my blogroll on Hitchens

The Four Horsemen of the New Atheism are now Three.

Tributes to Christopher Hitchens have been blossoming throughout the Internet since news of his death arrived last night (about midnight, DC time). Far more interesting to me are the reactions from my own reading list. Thus far, I've got three:

Mike's matter-of-fact announcement

Nathan's reaction

Jeff's reaction

I'm sure more tributes and meditations are forthcoming. For myself, I was surprised that Hitchens died so soon after the publication of his most recent article refuting Nietzsche's famous contention that "That which does not kill us makes us stronger." It goes to show that the media aren't very good at tracking the progress of a dying person accurately (see my Kevin's Walk piece on Ted Kennedy's decline). I had thought Hitchens was healthier than he actually was.

But the manner of Hitchens's death-- he died of pneumonia-- came as no surprise. As we were told when my mother was dying of brain cancer, the immediate cause of death generally isn't the cancer: it's infection. All that radio- and chemotherapy, added to the cancer's own ravaging of the body, will leave the patient so utterly immunosuppressed that, eventually, the walls fall and the barbarians come pouring into the city. I can only hope that Mr. Hitchens was allowed to leave this existence as painlessly as possible.

UPDATE:

Dr. V weighs in with a repost here.

Malcolm offers his thoughts.

Skippy's meditation.

Dr. V again, this time commenting on Peter Hitchens's remembrance.

Mike again.


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