Author Archives: Garry Rodgers

About Garry Rodgers

After three decades as a Royal Canadian Mounted Police homicide detective and British Columbia coroner, International Best Selling author and blogger Garry Rodgers has an expertise in death and the craft of writing on it. Now retired, he wants to provoke your thoughts about death and help authors give life to their words.

THE ADDICTIVE DISTRACTION OF DIGITAL DOPAMINE

We’ve all seen them. Those walking zombies aimlessly lost with their face in their phones and utterly oblivious to the forest, the trees, and the traffic. They’re devastatingly distracted by the Kim Kardashian of happiness molecules—dopamine—hopelessly and unknowingly addicted to their next rush of digital downloads fixed by non-stop scrolls.

This is a relatively new phenomenon, and it’s married at the hip to digital information dictated by the internet; digital devices and internet content controlled by the tech giants gaining ground on the entertainment industry. It’s here, and it’s not going away. At best, the digital dopamine addiction can only be controlled.

What’s sad is this dopamine distraction is harming society’s young. So many teens and twenties are hooked on their smartphones. Statistics say youths around the world spend far more time connected to the web than playing with their peers. The digital pandemic is so sick that it’s created an industry of wellness trying to treat digital dopamine addiction.

It’s also radically changed the entertainment world as well as the online support systems where Big Tech carries market cap values into the trillions of dollars. And those Big Tech titans are intentionally designing their algorithms to purposely distract viewers from facing reality. We’ll get into what’s going on in Tech, the downfall of the entertainment industry, how algorithms work, what dopamine is, and what motivates psychopath billionaires like Mark Zuckerburg to digitally prey on innocent and unsuspecting tweens.

What got me going on this piece was an article by Ted Gioia (The Honest Broker). The title is The State of Culture, 2024. These opening lines grabbed me. “Not much changes in politics. Certainly not the candidates. So, forget about politics. All the action is happening in mainstream culture—which is changing at warp speed. 2024 will be the most fast-paced—and dangerous—time ever for the creative economy. I want to tell you why entertainment is dead. And what’s coming to take its place.”

Mr. Gioia continues on to explain how the bigger entertainment shark once ate the little art fish. Then how the huge distraction whale swallowed the shark which, in turn, was devoured by the colossal addiction monster. He equates it to a cultural food chain and demonstrates it with these graphics:

It’s always been hard to be an artist. In the entertainment business, the primary artist is the content producer or concept developer. We were once called writers.

Until recently, the entertainment industry had been on a growth roll. So much so, that any content considered artsy was crushed as collateral damage by the forces of ever-needed new shows—regardless of if the productions were good or not.

That’s suddenly changed. It won’t help the art fish and it won’t help the shark. It won’t even help the whale because the whole online world is moving to a distraction model. And that’s to serve the phenomenon of dopamine addiction caused by the short and extremely fast pace of stimuli like reels, toks, clicks, instas, tubes, pushes, autoplays, variable rewards, and infinite scrolling. It’s an addictive distraction game, and it’s played colossally well by the Big Tech algorithms.

The fastest growing sector of the culture economy is distraction. Call it scrolling or swiping or wasting time or whatever you want. But don’t call it art or entertainment. It’s just ceaseless activity and is highly addictive because each short piece causes a dopamine release. Yes, the tech builders know it and it’s planned that way.

The key to the distraction model is that each stimulus only lasts a few seconds. To maintain the dopamine rush, the stimuli must be repeated. Over and over and over and over.

Gioia’s article says this is not just the hot trend for 2024. It can last forever because the distraction model is based on body chemistry, not on fashion or art. Our brains are wired to reward brief bursts of distraction by smoothing us with a dopamine hit. He calls it the Dopamine Loop and it looks like this:

This is the familiar cycle of addiction. Now, through the online distraction model, it’s being applied to the culture and creative world—and billions of people. They (we) are unwitting volunteers in the biggest social engineering experiment ever unleashed in human history.

Tech wants to create a world of junkies where Tech will be the pushers and dealers. Addiction is the goal. They don’t say it openly. They don’t need to. Just look at what they do.

  • Everything is being designed to lock users into an addictive cycle.
  • Platforms are shifting to scrolling and reeling interfaces.
  • Algorithms punish you for leaving sites.

There’s more. Apple, Facebook, and others want you to wear their virtual reality goggles. They are specifically made to swallow you through stimuli like the tiny fish in the food chain charts. You’re invited to live as a passive recipient of make-believe like a pod slave in The Matrix.

