Euthanasia.

What is the traditional Christian (strong) sanctity of life view and what is the biblical evidence?

-The traditional Christian view, sometimes called the ‘strong’ sanctity of life, says God created human life, it is a gift from God, and only God has a right to end it.

-Biblical evidence:

-We are created in God’s image. Genesis says that is why it is wrong to kill people.

-The 10 commandments say "thou shalt not murder".

-1 Corinthians says that our body is a ‘temple of the Holy Spirit’ and ‘you do not belong to yourself’.

What is the weak sanctity of life view and how does it challenge the strong view?

-The weak sanctity of life view says that the Bible contains many themes, and sanctity of life is just one.

-Other themes include compassion and love, both emphasised by Jesus.

-This view considers the ethical precepts in the Bible as things to be weighed against each other.

-All these factors must be considered, and in some extreme cases, the sanctity of life may be outweighed by others.

-In some cases, it might be compassionate to end a life.

-Furthermore, the strong view no longer seems relevant in modern times when technology can keep people alive far longer than when the Bible was written — making the strong view seem outdated.

-Example: DNR (Do Not Resuscitate).

What is a key criticism of the weak sanctity of life view?

-Compassion being recommended in the Bible does not justify overruling the sanctity of life view. That is a misunderstanding of the biblical laws. They are presented as absolute rules, not themes or guidelines to be taken into account or weighed against other themes.

What is Peter Singer’s view on quality of life and euthanasia?

-The quality of life claims that what makes life valuable is the balance of happiness over suffering.

-Peter Singer says that the sanctity of life is based on outdated Christian views and should be re-evaluated.

-He takes a utilitarian view: what remains to value in life without sanctity are things like happiness or the satisfaction of pleasure.

-Singer argues that the reason killing is wrong is that it violates the preferences or interests of a being to continue living.

-That reason does not apply in cases where quality of life is low or non-existent.

-If someone has a low quality of life and a preference to die, then voluntary euthanasia is justified.

-Non-voluntary euthanasia is also justified for those in a vegetative state and for babies born with terrible medical conditions. They cannot express a preference but have an interest in not suffering unnecessarily.

-Singer justifies these views with claims about personhood.

What is Archbishop Fisher’s criticism of euthanasia based on quality of life?

-Archbishop Fisher argues that if euthanasia is allowed for quality of life, then elderly or vulnerable people might be tempted to die because they feel like a burden.

-Western culture values success, self-sufficiency and beauty.

-Those who fall short can feel miserable.

-If we allow euthanasia, such people might feel encouraged to die because they feel like failures.

-In 2022 in Canada, there was controversy over two high-profile cases where people with medical conditions and insufficient financial support applied for euthanasia.

-One woman named Denise said she applied for euthanasia “because of abject poverty”.

-Pope Francis criticised Canada’s system as part of a tragic culture of treating the elderly and disabled as disposable, saying “patients who, in place of affection, are administered death”.

How can Fisher’s argument be evaluated in relation to support systems and euthanasia?

-Canada made the mistake of allowing doctors and nurses to raise euthanasia to patients even without exploring all other options.

-Other countries like Belgium have not allowed that.

-We can conclude that Fisher’s points are not criticisms of euthanasia itself.

-They highlight the problem with allowing euthanasia in a society that lacks proper support for those who need it.

-Arguably, this suggests that euthanasia must be combined with proper support for the vulnerable, not that euthanasia can never be justified.

What is the slippery slope argument and how does it criticise euthanasia?

-The slippery slope argument applies to any justification of euthanasia, whether autonomy, quality, or agape.

-It argues: if we allow euthanasia for low quality of life in clear cases of terminal illness – we are in danger of slowly starting to allow it in more controversial cases too.

-We start with terminal illness, then we’ll allow it for incurable illness. Then incurable mental illness. Then, we might start encouraging people to be euthanised to save money for the NHS. Then, we might start involuntary euthanasia of homeless people – and then disabled people – and then we’re in danger of becoming like the Nazis.

-The danger is: once we start judging whose life is worth living based on its quality – how are we going to draw the line about which cases we will accept?

-Fisher argues the only way to resist that is to view human life as sacred.

