Monday, July 30, 2007

"Benign idiopathic seizure?" - Fox News: "Chief Justice John Roberts Suffers Seizure, Remains in Hospital" What's that all about?

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

St. George Ambulance responded to a call at about 2 p.m. Monday of a man who had fallen 5 to 10 feet and landed on a dock, hitting the back of his head. The patient was ashen and was foaming at the mouth. National news report quotes a Supreme Court spokeswoman as saying that Roberts was conscious the entire time of the incident.

Yet, while twitching spasmodically on the floor, Judge Roberts reaffirmed his deciding vote that companies cannot be sued for pay discrimination, so long as they withhold the evidence against them until after statutes of limitations expire.

Anonymous said...

In plain English, "idiopathic" just means "we dunno what caused it", and "benign" means pretty much what you'd expect it to mean ("not terribly serious" is as good a definition as any).

Seizures are bad if they happen a lot, or if they stem from a troubling cause. However, if they happen only occasionally and are not caused by some terrible underlying condition, they are not a big deal, and not all that uncommon, either.