This is the new culture, and it’s here in 2024. Instead of movies and TV shows, we’re being served an endless stream of seconds-long vids. Instead of symphonies, we’re satisfied with sound bits, usually accompanied by a slick little pic.

The most striking feature of the new culture is the absence of culture. It’s mindless entertainment—escapism—of compulsive activity. It’s the dopamine culture.

Here’s where the science gets ugly. The more addicts rely on stimuli for their fix, the less pleasure they get. At a certain point, which our brains are designed for, this cycle creates anhedonia. That’s the medical word for the complete absence of enjoyment.

Dopamine deprivation takes over and the addict is broken. The scrolling cycle causes pain, not pleasure, and the pain causes more pain as the addict scrolls. It becomes a hopeless cycle and a spiraling downfall.

To quote Ted Gioia, “Some companies get people hooked on pills and needles. Others with apps and algorithms. But either way, it’s just churning out junkies. That’s our dystopian future. Not so much Orwell’s 1984. It’s more like Huxley’s Brave New World.”

Dr. Anna Lembke is a world-leading addiction expert. She’s Chief of Staff at Stanford University’s Dual Diagnosis Addiction Clinic which deals with patients who have multiple addiction issues. Dr. Lembke wrote a recent book titled Dopamine Nation that topped the New York Times Bestseller List.

She calls the smartphone the modern-day hypodermic needle. As the doctor puts it, “We turn to it for quick hits, seeking attention, validation, and distraction with every swipe. Since the turn of the millennium, behavioral (as opposed to substance) addiction has soared. Every spare second is an opportunity to be stimulated, whether by entering the TikTok vortex, scrolling Instagram, swiping through Tinder, or binging on online porn, online gambling, or online shopping.”

Dr. Lembke refers to a World Happiness Report that clearly shows many people in high-income countries are far less happy than they were a few years ago. She blames this on the scroll-and-dopamine culture. “We’ve forgotten how to be alone with our thoughts. We’re forever interrupting ourselves for a quick digital hit, meaning we rarely concentrate on taxing tasks for long or get into a creative flow. The zone.”

Dr. Lembke continues to explain that addiction is a spectrum disorder. It’s not as simple as being an addict or not being an addict. Addiction is deemed worthy of clinical intervention and care when it significantly interferes with someone’s life and functioning ability. When it comes to digital addiction, she says, the effect is pernicious.

To understand addiction, you must first understand dopamine which she dubbed “The Kim Kardashian of molecules” owing to its mainstream prominence. Dopamine is a chemical often called “The Feelgood Hormone” and its molecular structure (resembling an insect with dual antennae and an offset tail) has even become a popular tattoo.

Rather than giving us pleasure itself, dopamine motivates us to do things we think will bring us pleasure. Like reading a fantastic book or watching a top-notch film. As the brain’s major reward and pleasure neurotransmitter, dopamine drives us to seek food when we’re hungry and sex when we’re horny. But there’s a side effect. The higher the dopamine release, the more addictive the thing.

“We experience a hike in dopamine in anticipation of doing the thing as well as actually doing it. As soon as it’s finished, we experience a comedown or dopamine dip. That’s because the brain operates through a self-regulating process termed homeostasis meaning for every high there’s a low. What we really want is that second piece of chocolate cake or to watch another episode but if we’re not severely addicted, the craving will soon pass.”

Scientists first identified dopamine in 1957. It’s a precursor to addiction with 50% due to genetics and 50% due to environmental excesses. The human brain hasn’t changed since 1957 but our access to additive things has incredibly increased. Exposure to the internet, for instance.

Where back in the ‘50s the focus was on family and work, reading and sports, today’s world gives you unlimited pleasure at the click of a mouse or loading an app. When we over-download pleasure, homeostasis causes our brain to bring us lower and lower. We sink into a joy-seeking abyss called anhedonia.

Immediate gratification defines the dopamine culture. It means we’re constantly living in our limbic brain which possesses emotions rather than in our pre-frontal cortex that plans for the future, solves problems, and develops personality. When we depend on our digital companions to help us escape life’s issues, the limbic system loves the distractions.

We need time away, Dr. Lembke prescribes. She recommends a 24-hour unplugging once a week or a least locking the phone in a drawer for an hour. I’m not a doctor, but I strongly prescribe Dr. Lembke’s book Dopamine Nation. Here’s a screenshot of its blurb on Amazon:

So, medically, what is dopamine? This natural drug that seduces and intoxicates addicts? Let’s use the web itself for a quick distraction.

