Euthanasia

Euthanasia is?

Any action where a person is intentionally killed or allowed to die because it is believed that the individual would be better off dead than alive

Active Euthanasia

The primary cause of death is some human action “ killing”

Passive Euthanasia

The primary cause of death is some injury or disease “ letting die”

Voluntary euthanasia

The patient wishes to die and has requested it

Involuntary euthanasia

The patient in question wants to continue living

Non-voluntary euthanasia

The patient is unable to consent or indicate whether she wishes to undergo euthanasia ( like a coma patient)

What type of euthanasia is involved in the following cases?

1. Doctors withdraw life-sustaining medical treatment from Bloggs, despite Bloggs' expressed wish to

continue receiving it

2. Doctors administer a lethal dose of morphine to Bloggs, who has in an irreversible coma

1. Passive, Non-voluntary ( or involuntary euthanasia -

• Passive: death occurs by withdrawing treatment ( letting die)

• Non-Voluntary/involuntary: Bloggs did not consent ( and even opposed it)

• 2. Active, Non-voluntary/involuntary euthanasia

• Active—> death is caused by a direct action ( lethal injection)

• Non-voluntary —> bloggs cannot consent ( coma)

Tooley thesis is?

Active voluntary euthanasia is morally permissible and should be legal

The fundamental argument for voluntary active euthanasia

1. Circumstances in which a person’s death is in their own best interest

2. If death is in a person’s best interest, then it’s also in their best interest to commit suicide

3. A person in such circumstances must also satisfy two conditions: i. their suicide does not violate anyone’s rights and it does not make the world a worse place

4. A person’s committing suicide that satisfies the above conditions would not be morally wrong

5. If an action is morally permissible, then it cannot be wrong for a 3rd party to assist in that act

6. The least in certain circumstances, active voluntary euthanasia is permissible

The Fundamental Argument for Voluntary Active Euthanasia: Premise 1:

There are circumstances in which a persons’s death is in their own best interest

—> Late stage cancer with negative quality of life with a couple weeks to live

—> tooley claims that death would be in this person’s best interest

Premise 2 is?

If death is in a person’s best interest, then it’s also in their best interest to commit suicide

Objections to Premise 2?

It is never in one’s best interest to bring about their own death because suicide is a moral sin

Counter Argument to Objections premise 2

The Catholic church believes things like masturbation, premarital sexual activity, and/or use of contraceptives —> applying that logic will give the authority to the Catholic Church that those things are moral sins as well

Premise 3

A person in such circumstances must also satisfy two conditions: their suicide does not violate anyone else’s rights and it does not make the world a worse place

Premise 3a is?

A person in such circumstances must also satisfy two conditions i. their suicide doesn’t violate anyone’s rights and ii. does not make the world a worse place

Looking at i.

Tooley’s main point is that there are circumstances in which you don’t have such duties

there may be circumstances in which you have special obligations to others to stay alive

Objection: even if suicide does no violate any other persons’s rights, it would still violate God’s righ of ownership

Tooley responds by noting that such underserved suffering makes it unlikely that god exits ( problem of evil)

A persons are autonomous beings and cannot be the property of others ( even god)

Non-identity problem

Some actions might be wrong even if in committing such actions you are not wronging anyone

What does Tooley say about the Non-identity problem

Claims that there are circumstances in which you kill yourself and in doing so you do not violate a duty you have to anyone else and you don’t make the world a worse place

Premise 5

If an action is morally permissible, then it cannot be wrong for a 3rd party to assist in the act:

Premise 5

How would it be wrong if jack and jill preform action x,if it wouldn’t be wrong for Jill to perform action X by herself —> leads to the conclusion that assisted suicide is permissible

Active vs Passive according to Tooley

If you think killing is worse than letting die, you think that because the distinction is an instantiation of a more general principle —> causing a harm is morally worse than allowing a harm to occur

What are the two moves from the previous point?

The killing/letting die distinction must be formulated carefully to capture cases in which killing and letting die are harms and cases in which they are benefits

When killing and allowing a person to die are both harmful actions, the former is weightier

Second Argument

If you think that causing something bad to happen is worse than allowing, then you must also think that causing a benefit to happen is better than merely allowing a benefit to occur

The upshot

In the case of euthanasia, the person is better off dead -i.e benefit from dying

Objection: Killing an innocent person is always wrong —> axiological argument

Innocent human lives are precious and sacred and valuable, when you kill an innocent person, you make it so the world contains less value

Objection: Killing an innocent person is always wrong —> axiological argument response from Tooley

If you have a duty to make the world more valuable, then you are duty bound to procreate a bunch —> the repugnant conclusion

The violation of rights argument

Killing an innocent person is a violation of that person’s rights

the violation of rights argument response

1. Rights can be waived

2. What is the purpose of positing rights: to protect people’s autonomy but in cases of PAS, your autonomy is respected ( and your interests are too)