altitude you wanted to survive a little longer than ~5 seconds (to reach that oxygen mask back there, for instance) the thing to do would be to hold your breath, keep your mouth shut, and press your nose shut with your fingers hoping the alveolar partial pressure of O2 stays high enough for sufficient time? I’ll try to remember that, though I don’t think it would help me much.
Your link talks of prevention rather than cure, but that would be pointless in the context of this thread. I guess when you are in the death chamber with the mask strapped on the best thing to do would be to follow the 3 steps you mentioned.
If you wanted to be super cooperative with your own extinction, sure.
Sulfur Hexafluoride
Technically his mom.
But I assume she had no idea of how he would turn out prior to early abortion. She probably even loved him.
Would you rather the ones that put you to death enjoy your death for longer and go home afterwards poking each other on the ribs and gloating: “See how he struggled! Did the bastard no good, ha, ha, ha!”? Nah, I’d prefer going like Brian.
Nitpick: Does the word extinction apply to individuals? I don’t think I’ll ever go extinct, I’ll just die. Not even John Cleese said the Norwegian Blue was extinct, did he?
‘E’s not pinin’! 'E’s passed on! This parrot is no more! He has ceased to be! 'E’s expired and gone to meet 'is maker! 'E’s a stiff! Bereft of life, 'e rests in peace! If you hadn’t nailed 'im to the perch 'e’d be pushing up the daisies! 'Is metabolic processes are now 'istory! 'E’s off the twig! 'E’s kicked the bucket, 'e’s shuffled off ‘is mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the bleedin’ choir invisible!! THIS IS AN EX-PARROT!!
But not extinct!
Well, some don’t believe in “death with dignity.”
Commercial airliners cruise at around 40,000 feet, where the TUC for rapid decompression is 7-10 seconds. In theory you should be able to increase this a bit by holding your breath (just close your vocal cords as one does when diving under water) and tensing your chest and diaphragm to develop expiratory pressure. It’s reportedly possible to develop as much as 2 psi above ambient; this would get the density altitude in your lungs down to about 28,000 feet, increasing your TUC up around a minute or so.
Large volumes of dense gas do tend to settle in low places, sometimes with disastrous consequences. However, when dealing with the small passages of the lungs, the short durations, and the violent turbulence associated with inhalation/exhalation, I don’t think gravity makes much difference. When trying to clear out residual SF6 from the lungs, a few quick inhale/exhale cycles should be enough to take assure no interruption of confidence.
If it’s a given that you (the condemned prisoner) are going to be executed by N2, then you have a choice to make:
-
live miserably for an extra minute or two while you try to hold your breath as long as you possibly can, and create a horrifying visual spectacle for observers. Or
-
forego that extra minute and the physical suffering it would entail for you, as you immediately breathe deeply and die in a way that is least visually horrifying for observers.
IOW, there are pros ands cons for you personally, independent of how your death affects those around you. It’s your last act of agency; you get to choose.
That’s pretty much where I am. It’s a unrevokable procedure that demands certainty. So I’m fine if we got rid of it. However, I’m also okay with keeping it, especially if all it was used for was crimes against the state and not an individual. I would include terrorism in that along with the other obvious crimes like treason.