Dopamine is a type of monoamine neurotransmitter produced by your brain to act as a reward center. It regulates functions like memory, movement, motivation, mood, attention, and more. Like happiness and escapism. It’s the chemical messenger connecting your nerve cells.

Dopamine plays a role in your fight or flight syndrome. It’s designed, from an evolutionary perspective to reward you when you’ve done well. As humans, we’re hardwired to seek pleasure and avoid pain. Dopamine is good in the short term but bad in the long.

We’ve talked about the drug, and we’ve talked about the addiction. We’ve talked about the culture, and we’ve talked about the change. Now let’s talk about the technology and who controls the algorithms that have changed the culture and sell the dopamine drug of addiction.

The word “algorithm” is everywhere. In print, online, and in AI—Artificial Intelligence. Facebook knows when you’ve been naughty, and it knows when you’ve been nice. Google knows more about you than your spouse does. ChatGPT? Like The Carpenters sang, “We’ve only just begun.”

So here I go again with Chat. (Sorry, Chat is here until AGI arrives and then…) I asked the tool-bot to explain, clearly and simply, what an algorithm is. It replied:

Algorithms are step-by-step instructions or procedures for solving a problem or completing a task. They’re like recipes for computers telling them what to do to achieve a specific goal. Here’s a breakdown of how algorithms operate:

  • Input — Data, numbers, texts, habits
  • Process — Organizing into logic
  • Output — Results, conclusions, actions

It told me algorithms can be simple like processing numbers or extremely complex like algorithms used in AI programs such as ChatGPT. I also asked it how algorithms track our online behavior. It said:

  • Data Collection — Watches and records what you’re doing
  • Data Processing — Extracts meaningful information to its purpose
  • Pattern Recognition — Figures out where you’ve been
  • User Profiling — Figures out who you are
  • Behavioral Prediction — Calculates what you want
  • Feedback Loop — Checks to see if it’s right

Sound spooky? It does to me. Think of every time Facebook showed you something that aligned with your thoughts. I asked Chat how algorithms do this. What tools they use. It said:

  • Cookies
  • IP Address Tracking
  • User Accounts and Profiles
  • Pixels and Scripts
  • Social Media Activity
  • Browser History

During my chat with Chat, that insightful bot said something that made me think. It said, “User engagement and monetization can contribute to addictive patterns of behavior. It’s essential for tech companies to balance their business interests with ethical considerations and prioritize the well-being of their users.”

Tech companies own the internet. They have complete control over a user’s feed. Ultimately, their minds. Let’s look at the top five tech companies and their worth. As of yesterday, 23 February 2024, here are their stock market capitalization standings:

5. Meta — $1.21 Trillion

4. Amazon — $1.74 Trillion

3. Alphabet — $1.77 Trillion

2. Apple — $2.80 Trillion

1. Microsoft — $2.99 Trillion

Let’s not overlook Nvidia on this list of distraction builders. Nvidia makes the chips (the brains) that allow the techs to invent algorithms that addict their users to online dopamine dependence. This is Nvidia’s $1.72 Trillion stock market performance over the past five years:

It’s not only money that motivates Big Tech to mess with people’s minds and devastate their lives. It’s more than that. It’s power. Control. Manipulation. Dominance. Marketplace position. Not just stock market growth and capitalization.

As a distraction—maybe a digital dopamine hit—watch this four-minute clip of Mark Zuckerberg getting smoked over the coals of justice in a recent US Congressional hearing about harming children online. It’s worth the price of admission.

 

WHAT REALLY CAUSED THE SALEM WITCH HUNTS

The Salem witch hunts and mass executions of innocent victims falsely accused of sorcery is an American historical black mark. Through June to October of 1692, Puritan authorities in Salem, Massachusetts hung nineteen citizens after trying and convicting them for witchcraft. They crushed another man to death with heavy stones and let five others perish—shackled in chains. Two imprisoned souls were mere children.

Today, all Salem witch hunt victims are officially exonerated. This terrible debacle became the poster case for trumped-up accusations and wrongful convictions. In fact, the term “witch hunt” is symbolic for going after those profiled for a vengeance need or paranoid forces “out to get someone”. Even a past United States president Twittered-on about witch hunts.

This horrific travesty of malicious injustice was an American turning point. Historians call the Salem witch trials the rock upon which theocracy shattered. They were the perfect storm of isolationism, religious extremism, fanaticism, and divided socio-economic structure. The witch trials were also unprecedented as bad jurisprudence and horrible miscarriages of justice.