-This argument is logically coherent. It is right to worry whether we are virtuous enough to safely wield the power to decide who should die.

How does Peter Singer respond to the slippery slope argument?

-Singer says we must combine quality with autonomy – this will prevent slipping down the slope to ‘involuntary euthanasia’.

-He argues the slippery slope made sense to worry about back in the 70s, before we had real data.

-People who receive euthanasia in Oregon are disproportionately white, educated and not particularly elderly, so euthanasia does not especially target vulnerable people.

-Singer adds that there is no creep of euthanasia becoming more widespread.

-In Oregon, only one in three thousand deaths are by euthanasia.

-Genetic screening allowing mothers to know if their baby has a condition before it’s born and aborting it meant the post-birth non-voluntary euthanasia numbers dropped from 15 in 2005 to 2 in 2010.

What does Singer say about comparisons to Nazi euthanasia?

-The Nazis are often brought up as an example of a situation we could slip down the slope towards.

-However, the Nazis had very different motivations when creating their euthanasia program.

-Ultimately, the Nazis did not themselves slip down the slope to end up in their ideology regarding euthanasia.

-Their attitude to euthanasia was their starting point.

-So, they are actually not a good example of slipping down the slope.

-They only illustrate the importance of having an ethical starting point when approaching euthanasia.

-If we do, we won’t betray that ethical starting point.

What is Nozick’s argument for autonomy in support of euthanasia?

-Nozick took a deontological/absolutist view of autonomy.

-He argued for the principle of ‘self-ownership’, that each person owns their body and can do what they want with it.

-If someone wants euthanasia then that is up to them, no matter the reason.

-If a doctor then wants to help them die, there is nothing ethically wrong with that.

-Voluntary euthanasia is therefore always morally acceptable.

How do Singer and Mill critique absolute autonomy and propose a consequentialist alternative?

-There are ethical downsides to allowing anyone to die who wants to.

-Singer points to the example of a love-sick teenager who wants to die for short-sighted reasons.

-Mill and Singer take a consequentialist view of autonomy to solve this issue.

-Singer claims we can ‘safely predict’ they will get over their issues.

-Allowing autonomy in euthanasia for absolutely any reason would lead to many people dying when they themselves would have ended up regretting that. That doesn’t seem like it actually enables autonomy.

-Being allowed to do something you’d regret due to temporary short-sighted emotions is not autonomy.

-Humans can have lapses in judgement where they act uncharacteristically. It’s not autonomy to allow people to die due to such desires.

-Philosophers argue we should understand autonomy in terms of a person’s ‘ideal’ desires, meaning what they would want with full knowledge and without any non-rational distractions like intense emotion.

-Thinking of autonomy as being free to act on literally any desire we might have ignores the fact that humans are often irrational. When acting based on intense emotions, we aren’t acting autonomously, we’re acting animalistically.

-Singer concludes we need to make sure that autonomy is rational.

How can we avoid the slippery slope by combining autonomy with rationality?

-Allowing consequentialist autonomy will result in a slippery slope towards absolutist autonomy.

-Fisher argues that once you accept that people have the right to die, you have no way to prevent slipping down the slope to allowing it in all cases where people want it.

-In that case, autonomy cannot avoid the issues faced by Nozick’s version.

-However, there is a way to coherently adopt a consequentialist view of autonomy, which is to pair it with rationality.

-Following Singer and Mill’s arguments, the individual who is in the best position to judge what is best for them and whether the potential value of their future life is of sufficient worth to make continuing to live the best choice for them.

-However, sometimes people can make irrational choices, not taking their actual long term self-interest into account.

-To ensure that autonomy avoids ethical issues, we can therefore add the condition of rationality. The young love-sick person is clearly not making a rational calculation, for example.

-This also involves quality of life, since a low quality of life would usually be a requirement for a wish for euthanasia to be rational.

-This position is not susceptible to the slippery slope argument. It would not allow euthanasia for short-sighted unthinking reasons since that would not be rational.

-This is a logically coherent way of avoiding extending autonomy absolutely.

How would Situation Ethics, according to Fletcher, apply to euthanasia?

-Fletcher was president of the Euthanasia Society of America.

-Situation ethics would judge that euthanasia can be morally good, in situations where it maximises agape.

