Summary of Four Sources Regarding Euthanasia

In Steven Forbe’s web article “Time to Terminate ‘Assisted Dying’” he argues how eerily similar assisted physician suicide is with the practice of eugenics practiced by the Nazis. He maintains that it is “axiomatic that life is sacrosanct.” Forbes brings up criticisms of Holland’s and Belgium’s decisions to acknowledge the consent given by minors and their parents to forego treatment in the face of inevitable death. He maintains that such a practice has no place in a “civilized and humane society” (Source 1).

Kyle Munkittrick’s magazine article discusses that death chosen on “our own volition” is a moral good when compared to our death being chosen by someone else in a malicious or accidental manner. He also claims that death by natural causes not in anyone’s control is erroneously attributed to be morally good when in fact he believes it to be morally neutral, thus it follows that death chosen is better than death received perchance (Source 2).

In the New York Times article, Sarah Lyall recounts the difficulties she faced in assisting her mother with suicide and how the law obstructed the fulfillment of her mother’s wish. She recollects the difficulties she faced in letting her mother peacefully pass since she did not know the lethal dose to administer her, yet instead subjugated her to more days of primal fear and anger (Source 3).

In the scholarly article published by the Journal of the American Medical Association, they conduct a study to gauge the opinion of medical professionals working at a university hospital on how euthanasia should be administered. The schools of thought being positive euthanasia where the “use of therapy… will promote death sooner than otherwise” and negative euthanasia where there is “omission of therapies that probably would prolong life.” More than 60 percent of 1st year medical students, 4th year medical students, and physicians favored negative euthanasia (Source 4).

Sources

1) Forbes, Steve. “Time To Terminate ‘Assisted Dying.’” Forbes, Forbes Magazine,11 Sept. 2018, www.forbes.com/sites/steveforbes/2018/09/11/time-to-terminate-assisted-dying/#1b38a2b57888

2) “Euthanasia, Immortality, and The Natural Death Paradox – Science Not Fiction.”D-Brief, 7 June 2011,  blogs.discovermagazine.com/sciencenotfiction/2011/06/07/euthanasia- immortality-and-the-natural-death-paradox/#.W57NuOhKiUk

 

3)Lyall, Sarah. “The Last Thing Mom Asked.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 31 Aug. 2018, www.nytimes.com/2018/08/31/sunday-review/mother-death-euthanasia.html

 

4)Euthanasia” Edited by Jennifer Reiling,

Jamanetwork-Com.ccny-proxy1.Libr.ccny.cuny.edu,jamanetwork-com.ccny-proxy1.library.cuny.edu/journals/jama/fullarticle/2482316.