Today, few educated or rational people believe in evil witchcraft or black magic. (Modern peaceful Wiccan practitioners are a different matter.) That old destructive medieval and ignorant mindset sieved from America after the Salem witch trials. But, for over three centuries, few people understood why the disaster happened. Various theories suggested Freudian mass-hysterics, a widespread fungus causing mind-altering behavior, and even meddling by alien forces aligned with the dark side.

Now the truth is out there. A meticulous, scientific study by two American academics published in the book Salem Possessed wraps up the witch hunt reason. It’s not some supernatural power or psychedelic drug. The answer lies in a complex mix of sociology, geography, demography, human psychology, genetics, pathology, and forensic science.

Something far more sinister than sorcery really caused the Salem witch hunts.

History of the Salem Witch Hunts

It trigged with teenagers. In January 1692, three bored girls played a game similar to today’s Ouija Board. They cracked eggs and separated the whites in a pan of cold water, then used imagination to decipher patterns divulging hidden secrets and foretelling future events. They got carried away. Soon they were writhing in fits and cramping into twisted contortions.

The girls were relatives of Salem Village vicar Samuel Parris, a Massachusetts Bay Puritan parishioner who referred the distorted girls to a local physician. The doctor found no medical cause for the girls’ discomfort. He suggested it was work of witchcraft and turned it back to the minister. The reverend sided with Satanic superstition and went about extracting accusations from the young girls.

They implicated three Salem women for bewitching and causing their erratic behavior—Sarah Good, Sarah Osborne, and Tituba. Good was known for tardy church attendance. Osborne was a loose-moraled beggar. And Tituba was a Carib slave house servant. The trio were hardly credible to Salem’s upper crust and certainly suitable scapegoats not equipped to defend themselves.

Good and Osborne fervently denied being witches. Despite intensive interrogation in magistrate’s court, they held to their denials. Tituba, on the other hand, confessed. She gave wild accounts of signing Satan’s book and offered crazy tales of human hogs, great black dogs, red cats, and yellow birds. Tituba also named of other Salem witches.

From there, everyone got carried away. Authorities rounded-up scores of witch suspects, hauling them before interrogatories. More people—women and men—confessed under duress and named more names. In a few months, nearly two hundred “witches” were accused, hunted down, and arrested in Salem and neighboring communities. Quickly, the arrests turned to trials and mass hangings began.

The 17th Century Salem Legal System

1692 was an important year in 17th Century Salem’s legal system. It coincided with a new charter for the Province of Massachusetts Bay following the 1680s King William War. The colonists were deeply divided in Salem and the surrounding area’s social structure. It was protective Puritism vs. progressive private enterprise. The King’s newly-appointed Governor, William Phip, arrived with the charter in January,1692—just as the witchcraft accusations arose.

The spiraling sequence of accusations, arrests and confession led to mass hysteria and a “thronged” legal system. To accommodate justice, Governor Phip convened a Special Court of Oyer (hearing) and Terminer (deciding). He appointed magistrates, judges and sheriffs based on local recommendations by powerful people in the religious sphere.

The Salem witch trials occurred long before the United States Constitution was a gleam in revolutionary eyes. Rules of evidence stemmed from English common law and principles based on religious doctrine. For witchcraft cases, evidence came from accusatory mouths of uneducated and manipulated common folk, not from corroborated independent and credible witnesses.

Once a citizen claimed their loss or discomfort was witchcraft caused, they laid a complaint against the accused before an appointed magistrate. If the complaint appeared credible by the magistrate’s standard, the accused was arrested and brought in for mandatory interrogation. This was well before the right to remain silent.

Interrogations were public events. Open questions by a panel and audience members given standing were standard procedure. Every effort pressed the accused to confess and reveal other witches. It was a Puritanical purging of Salem’s evils and a chance to rid society of undesirables. Once a grand jury heard interrogation evidence, they preferred an indictment and the ‘witch” was set on trial.

Witch trials depended on what’s called “spectral evidence”. This was testimony of the afflicted who claimed to see the apparition of the accused witch appear in a ghostly form while performing witchcraft upon them. Theologically, the court evidence relied on whether or not the accused gave the Devil permission to use their shape. The Salem witch courts contended the Devil could not perform evil acts using a person’s shape without that person’s expressed permission—therefore, if the afflicted complainant had seen the accused’s shape—it was in facto proof the accused was guilty of witchcraft and complicit with the Devil. According to Puritan law, the witch must die.

