Euthanasia vs NL vs SE Flashcards
Introduction
Intro: Explain Euthanasia, voluntary involuntary, sanctity, quality of life, SE agape supports quality, but weak ethical system so fails to be helpful
Key term: Natural Law
a religious ethical theory, most famously put forth by Aquinas, that puts reason at the centre of moral thought and decisions
Euthanasia
a modern practice where a person/persons can be killed on their own terms, whether passively (switching of a life machine) or actively (lethal injection).
Definition: Situation Ethics
Focused on Jesus’ agape on the Sermon on the Mount – most loving things to do in each individual situation
Situation ethics applied
When suffering of a patient is so great that their life becomes unbearable, they should be able to end it as this is seen to be the most loving action..
Advantages of SE
Nan Maitland – bot terminally ill but suffered from arthritis did not to experience ‘prolonged dwindling
euthanasia may be the way in which agape is best served for the person, their family and their friends
-Fletcher’s working principles of relativism and personalism, the absolute laws of Christian ethics should be made relative, which means euthanasia is not always morally wrong
-putting the person at the heart of the decision and allowing them to make the best decision for themselves, unlike natural law which values the law over the individual
Disadvantages of SE
-Pope Paul. Allowing euthanasia will encourage immoral people to put pressure on sick relatives to end their lives when this was not what they wanted.
In the Netherlands where euthanasia is permitted, there is evidence to indicate that many die against their wishes, this shows that the law cannot easily protect those who are in vulnerable state.
does not give a high priority to the principle of the sanctity of life ( we are made in Gods image and are of sacred value)
Exodus 20 ‘Thou shall not murder’
Job 1 ‘Life is a gift from God ‘he is the one who determines when it should end’
p2 - Disadvantage of Netherlands
-Because out of the 48,000 cases of euthanasia cases in the Netherlands, there were only two cases where it was possible the patients’ lives were ended against their will. Although equally these two cases could be explained by poor documentation.
p2 - Weak sanctity of life
Singer - Weak sanctity of life instead of strong; no exceptions-: although human life is always valuable, however there may be some situations where it would cause more harm than good to continue with it. (non-voluntary euthanasia)
of love in exceptional circumstances and is not morally wrong. i.e Tony Bland - Fatally injured at the Hillsborough disaster. Feeding tubes were removed
P2- Disadvantages of Singer
so much that contributes to a person’s quality of life and not all of it can be medically measured. An issue as complex as euthanasia cannot be based simply on whether love is best served.
Hippocratic oath - Doctors in the 21st century take it, it obliges them to of good and avoid harm. By allowing someone to have complete autonomy over their own lives and allowing them to decide when they will die is going against this oath.
Natural Law - Euthanasia
This view of preservation of life is considered ethically good by most societies in the world as euthanasia is illegal in most countries. Therefore, natural law can have a universal application important in a multicultural society. There is a common approach to the issue of euthanasia between Roman Catholics, Muslims and Orthodox Jewish scholars.
Disadvantages of NL
Maguire
Strongly reject that God alone should decide the time of death for each person as this seems to imply that we belong to God and are his property and we were given free will to use it as we wish.
Mill’s - ‘Over his own body and mind, the individual is sovereign’ - People regarded as having the right to autonomy over their own lives.
Disadvantages of counter - NL
It is not always easy to know what the most loving course of action will be and euthanasia does not allow for a change of mind if the decision turned out to be the wrong one.
In forbidding euthanasia, the dangers of misdiagnosis or necessarily pessimistic diagnosis are avoided. The possibility of a miraculous cure remains a possibility.
