"Did Jobs significantly decrease his chance of surviving his cancer by waiting nine months to undergo surgery? It seems like a no-brainer, but it turns out that that’s actually a very tough question to answer.
... So, is it possible, even likely, that Jobs compromised his chances of survival? Yes. Is it definite that he did? No, it’s not... In fact, based on statistics alone, it’s unlikely that a mere nine months took Jobs “from the high end to the low end of the survival rate,”
I just need to mention that tremendo's link to sciencebasedmedicine contains a MUCH higher quality of commentary than the half-dozen other articles I've read on the subject. I know an upvote ought to be enough, but it didn't seem so.
That said, for those interested, an actually well reasoned and knowledgeable piece on the subject comes from Science Based Medicine: http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/index.php/the-death-of-s...
Some quotes:
"Did Jobs significantly decrease his chance of surviving his cancer by waiting nine months to undergo surgery? It seems like a no-brainer, but it turns out that that’s actually a very tough question to answer.
... So, is it possible, even likely, that Jobs compromised his chances of survival? Yes. Is it definite that he did? No, it’s not... In fact, based on statistics alone, it’s unlikely that a mere nine months took Jobs “from the high end to the low end of the survival rate,”
Now, let's hope this thread dies instead.