This convoluted logic resulted in immediate hangings and a compression death through layered stoning. It also caused deaths of those awaiting trial while shackled in dungeons. In three months, twenty-four innocent people were dead and many more awaited similar fates. That’s until someone accused Governor Phip’s wife of being a witch.

Suddenly, the executions stopped. Phip ordered an evidentiary review. It determined spectral evidence was inadmissible, noting it was not credible and highly prejudicial to the accused. Phip stayed the remaining execution warrants and commuted sentences, essentially freeing all those facing witchcraft allegations. Within three years, the Province of Massachusetts Bay officially exonerated all accused witches and ordered a consolidating day of fast and remembrance.

Cause of the Salem Witch Hunts

Many historians and writers pondered how normally rational people got so swept by the wind of witchcraft craze. Certainly, there was a mass psychological hysteria and paranoia. But the actual reason—the root cause—of why so many witch accusers and so many accused witches behaved so bizarrely was unknown. For years, suspected causes for bewitched symptoms like convulsing and hallucinating fell on the Claviceps purpurea fungus found in Puritan bread. It’s known for LSD-like side effects.

But a bread acid trip didn’t cut current standards, even though the mass hysteria was long explained by archaic superstitions of wanton witchcraft and the Devil’s demons. Everybody ate Puritan bread in Salem, and only a few presented weird symptoms. No, a rational look at the Salem witch hunts needed further investigation by reasonable and independent thinkers.

That rationality came from two Harvard-educated history professors at the University of Massachusetts who wrote the intriguing book Salem Possessed. Paul Boyer and Stephen Nissenbaum’s work took an in-depth look at the social, economic, and geographical factors affecting Salem’s citizens back when the witch hunts started. They also took a forensic approach to the psychological and pathological influences causing the complainant’s symptoms.

Boyer and Nissenbaum came to an astounding social conclusion. However, they weren’t the first to arrive there. In 1867, New England historian Charles W. Upham produced an accurate map of how Salem Village appeared in 1692. Then he plotted the houses where witch accusers and accused witches lived. Astonishingly, almost all accusers lived on the west side of Salem Village. The accused lived on the east side.

Salem Possessed’s authors concluded that if the Devil had come to Salem, he was being very choosy about which homes he visited. No, they concluded. The reason for the witch hunts had to lie in Salem’s history, and they were right.

Salem is one of the oldest European settlements in North America’s New England region. As the crow flies, it’s less than twenty miles northeast of downtown Boston. English immigrants of the Puritan faith first occupied Salem to establish a community based on their conservative views to protect old ways threatened by the age of Enlightenment and the then-liberal Anglican Church.

The Puritans were agricultural people. Naturally, they chose to settle in the best farmland which lay to the west of Massachusetts Bay. Over the course of eighty years—roughly four generations back then—the Puritans built a religious and agricultural society centered around what they called Salem Village. Today, the area is known as Danvers, Massachusetts which is a different jurisdiction from present-day Salem.

During the mid-1600s, a harbor community developed on Massachusetts Bay, east of the village. It became known as Salem Town. Commercially progressive settlers occupied Salem Town and focused on making money rather than praising the Lord and preserving old ways. As Salem Town grew, it pressed westward and crossed the border into the village. That didn’t sit well with the Puritan villagers.

Boyer and Nissenbaum uncovered a tangled history of feuds, jealousy, mistrust and hostility between the west Salem villagers and their eastern invaders. West Salem had two tightly knit prominent families who married within. The easterners were a mix of newcomers who married outside family lines. For some reason, everyone who displayed physical symptoms of being witch victims came from the two prominent Puritan families.

From a socio-economic and religious point, it’s clear the impact of commercial capitalism and the shifting role of the church left the backward Puritans threatened by their modern newcomers. It led to unbearable tensions which broke once the first bewitched symptoms showed in January of 1692. That opened a floodgate of superstitious opportunity to kill the eastern Salem villagers.

Salem Possessed makes a powerful argument that human personality partially caused the Salem witch hunts. If that be the Devil in humanity, then so be it. However, the Devil isn’t a good forensic reason for why the teen girls experienced peculiar symptoms like mood swings, cramps, and hysterical contortions. Something else was at work, and the pathology points at genetics.

Putting it bluntly, the Puritans were inbred. Their closed circle was more than religious and economic. They married within and secluded their gene pool. Huntington’s Chorea or Huntington’s Disease is common in people with dysfunctional genes. It’s a hereditary neurodegenerative illness with physical, cognitive, and emotional symptoms exactly like the west Salem village girls experienced. The gene mutation creates a protein that kills cells in the brain’s cerebral cortex.

