Letting Someone Die

One of the central arguments between killing and letting die is whether an action or inaction is morally worse. This paper will argue that killing someone and letting someone die is not on the same moral level. There could be circumstances, in which letting die can be morally different than killing someone. Morally worse will be interpreted as actions that result in bringing less good, which are beneficial outcomes, into the world. As well, killing someone will be interpreted as deliberate actions resulting in someone’s death. Whereas, letting someone die will be interpreted as deliberate withholdment, inactions, resulting in someone’s death. I will be taking to the assumption that all other factors such as end results, willpower, and intentions

Both of these men support the claim that an inaction is equivalent to an action through their definition of when a person is considered to have been killed. They claim, in a strict sense, that one kills a person when they consider bringing about a person’s death and undertake actions to execute their proposal. Furthermore, they state that every proposal to bring about someone’s death, under any circumstance, is contrary and disrespectful to the good of life. Thus, they utilize this definition to imply that killing people is immoral regardless of the circumstances. The good of life in this context is interpreted to mean the continuation and preservation of life. In regards to the child scenario, the physicians and parents are, morally speaking, killing the child. The physician and parents have proposed that the child’s life imposes a burden on the society, and therefore everyone will benefit if the child were dead. Thus, through their proposal, of withholding treatment, the physician and parents have committed themselves to killing the child. Furthermore, their inaction, of withholding treatment to let the child die, is an action, because they are deliberately choosing to take action by physically refusing to treat the child. Based on this interpretation the inaction of performing the treatment, allowing the child to die, is in a moral sense the same as directly killing the child because it’s aimed at killing the child. Therefore, this scenario exemplifies that there is no distinction between the morality of letting the child die and killing the child, because of the intention of ending the child’s