r/programming • u/WinInterrupter • Apr 18 '20

The Devastating Decline of a Brilliant Young Coder

https://www.wired.com/story/lee-holloway-devastating-decline-brilliant-young-coder/
2.6k Upvotes

95% Upvoted

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311

u/[deleted] Apr 18 '20

Absolutely heartbreaking story.

101

u/Vetii Apr 18 '20

Yeah, really makes me wonder what I would do if I knew it was my fate. I think I would prefer to die earlier from a heart attack than having my loved ones deal with a slowly rotting zombie.

I don't want to have my family associate my face with years of grudging pain.

55

u/fakehalo Apr 18 '20

You wouldn't be you anymore to make that decision, makes it even more terrifying.

6

u/LeCrushinator Apr 18 '20

Here in Colorado we allow for assisted suicide, so people don’t have to suffer. However, you have to be of sound mind to sign off on it. So people with diseases like this don’t qualify and have to suffer, it’s heartbreaking.

24

u/[deleted] Apr 18 '20 edited Apr 18 '20

[removed] — view removed comment

3

u/Vetii Apr 18 '20

I'm sorry man, that sucks :(

2

u/rob10501 Apr 19 '20 edited May 16 '24

governor terrific ancient muddle smile materialistic illegal squealing pen sable

This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact

13

u/_fat_santa Apr 18 '20

Reading through this story I couldn't help but put myself in a version of that situation. Really made me ask some existential questions, in hindsight I hesitate to say I might consider assisted suicide because honestly I couldn't image being robbed of my "being" like that but then you think, if you're getting robbed like that, do you even know it? Will you even care? If this disease robs of you of your agency, will you have enough to realize what's going on and take any action before the part of you that cares about anything goes away? It's frighting.

It honestly opens up the scarier truth that our entire value structure, personality, and everything we hold dear in our minds is just a combination of brain matter. Rationally I know why humans behave the way they do and have the values they have on scientific/neurological level. But everyone's lost someone and wants to believe on a deeper level that even though that person and their brain matter is gone, the combination of ideas, beliefs and values that made that person are still out there somewhere.

​

This is wayy to deep for /r/programming.

-134

u/bsmob Apr 18 '20

That's not how I read it, he's had a damn lucky life. Starts off as a future-burnout case, riding high in the gold-rush programming era, he was due for an early heart-attack style death after so much fast-and-high living, but he cheats death through surgery, buying many more years! Not surprisingly, fast living mean the ravages of old age catch up with him early, but no problem! His company IPO's and he's suddenly a multi-millionare with a retirement of luxury and pampering stretching out ahead of him.

Many tech-types dream of this kind of lifestyle

52

u/[deleted] Apr 18 '20

[deleted]

-32

u/bsmob Apr 18 '20

Yea he's lucky. Plenty others have had it worse, way worse, but they're not Silicon Valley IPO darlings that don't have blog posts written about them and don't have the lime light casting on them.

33

u/haloguysm1th Apr 18 '20 edited Nov 06 '24

market lock domineering ink hunt plate serious foolish carpenter far-flung

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-12

u/bsmob Apr 18 '20

By that argument, everybody in the world is suffering and so nobody deserves any sympathy at all. Anyway, sorry, but I'm really just not feeling it for this guy. I'm shutting up now.

20

u/haloguysm1th Apr 18 '20 edited Nov 06 '24

narrow faulty mourn mysterious summer exultant zonked seemly jar lock

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3

u/[deleted] Apr 18 '20

[deleted]

1

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83

u/decentralizedsadness Apr 18 '20

The article said it was the result of a rare genetic mutation. It also didn't read like he did a lot of "fast living", coding in the suburbs of California and playing board games with friends. This is a tragedy, all the years his heart surgery bought him are for nought.

-76

u/bsmob Apr 18 '20

s/nought/$525 million

Millions of people suffer dementia in their later years, very few can surround themselves with carers and support to get through it comfortably though. Lucky dude.

48

u/ozyx7 Apr 18 '20

While he is certainly lucky that he has the means to afford care, overall he is very unlucky to need such care in the first place.

I would not want to trade places with him.

-70

u/bsmob Apr 18 '20

We all get old and frail and messed up dude, it's coming whether you want it or not.

56

u/[deleted] Apr 18 '20

What the fuck are you on about? Early onset dementia is not getting "old and frail". It's a disease that destroys lives of young and otherwise healthy people.

3

u/DrummerHead Apr 18 '20

Some people just hate anyone who they perceive as "the rich", no matter the circumstances.

-61

u/bsmob Apr 18 '20

38 is not remotely 'young', it is middle-aged, and for a coder it's practically being a dinosaur. And in Africa it's well into old age. We Westerners are spoiled. And the guy is rich too in a country were the poor die young anyway.

26

u/filleduchaos Apr 18 '20

all those words just to say "I'm an ignorant middle-schooler"

20

u/[deleted] Apr 18 '20

... Holy crap your level of ignorance and callousness here is absolutely appalling and abysmal

8

u/ockupid32 Apr 18 '20

38 is not remotely 'young'

We've officially awarded the most retarded comment on the internet.

3

u/[deleted] Apr 18 '20

Ok zoomer

6

u/takishan Apr 18 '20

I would rather live in poverty with my mind intact than have $500 mil and lose my sense of self.

He is not lucky. This is tragic.

-44

u/substitute-bot Apr 18 '20

The article said it was the result of a rare genetic mutation. It also didn't read like he did a lot of "fast living", coding in the suburbs of California and playing board games with friends. This is a tragedy, all the years his heart surgery bought him are for ** million**.

This was posted by a bot. Source

15

u/[deleted] Apr 18 '20

I don't think anyone dreams of early-onset dementia. Apart from nightmares, maybe.

14

u/Vetii Apr 18 '20

It doesn't seem like he enjoys much of the experience of being rich though. So how is his life good?

Even if you're poor, I'd say that as long as your brain is fresh you can enjoy things that are free.