[extropy-chat] il papa's last rites?

[Damien Broderick]

I see that:

<The Vatican denied Italian media reports that he had died. The first 
reports, picked up by the state broadcaster RAI, said his electrocardiogram 
had gone flat. The ADNkronos news agency said monitoring showed his brain 
activity had halted. But Sky Italia television later quoted Vatican sources 
saying both his brain and heart were still functioning. >

This raises a very interesting prospect. Once the Pope's brain activity has 
halted, it is to be hoped that his feeding tube remains in place, and that 
every miracle of medical science is used -- as God is now known to have 
intended -- to keep his mindless body ticking over. Catholics would then be 
in an interesting situation: an unreplaceable supreme Pontiff whose silence 
is infallible and indefinitely protracted.

Damien Broderick