rae, moral choices: euthanasia4

Arguing for autonomy [freedom from external control, independence] - the law usually protects the rights of the individual in their private decisions, marriage, family, child rearing, abortion etc. all reflect their own values - in the USA this is called “the right to privacy”. This should be extended to the choice of when to end one’s own life - it is a private and personal decision - it should reflect personal views, especially relating to a person who is terminally ill and wants to die.

Wednesday 21 September 2011

Rae’s response- you cannot put illegal drugs into your body or use prostitutes. If there is a conflict of your rights against those of society - usually society wins. If we open up to euthanasia then we can harm others at the end of life - in Netherlands evidence suggests that ill people are being administered euthanasia against their will - yet those advocating PAS/E all agree non voluntary use is immoral. So arguing for autonomy is in fact harming others - and so the reality of harm overrides the right to privacy / personal choice.


If the right to die is based on personal autonomy then we should all have it - it is a universal right of all to choose when and how we die. Even advocate of PAS/E say this option should be limited.The idea of autonomy does not fit into a Christian worldview - Heb 9:27 - God has appointed the time for each man to die (Ecc 3:2). God is sovereign in our life and he has appointed such moments. In many Western nations there has been a long Christian, and theological, tradition which has held to this idea of God being sovereign over death.


Euthanasia is not a violation f the Hippocratic oath - you say that doctors should respect life and take an oath to protect it - Kevorkian responds by saying this applies to abortions yet many are performed each year. Added to which the Hippocratic oath is not taken really seriously now in medical training, and if Hippocrates had known in his day what we do today he might have thought differently - now we know of more people spending long periods of life in increasingly poor life quality circumstances.


Euthanasia is not a violation f the Hippocratic oath - you say that doctors should respect life and take an oath to protect it - Kevorkian responds by saying this applies to abortions yet many are performed each year. Added to which the Hippocratic oath is not taken really seriously now in medical training, and if Hippocrates had known in his day what we do today he might have thought differently - now we know of more people spending long periods of life in increasingly poor life quality circumstances.

Rae responds - if Hippocrates had known of our ability to manage and relieve pain he would have seen this as part of his brief to alleviate suffering without having to resort to PAS/E.


Hurricane Katrina and Euthanasia“Critica!y i! patients, too unstable to be moved or transported were “euthanized,” that is, put to death. Physicians a!egedly had discussions about administering fatal doses of morphine, and then apparently made the decision to give lethal injections to patients. They felt it was more compassionate to ki! them rather than leave them alone and unattended, as temperatures soared over a hundred, water flooded the hospital, and sanitation systems broke down. It appeared there was some merit to the a!egations, and Louisiana’s attorney general, Charles Foti, ca!ed for a complete investigation of the facts surrounding the possible euthanasia of critica!y i! patients The coroner stated that the bodies of the patients were badly decomposed, making the causes of their deaths difficult to determine.”


There is no morally relevant difference between killing and allowing to die - whats the difference between turning off life support and killing someone? Kevorkian might cite moral philosopher James Rachels who suggested this situation:- A man will inherit a fortune if his nephew dies- situation 1 the uncle goes into the bathroom and drowns the nephew- situation 2 the uncle goes into the bathroom after the nephew has hit his head and is lying unconscious under the water


In both cases the uncle is equally responsible for the nephews death - there is no difference between allowing the boy to die and actively killing him. Rachels applies this to the end of life and says there is no difference between PAS/E and terminating life support.Rae’s response - the action of the uncle is morally outrageous in both cases - so much so that any fine distinctions are then overlooked - this is called the sledgehammer effect, where essential distinctions are masked by transferring the idea from one situation to another.


More important is the fact that intent has not been addressed in a moral act. Rae suggests that it is different to offer a gift rather than a bribe - the amount of money offered might be he same but it can be offered for vastly different reasons - it is the intent of the person that is questioned.Rachels also talks of two grandchildren going to visit an elderly sick grandparent - one goes out of care and concern, the other to ensure a place in the will, both do the same thing it is only their character that is different.


Rae suggests these are two fundamentally different acts - one goes to cheer up a sick old lady, the other simply for future material gain. The intent determines the morality of the actions. What has to be decided is are actions and intent linked - in which case Rachels argument fails - or does intent not reveal character? Intent has to mark a moral distinction between killing and allowing someone to die - the result of actions might be the same but intent is crucial. PAS/E aims to cause a patient to die.


The cause of death also has to be addressed - is it the underlying disease, where removal of treatment simply allows the disease to take its course - palliative care (relieving pain without acting on the underlying cause) is provided here to prevent undue suffering. In PAS/E the doctors action cause the death of the patient. Thus the two actions are very different.


Euthanasia does not always involve killing a person - the distinction is made between biological (physical existence) and biographical life (events which make life meaningful) - so a person can be so ill or life so impaired that in effect “life has gone from them”, the body is there but the person is gone - this is applied to unborn, handicapped and end of life issues. So PAS/E in this case is not killing a person - and not violating a command not to kill! In essence the argument is that biographical life has ceased to exist.


Rae responds - biographical life is based on biological, it presupposes it - both aspects are essential to being a human being - so personhood is not lost just because the capacity to exercise an ability is lost - losing the function of an arm is not the same as having it amputated.If biographical life is what gives us value then when it is lost we can strip the person of all rights - start taking their organs, experiment on them, even bury them?And following on, surely permission would not be needed for PAS/E? It becomes involuntary.


rae, moral choices: euthanasia4

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