Many adults in the Puritan community already had some stage of Huntington’s Disease. That impaired their thought processes as well as their offspring’s. Because of longevity in the Salem region and that power still clung to the Puritan Church in the late 1600s, Puritans made up the judicial force that persecuted the alleged witches. Their personality and pathology dysfunctions are what really caused the Salem witch hunts.

For three centuries, lore held that the witches of Salem were hung from scaffolding in the center of today’s Gallows Park. That’s not correct. Several years ago, the Gallows Project funded by the University of Massachusetts did a thorough research based on historical records and advanced forensic techniques like GPS analyzation and ground penetrating radar.

They conclusively identified the execution spot as a tree at Proctor’s Ledge. It’s right beside a Walgreens, and the community built a small memorial honoring the wrongfully accused witches of Salem.

NITROGEN HYPOXIA EXECUTIONS — A FIRST BY ALABAMA

On January 25, 2024, the State of Alabama executed prisoner Kenneth Eugene Smith. Inmate Smith, age 58, had been convicted in the 1988 contract murder of a mother of two and was sentenced to die. After three decades on Death Row, he was legally killed by a controversial and unique method. Kenneth Smith became the first person in America to be suffocated with nitrogen gas.

This new and previously untested execution process is called nitrogen hypoxia. Nitrogen makes up the abundance of our atmosphere and, when mixed with oxygen, is vital for human life. Hypoxia means “a state in which oxygen is not available in sufficient amounts at the tissue level to maintain adequate homeostasis”. In other words, to support life.

Quite simply, Smith was strapped to a gurney inside the execution chamber at Holman Correctional Facility near Atmore, Alabama. A gas mask was placed over his face and, instead of administering oxygen, Smith was delivered pure nitrogen. According to Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall, “It is the most painless and humane method of execution known to man.”

Alabama is one of three U. S. States to approve nitrogen hypoxia executions—also endorsed by Mississippi and Oklahoma—however, Alabama is the first jurisdiction to exercise the process. It had never been done before in the civilized world. As United States Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor put it, “It appears Mister Smith is being used as a guinea pig.”

Before examining how this nouveau gassing technique works, let’s review who Smith was, the crime he committed, the general state of capital punishment in America, and why this was the second time the State of Alabama tried to physically execute Kenneth Smith, having failed in an earlier attempt at lethal injection.

Kenneth (Kenny) Smith was born on July 4, 1965. He grew up in Alabama and had an unremarkable past—up to the point where he and John Forrest Parker were recruited by Billy Gray Williams to kill 45-year-old Elizabeth Sennett in Colbert County. Mrs. Sennett was married to the Reverend Charles Sennett Sr. who was the pastor to Billy Williams. Rev. Sennett was in dire financial straits, so he took out a life insurance policy on his wife and conspired with Williams to murder Elizabeth and collect the money.

Billy Williams, being an entrepreneurial man, turned around and subcontracted the job to Parker and Kenny Smith. They were each paid $1,000 to repeatedly stab Elizabeth Sennett in her home, which they did. Somehow, a Crimestoppers caller ratted them out and it led the police to arrest them and come looking for Williams and the Reverend. Sennett, knowing the gig was up, confessed to his remaining family. Then he went out to his truck and shot himself dead in the head.

Parker and Smith were tried for first-degree murder, were convicted, and both were sentenced to death. Parker was executed by lethal injection in 2010, but Smith managed to get a new trial. He was convicted a second time and, again, given the death decree. Billy Williams, by the way, got life without parole for conspiracy to commit murder and died in jail from natural causes.

At 7:45 pm on November 17, 2022, Kenneth Smith had run out of appeals and nearly out of time. He was escorted to the execution chamber at the Holman Facility and strapped onto the gurney. A last-minute legal glitch stopped the lethal injection procedure and Smith lay on the table until 10:20 when the U.S. Supreme Court gave the go-ahead.

For the next hour, the execution team vainly searched for a vein in Smith’s arms to insert the catheter. As a last resort, they placed Smith upright in an inverted crucifix position hoping the upside-down method’s gravity pressure would balloon a blood vessel. Approaching midnight, when the death warrant was about to expire, prison officials called off the execution and Smith survived on borrowed time.

This was the third botched execution in a row at Holman. This trio of tries caused the state governor to order a review of the execution models available to Alabama—lethal injection and electrocution. The review returned with a creative suggestion. Nitrogen hypoxia. The state rushed through a bill, and the suffocation death through nitrogen hypoxia execution option was made legal.