-In situations where it would maximise agape to avoid euthanasia, it would be wrong, however.

-For example, if someone has a very low quality of life and an autonomous wish to die, it seems that Fletcher would accept euthanasia.

-However, if someone is pressured into euthanasia by their family who are greedy for inheritance or by society making them feel like a failure or a burden, or if they have a short-term issue like Singer’s example of a lovesick teenager, Fletcher would think it wrong to allow euthanasia in such cases.

What is Barclay’s critique of using Situation Ethics for euthanasia decisions?

-People are not perfectly loving so if given the power to judge what is good or bad, people will do selfish or even cruel things.

-People’s loving nature can be corrupted by power.

-Someone might find it loving to manipulate/pressure someone into or out of euthanasia, perhaps if they will get inheritance to pay for their children’s food or something.

-Some might find it loving to end their life because they feel like a burden.

How do Fletcher and Robinson defend Situation Ethics against Barclay’s critique?

-Defence of Fletcher: humanity has progressed since mediaeval times.

-Fletcher and Robinson argue (influenced by Bonhoeffer) that humanity has ‘come of age’. This means that humanity has become more mature.

-In medieval and ancient times, when humanity had not come of age, people in general were less educated and less self-controlling.

-This meant that they needed fixed, rigid, clear rules to follow, because they could not be trusted to understand and act on the nuances and complexities in how a rule could justifiably be bent or broken if the situation called for it.

-However, now people are more civilised, to the point that granting them more autonomy will increase love without risking the stability of society.

How does Natural Law apply to euthanasia?

-Natural law ethics claims that we should follow the Bible teachings, which Aquinas calls the ‘divine law’. It claims there is also another law, the ‘natural law’ which also comes from God.

-God has given reason to human nature and designed it to be able to intuitively know the primary precepts of natural law.

-Application to Euthanasia: Euthanasia violates the primary precept to protect and preserve human life.

-Violating the sanctity of life, such as by allowing euthanasia, also violates the primary precept of maintaining an orderly society.

-Natural law is the idea that God designed all things, including humans, with the potential to be in harmony if they follow God’s natural law, such as the preservation of human life.

-Failure to follow this will therefore cause disharmony. Our society will break down because living contrary to God’s design is unnatural and thus leads to immorality and social disorder.

How do Natural Law theorists defend their opposition to euthanasia, even in hard cases?

-Mother Theresa summed up this kind of argument well during her speech upon receiving the Nobel Peace Prize. She claimed “the greatest threat to world peace is abortion. If a mother can kill her own child in her own womb, what is left to stop us from killing one another?”

-Euthanasia might seem right in extreme cases, but the natural law view is that if we allow killing, that disorders our being in relation to God. It blackens our soul.

-Humans are unworthy of wielding the responsibility of deciding who lives and who dies. It’s arrogant to think that we could make decisions like that without being corrupted.

-The Catholic Church uses the double effect to claim that sometimes doctors can stop or withdraw treatment (passive euthanasia) or even administer pain medication which could speed up death.

-So long as the intention is not to kill, the double effect would suggest such actions can be morally acceptable.

Why might Aquinas’ Natural Law ethics and the sanctity of life principle be seen as outdated today?

-Aquinas’ Natural law ethics and the sanctity of life principle are increasingly seen as outdated. Sociologically, we could claim these ethical principles were created to be useful in the socio-economic conditions of their time.

-Ancient and Medieval society was more chaotic, strict rules were important to hold society together and because people were not educated nor civilised enough to be trusted with the freedom to interpret their application.

-It made sense to create strict absolutist ethical principles to prevent society from falling apart. This would explain the primary precepts. They served a useful function in medieval society.

-Applied to euthanasia, we can argue it was useful to simply ban all killing in medieval times, because violence and killing was much more common and therefore needed to be strongly restricted.

-People were less self-controlling and less educated, so they needed clear simple rules to follow.

-The issue clearly is that all of these socio-economic conditions have changed. So, the primary precepts are no longer useful. They were designed for a different time and are now increasingly outdated.

-Society can now afford to gradually relax the inflexibility of its rules and think about how they might be reinterpreted to better fit modern society.