Kenneth Smith had a choice for round two. He elected to try out the nitrogen. After all, his first experience with intravenous lethal injection didn’t go well. Smith typically exhausted all appeals and, on the evening of January 25, 2024, he returned to the chamber, put on a mask, and began inhaling pure nitrogen. According to the prison press release, Smith went unconscious after two minutes and was declared dead after twenty-two. The prison release assured, “It is the most painless and humane method of execution known to man.”

—   —  —

If you’ve been following Dyingwords for a while, you’ve seen I’ve progressively formed a partnership with artificial intelligence. I use AI daily as a research tool and, to some degree, as a writing aid. I make no apologies for this—I willingly embrace new technology and endorse the saying, “Luddites never win.” With that, let me turn to my learned friend, ChatGPT3.5, and discuss nitrogen hypoxia.

Me: Please explain what happens to the human body when oxygen is removed from the air supply and is replaced by pure nitrogen.

ChatGPT: The air we breathe is primarily composed of nitrogen (about 78%), oxygen (about 21%), and trace amounts of other gases, including carbon dioxide. When oxygen is removed from the air supply and replaced by nitrogen, several physiological effects occur, leading to a condition known as hypoxia.

  1. Reduced Oxygen Levels (Hypoxia): Oxygen is essential for various physiological processes, especially cellular respiration, where cells use oxygen to produce energy. When oxygen levels decrease, the body enters a state of hypoxia. This can lead to a cascade of effects on different organs and systems.
  2. Respiratory Effects: Initially, the respiratory system attempts to compensate by increasing the breathing rate. However, since nitrogen does not support cellular respiration, this compensatory mechanism is ultimately insufficient to maintain adequate oxygen levels.
  3. Circulatory Effects: The cardiovascular system responds to low oxygen levels by increasing the heart rate and redirecting blood flow to vital organs in an attempt to deliver the limited oxygen available more efficiently. This response, though, is not sustainable in the absence of sufficient oxygen.
  4. Central Nervous System Effects: The brain is highly sensitive to changes in oxygen levels. In hypoxic conditions, cognitive functions, decision-making, and coordination can be impaired. Severe hypoxia can lead to loss of consciousness.
  5. Cellular Damage: Prolonged exposure to low oxygen levels can lead to cellular damage and, eventually, cell death. This can have widespread effects on tissues and organs throughout the body.
  6. Hypoxia Symptoms: Symptoms of hypoxia include dizziness, shortness of breath, confusion, rapid heartbeat, and, in extreme cases, loss of consciousness. The severity of symptoms depends on the degree and duration of oxygen deprivation.

It’s important to note that replacing oxygen with nitrogen in the air is a highly dangerous scenario and is not encountered in normal, everyday situations. In the atmosphere, oxygen and nitrogen coexist in their natural proportions. Altering these proportions, such as by removing oxygen, can have severe and life-threatening consequences. In practical terms, ensuring a safe and sufficient oxygen supply is crucial for human health and survival.

Me: How long would it take for a human to die under these conditions?

ChatGPT: The time it takes for a human to die under conditions where oxygen is removed from the air supply and replaced by nitrogen depends on various factors, including the degree of oxygen deprivation, the individual’s health, and how quickly the body responds to the lack of oxygen. In such extreme conditions, death could occur relatively quickly, typically within a matter of minutes.

The human body can tolerate short periods of oxygen deprivation to some extent. However, severe hypoxia can lead to irreversible damage to vital organs, especially the brain, which is highly sensitive to changes in oxygen levels. Loss of consciousness can occur rapidly, followed by brain damage and ultimately death.

It’s important to note that intentionally creating an environment with little or no oxygen is extremely dangerous and can lead to immediate harm or death. Oxygen is essential for sustaining life and attempts to remove it from the air supply are not only life-threatening but also ethically and legally unacceptable. In real-world scenarios, maintaining a safe and sufficient oxygen supply is critical for human health and survival.

Me: Would this manner of death be painful?

ChatGPT: The manner of death described, where oxygen is removed from the air supply and replaced by nitrogen, can indeed be painful. The lack of oxygen, leading to hypoxia, triggers a cascade of physiological responses that can result in distressing symptoms and sensations. As the body struggles to obtain the necessary oxygen for vital functions, individuals may experience discomfort, anxiety, and a sense of suffocation.

Symptoms of hypoxia include dizziness, shortness of breath, confusion, rapid heartbeat, and in severe cases, loss of consciousness. The brain, being highly sensitive to oxygen levels, is particularly vulnerable, and the lack of oxygen can lead to cognitive impairment and disorientation. As the oxygen deprivation progresses, it can result in irreversible damage to the brain and other vital organs, contributing to a painful and potentially distressing experience.

It’s essential to emphasize that intentionally creating such conditions is both unethical and dangerous. In practical terms, efforts should focus on ensuring a safe and sufficient oxygen supply to maintain human health and well-being. If you or someone you know is experiencing distress or contemplating self-harm, it is important to seek help from mental health professionals or emergency services immediately.

Me: From a biological aspect, what is happening that causes death through nitrogen hypoxia?

ChatGPT: The process leading to death in a nitrogen hypoxia scenario involves the deprivation of oxygen, leading to a condition called hypoxia. Oxygen is essential for various biological processes, especially cellular respiration, where cells use oxygen to produce energy in the form of adenosine triphosphate (ATP). Here’s a breakdown of the biological aspects leading to death in a hypoxic environment:

Cellular Respiration Disruption

    • Oxygen is a crucial component of the electron transport chain, the final stage of cellular respiration.
    • In the absence of sufficient oxygen, cells cannot efficiently produce ATP, the energy currency of the cell.

ATP Depletion

    • ATP is required for various cellular activities, including maintaining cell membrane integrity, active transport, and other energy-dependent processes.
    • Without an adequate supply of ATP, cells cannot function properly.

Cellular Dysfunction

    • The lack of oxygen disrupts the normal functioning of cells, particularly in highly oxygen-dependent organs like the brain and heart.
    • Cellular dysfunction occurs as a result of energy depletion and the inability to carry out essential metabolic processes.

Brain Damage

    • The brain is particularly sensitive to changes in oxygen levels. Oxygen deprivation can lead to neuronal injury and dysfunction.
    • Cognitive impairment, loss of consciousness, and, eventually, irreversible brain damage can occur.

Organ Failure

    • As oxygen deprivation persists, multiple organs, including the heart, liver, and kidneys, start to fail due to the lack of energy and the disruption of cellular processes.

Cardiovascular Collapse

    • The cardiovascular system attempts to compensate for the low oxygen levels by increasing the heart rate.
    • Eventually, the cardiovascular system may fail due to the inability to provide adequate oxygenated blood to the organs.

Loss of Consciousness and Death

    • Loss of consciousness occurs as the brain is severely affected by the lack of oxygen.
    • If the hypoxia is prolonged and severe, irreversible damage to vital organs leads to death.

It’s important to emphasize that intentionally inducing hypoxia is a dangerous and unethical practice. The human body is highly dependent on oxygen, and any deliberate interference with this essential element can have severe and life-threatening consequences. In medical and ethical terms, ensuring the well-being of individuals and adhering to humane standards is of utmost importance.

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As with many issues, Americans are deeply divided about capital punishment—the death penalty. Views vary depending on moral, religious, and legal points. One of the main arguments against executions is the chance of killing an innocent person. There certainly is something to that angle.

A fallback has always been Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution which addresses cruel and unusual punishment. But from a long-established high court ruling, there’s no requirement for a state to demonstrate that a method of execution is not “cruel and unusual”. The law holds that it’s up to the condemned inmate to show it’s torturous rather than the burden being on the state to show it’s not. So, basically, the state can rightfully make up anything it wants.

Twenty-one states allow capital punishment. Twenty-three do not. Six have their executions on pause. There are twenty-six death sentences scheduled to go ahead in 2024 across America, and there are over twenty-three hundred inmates warehoused on death rows. California, alone, has six hundred and sixty-five with Florida second at three hundred and thirteen.

Interestingly, three states have never executed a prisoner—Alaska, Hawaii, and Michigan. And it’s been decades since certain states stopped state-sponsored killings—Rhode Island in 1845, Wisconsin in 1851, Maine in 1885, North Dakota in 1905, Minnesota in 1906, and New Hampshire in 1939.

The states most recently carrying out executions are Georgia in 2020, Arizona in 2022, Mississippi in 2022, Missouri in 2023, Texas in 2023, and Oklahoma in 2023. And, of course, we have Alabama in 2024 administering nitrogen hypoxia to Kenny Smith.

The Smith execution had a huge international media coverage. There’s no doubt this precedent-setting event ushered in “an emergence of a wholly new method of capital punishment.” With all the painful problems associated with lethal injections… maybe nitrogen hypoxia really is the most painless and humane method of execution known to man.